Brand Development
Developing a brand is a critical part of taking a product or service to potential customers, or indeed to potential investors. Creating a brand identity allows you to develop a relationship with your target customer as brand awareness is created through marketing appropriately via the right channels, at the right time, to the right audience. A brand is an important intangible asset to any business or entrepreneur, which can be valuable.
Our Process
Preparation
The first step in creating a brand is to discuss understand what the product or idea does or its purpose, why is it unique and who will buy it? This involves:
- Client Consultation: We start with an in-depth discussion with you to understand your vision for your idea or product. Why did you develop it ? Why is it unique ? What do you want to achieve from it? These may change overtime as the project develops and that’s fine. It’s important to understand your motivations, inspiration and more about you as sometimes a back story can really help to develop the depth of the brand. You might not know the answer to some of these questions and that’s fine too. Our job is to find a narrative – a story to tell – and our expertise will help tease these answers out to give us the building blocks to create your brand.
What you will get
This step is essential to creating a brand. From our discussion we can help to bring your vision to life by developing the following options.
- Develop the Purpose and Values:
Articulate the purpose of your brand. What, why, who?
Identify the core values that will guide your brand’s actions and decisions.
- Find Your Target Audience:
Understand who is likely to buy your product, identify their needs.
What do they like? What will make them buy your product?
Create a fictional customer – give them a name – bring them to life
- Market Research:
Research your industry and competitors.
Identify trends and opportunities in the market.
- Develop a Unique Selling Proposition (USP):
Determine what sets your brand apart from competitors.
Highlight a unique benefit that your brand offers.
- Create a Memorable Brand Name and Logo:
Options for names to choose from. All easy to remember, spell, and pronounce.
Options for logos that reflects your brand’s personality and values.
- Design a Brand Identity:
Options for a visual identity, including colours, typography, and imagery.
Ensure that all branding elements are cohesive across various elements eg packaging, labels, point of sale.
- Create a Brand Message:
Develop a clear and concise brand message that communicates your core proposition.
Create a tagline or slogan that captures the essence of your brand.
- Customer Research:
Gather feedback from potential customers and key stakeholders
Use this feedback to finalise proposals to move forward with the next steps
It is really important to listen and act on this information. Feedback is a gift.
- Finalise all visual elements of your brand
The next steps are moving the brand into existence and making it start to work for you. Based on sign offs from Step 2 we can develop the following options as are appropriate to your project.
- Build an Online Presence:
Establish a professional website with a user-friendly design.
Leverage social media to connect with your audience and engage them
- Develop Marketing Content:
Create content for all viable channels to reach your target customer.
Ensure that all materials align with your brand identity and voice.
- Provide Consistent Customer Experience:
Deliver a consistent and positive experience at every customer touchpoint.
- Establish Brand Guidelines:
Document and communicate guidelines for using your brand assets.
Ensure consistency in how your brand is represented across all elements.
This is useful for giving to third party retailers to ensure your brand is properly represented in their stores or on their websites.
- Protect Your Brand:
Consider trademarking your brand name, logo and message/strapline.
- Brand Evolution
Brands should evolve with ever- changing market conditions and customer preferences.
Regularly reassess and update your brand strategy. Building a brand is an ongoing process that requires a willingness to adapt when necessary. It’s not a one-off task – the foundations can be laid and then it is vital to keep relevant to maximise your sales potential.
FAQs
Why use D2M to develop your brand with you?
We have over 30 years of combined experience of creating, developing and evolving many well-known high street brands. These brands span across a wide array of industries including fashion, hard goods, textiles, toys and everyday consumer products. The craft of creating a brand is the same for everything regardless of what it is – product, service or anything. Our experience is global so if you have ambitions to sell globally then we can develop the brand to do this. Choice of words and colours are very important to consider as some words don’t ‘travel’ very well and can be mis-translated in other territories and it is the same with colours, which can be associated with various cultural beliefs. The sky is your limit so global aims are very much encouraged.
You might already have a vision which we can work on with you, to bring it to life or perhaps you would like us to create something from scratch. The choice is yours.
Overview of Brand Development
What is a Brand?
A Brand is a unique identity and a personality – created through various guises to attract your target customers overtly and subliminally. The followings elements should always be considered and developed. Think of them as tools to use to communicate.
Name – This should be easy to remember, spell, communicate and sometimes suggest what your product might do. The name needs to work across lots of brand elements so size, legibility and script are important to consider.
Logo – this could be a symbol, shape or anything really but all the considerations as above are valid for this too.
Colours – not always your favourite colours! Colour palettes are a craft to create and can make and break your product. Are you considering a high fashion product which will need trend forecasting or is it a functional everyday product with no seasonality. The most important thing to remember who your target customer is and what will make them buy your product?
Strapline/Message – Alongside your name and colours you may want a simple message to convey more of your voice. This needs to short sharp and punchy. It is important that the logo can stand alongside this and on its own too.
Packaging – This is another way of communicating to your customer. All the elements from above come into play here to sell your product. Packaging can be boxes, bags, labels, sew in labels, hangers etc. If your vision is for your product to be sold in shops the packaging needs to be developed to consider how it might be displayed eg on a shelf, hung on a rack etc to draw attention, convey your brand voice and what the product is/does.
Experience – Every touch point with your Brand should be consistent and cohesive to create the ideal brand experience for your customer. This is literally everything, every interaction whether physical or remote.
Digital – Your brand may need to work on 3rd party websites with strong brand presence and clear messaging. It needs to stand off the page and not get lost in the crowd of competitors. You may choose to sell the product directly by creating your own transactional website which is the golden opportunity to tell your brand story.
All these elements blend to create a personality that is memorable and appealing to your target audience. It should have values, a voice and be easily recognisable and it needs to be clear to communicate effectively across all elements.
Why do you need a brand?
A brand gives your idea a distinct identity, meaning that you can stand out from the crowd in a busy marketplace. Of course, if you’re launching something completely new and unique then you can explain this through the brand messaging to appeal to your target market. It is the vehicle for you to convey the purpose and sense of your idea to the people you want to buy your concept. It brings the idea to life by giving it a personality with the aim of making it memorable by developing how you want your idea to be viewed. A brand works on many levels and can be used in many ways to continually reinforce the brand at every touchpoint and interaction.
Understanding the Value of a brand
Think of a brand as your way of talking to the people you want to reach – it’s your voice. Say what you want to say. A well-developed brand should allow your concept to grow if you want to develop your ideas to your offer in the future. A product can be the best idea in the world but if it’s not clear what it does or what it is offering then it will never potentialize sales volumes.
It’s wise to register your brand with a Trademark for protection from others developing identical products without your permission. A trademark covers a logo,phrase, words or symbol that relates to your idea, meaning that you own that brand.D2M can help with this so that you are fully protected. It is important not to discuss your idea with anyone until you are protected, otherwise there is a risk of someone taking your idea. There is value in a trademarked brand and it could be one of your most valuable assets and is known as intellectual property. COST TBC
In addition to this we would always recommend putting together an NDA (Non Disclosure Agreement) using a legal service before you share details of what makes your product or service unique. The party you are discussing it with will need to sign it before the discussion. It’s straightforward and not expensive.