Typical Mistakes In Branding
Are you creating a new Brand? Thinking about increasing your market share? Do you want to win the hearts and minds of Customers? If you answered YES to all the questions, then this article is for you. Every day, for many years, the specialists of our tech branding agency have been helping a variety of companies to correct the same mistakes in the creation and development of Brands.
Most companies make mistakes even at the stage of the appearance of programs and desires to create a Brand. Before starting work in this direction, it is necessary to clearly understand what a Brand is, why it is needed, what advantages it gives to its owners, etc. In short: A brand is not just a company name, logo, trademark, or the product itself. A brand is an impression of a product in the minds of Consumers, allowing it to provide a company or product in comparison to competitors. A real Brand is a living image in the minds of customers, partners, and the public. The process of creating and managing a Brand is called Branding. Managing a Brand means finding its merits, communicating them to the Consumer, distinguishing the Brand from the general mass of similar products. Without a clear understanding of the need for a Brand, a company cannot competently set the task of developing it, and a correctly set task is already 50% of its solution.
Not all agencies offering their launch services understand and can carry out a set of works for successful, market launch and creation of a leading brand position. To achieve results, the Customer Company and the Agency must communicate in the same language, understandable to both parties. Quite often, to make an impression, Agencies tell Customers about the Brand and its necessity in the language of special terms, which is of importance and importance to the representatives of the Agency and surpasses the mystery and mystery of the Brand itself. Therefore, we recommend that when choosing an Agency, do not hesitate to ask questions, clarify and ask to explain in detail all stages of work in clear and understandable words.
It is also a mistake to order a Brand just because your competitors or other companies “have it”. As practice shows, such work either does not lead to anything, or is limited to the presence of folders with documents that are useless for the case for a long time in the boss's closet.
Lack of correct understanding of your Buyer
The next threat during creation is the lack of a clear idea of who he is - the Buyer, what are his true needs, expectations and interests. To obtain answers to such questions, in most cases, it is necessary to conduct competent marketing research. The correctness of the conclusions and the success of further actions will depend on the professionalism of the company's employees and partner firms involved in creating the brand's positioning.
For a serious project, it will be a big mistake to make key decisions without preliminary analysis and analysis of the market and the buyer. The price of mistakes can be very high.
Authoritative Opinion
Threats can also come from decisions based on the preferences and biases of owners or management companies that align with the overlapping needs of customers. The owner of the company is in most cases the audience for his brand. It is necessary to remember the rule of "strawberries and worms": if I want to catch fish, I use worms as bait (not strawberries!), Because fish loves them.
The owner of the company can impose his opinion on the developers - no one will forbid him. In this case, he should understand that he, most likely, understands this issue much weaker than specialists and does not know many experts and "pitfalls" - which can result in quite authoritative losses. There is a joke that contains a grain of truth: the more the Customer understands about branding, the more it harms the development of the Brand. Trust specialists.
Specificity Of The Regions Where The Product Is Sold
When developing a name for a Brand, a strategy for its promotion and other activities for creating and promoting a Brand. If a product / service is planned to enter the international market, it is also necessary to check information about negative associations, religious preferences, and other structures of the regions. Then successful actions in one territory will not be a failure. For example, some names or images that are normal for one person may be funny or annoying to another. Classic examples are Zhiguli, Kaloderma, Pedrini, Dosirak (they have Doshirak) and many Chinese brands such as Huyan Pekejing.
It is important to understand that Leaders become and remain those companies where employees of various fields of activity are involved in creating and maintaining a brand: production, marketing, sales system, logistics, etc. The key to the success of any brand is compliance with what the brand promises to its consumers and the result obtained when contacting the product.
Copying of stronger competitors can negatively affect the development of the Brand. Of course, you need to know and take into account the behavior and characteristics of powerful and well-known companies in your industry, but in no case should you take all their actions for dogma.
It happens that a company becomes a market leader not because it thoughtfully, progressively formed its image, gaining the loyalty of Consumers, but became successful due to many other reasons: the lack of competition during its formation, had powerful financial investments, or other factors played a role. As a rule, such companies, when the market is saturated, gradually give up their positions and eventually leave the market forever.
But what if the company has been on the market for a long time, having a well-known name, but not popular among consumers? Perhaps it is due to incorrect positioning or other components of the Brand. In such a situation, in order to attract new Consumers, enhance the uniqueness of the product, increase positive reviews and build loyalty, the solution to the problem can be Rebranding - a set of measures to change the Brand or its components. The tasks of rebranding are changing a brand to a new one, as well as correcting or eliminating the shortcomings of an existing brand. Restyling is a change in brand style. Redesign is a change or correction of the design of brand elements.
There is an ironclad rule: rebranding, redesign or restyling are carried out when there is an objective need for them, and the funds spent are covered by the benefit from their result.
A common mistake: rebranding just because the new head of marketing wants to prove their worth; or an existing brand, design or style is tired of the owner of the company, etc. The second mistake: the belief that a brand that is inferior but familiar to customers is better than developing a new one. If an existing brand has significant shortcomings, it is necessary to get rid of them as quickly as possible, since the price of the issue grows over time. And the best thing is to initially correctly and efficiently create a Brand that will not need rebranding / redesign / restyling for a long time.
This article describes the most common mistakes made when developing brands, but even this amount of information will avoid many problems and create a strong and attractive Brand.