Developing a Brand

As I stated in my last post, I am researching branding because I am making a portfolio website that is doubling as my freelance website, and one of the things that I would like to offer my clients is creating a brand for their company. My last blog post was simply a basic introduction to branding, and now I am looking into the steps to develop a brand.

      1.  The first step to developing a brand is to define for what the brand is for. Defining your brand will serve as the foundation for every other part of the brand development process. Here are some important questions that you need to answer to begin creating you brand:

1. What products/services do you offer and what is the quality of these?
2. What are the core values of this product/service or company?
3. What is the mission of the company?
4. What does your company specialize in?
5. What audience are you targeting? What about your service/product will attract consumers?
6. What is the tag line of your company? What message does the tag line send to your prospects?
7. Using everything above, create a character or personality for your company. What is your character like? What qualities does it have and what type of personality does it have? Creative? Innovative?
8.  Using this personality/character, build a relationship with your target audience. Connect the two in a way that attracts your target audience and makes them feel connected. 
9. Lastly, describe the character/personality and its connection with your target audience, define it in words as though writing a personal ad.

     2.  The brand should have a clear cut objective about what you hope to gain from your brand. The brand should show the company's personality, image, core competencies, and characteristics. Strong brands help build credibility and gives the company more influence on the market. To determine your brands objectives, answer the following questions:

                     What do you want your brand to do for your company?
                     What impression do you want to give your customers about your product or service?

      3. One thing that you have to focus on and keep in mind is your target market, knowing who your brand is trying to gain the attention of. You want your target audience to recognize that they are the ones you are trying to focus on. Knowing your market inside and out is extremely important and requires a lot of market analysis.

      4. Another thing you have to analysis and focus on is the different market conditions that can affect your product or service negatively. A couple examples would be: competition, timing, financing, location, lack of demand. To be able to handle these obstacles when they arrive, you need to fully research and analysis your product/service and its strengths and weaknesses. Some questions that you should as to help in analyzing is:

1. Do you have a niche market? What problem does your product/service fix?
2. What factors should determine the price of your product or service?
3. Who are potential customers and where can you find them?
4. Who are your biggest competitors? What can you do to be better than them?
5. What type of advertising should you use? Where will be most noticeable by your target market? New media or traditional media?

      5. Lastly, brand packaging. The brand is your identity in the marketplace, and your company is all about the appearance of your package. The following common business tools can be used to effectively package your brand: business cards and stationary, web sites, answering systems, and email addresses. Keep in mind what these business tools say about your company. What image do they show and represent?

Creating an affective brand for your company is a long and tedious task, it requires a lot of research, analysis and time to put together, but once it has been created, it can help give your company an identity that stands out from all its competitors.

NOTE: Information was taken from About.Com Marketing. Multiple articles were used, all written by: Laura Lake.