Building a distinctive brand identity & effective brand strategy

We all know of the influence of well-constructed brands. Nowadays, it is not enough to have the right product or service; you must also build a brand that is unique, personal and appealing.

Having a distinctive brand identity and personality is what will make somebody remember or forget you. Choose you or go for the competitor. We can see the power of brands in famous cases like Apple and Nike. Their presence is so powerful that it's difficult to ignore them.

What kind of branding process or techniques can we use to achieve that position? There are many different keys to designing a great brand experience, here we'll describe the main ones you'll need.

Brand Purpose

As mentioned before, it's not good enough to have a great product or service. Your brand should exist for a more significant reason. Your brand purpose should be your vision, the thing you want to achieve. It should also appeal to your audience, so it shouldn't be something focused on your benefit.

For example; a useful purpose can be "Make everyone belong anywhere". Airbnb uses this tagline to express what they want to achieve with their service. It's a great example because it's inspiring, direct and aspirational.

Brand Personality

Another essential aspect to think about when building your brand is giving it a distinctive character. People expect brands to talk to them nowadays. We are not referring only to the ads and marketing pieces. It's also important to consider what tone of voice you use on social media, the way you respond to your customers and the language you use.

The best way to start thinking of your brand personality is to think about who you will be talking to. Reflect on the kind of language and communication style your audience use and expect from you. It's not the same to focus on Millennials than trying to appeal to a corporate world.

Brand Image

Finally, we arrive at the design aspect of your brand. As we see it, it should be the cherry on the top of the process. Your brand image should reflect your purpose and personality. Starting the process the other way around could cause an inconsistent strategy and, therefore, a weak brand experience.

A lot of designers and creatives fall into this mistake. They are tempted to jump immediately into the visible part, leaving for later the brainy and profound part of a brand.

It's about the experience

We can conclude that a brand is a sum of many different aspects, and a lot of them are not as tangible as we could imagine at the beginning.

Building a brand takes time, and most of them evolve over the years. It's not enough to sit down for a couple of hours and make some decisions; your brand will always be a living thing. It will grow and mature.

The best way to organise the work is through focused sessions where you, your partners and the design team discuss together the different aspects of your brand. We advise you to start with the three points mentioned above, and in that particular order.

At Triggers we developed a tool to help brand managers, designers, entrepreneurs and founders build strong and appealing brands. If you are looking for something that facilitates the process and makes it easy to lead a branding session, take a look at our Branding Collection.