Elements of Brand to Focus on Before Launch

When a product idea hits you, you can’t think of anything else. Your desire to act overtakes you. But wait, the need to act now has led to the downfall of many businesses.  Although the high estimate of a 95% business failure is more of an urban myth than truth, the McKinsey Global Institute estimate it to be between 25% and 45%.  That’s one out of 4 and almost half depending on the industry.  Of the 5 reasons products fail, 4 have to do with lack of planning according to a Copernicus Marketing Consulting and Research survey. 

Before the product, there is a brand; before a sale, there is selling; and before action, there is planning.

Why do you need brand planning?

Your brand is the face of your product. It is how people recognize you and interact with you. It is how you reach out to them, and they reach out to you. However, the number of brands has increased, and so has the brand power. But it is not equally distributed. There are some brands that launch only to get lost in obscurity a few months later, and there are others that persist for decades, and even become timeless. To become part of the latter, you need your brand to put the best foot forward, reach the right target audience correctly, and elicit positive emotions.

But these multiple elements can only come together correctly if you have a plan.

“Without a plan, your branding efforts are nothing more than throwing paint at a drywall and seeing what sticks.” – this is a popular saying regarding brand strategy. So, before launching your brand, you need to follow a AAA attitude.

Assess all the elements that you need

Assemble these elements together in a coherent fashion

And then, push these elements to act together, so your brand leads to engagement, conversions, and sales.

Six Elements of the Brand that you Must Bring Together

A brand’s element can be categorized into two parts.

Tangible elements

These are the elements that your customer can experience. It consists of three

1. Brand voice
2. Brand promise
3. Brand Identity

Brand voice

It is the personality of your brand, the emotion that you want to infuse in your content. Every content you put out there for your customers to consume, whether emails, social media posts, or articles, must be underlined with your unique voice. It humanizes your brand and communicates your brand’s value.

Brand promise

The brand promise is about articulation. It represents the unique brand value that you communicate to your customers. It consists of the vision and mission statements that show your brand’s value proposition. It aims to set your customer’s expectations when they read your content.

Brand Identity

Brand identity is what your customers see when they look at your brand. It consists of all the visual elements, from the color palette to the logo to the fonts to your company’s website. It is the

the tangible entity with which your customers interact.

Intangible elements

These are the underlying assets of your brand that pushes it forward.

1. Brand Values
2. Brand targeting
3. Brand positioning

Brand Values

They are the guiding principles of your company that drive your marketing efforts. It underlines the context of your brand. By aligning that with your customers, your brand becomes more relatable and more convertible.

Brand targeting

Brand targeting, as the name suggests, is about finding the target customer that your product or service caters to. Under this element, you create a buyer persona based on your customers’ demographic, focusing on not only their age, sex, or profession but also behavior and personality traits.

Brand positioning

Your brand position is how your targeted customer differentiates you from your competitors. Consider it a test to see if your customer can recognize you differently from your competitors. Getting brand positioning right is an intrinsic aspect of branding that proves that your marketing efforts are moving in the right direction.

Getting Brand Identity Right – the Key element of Branding

Once you have understood your target audience and have discerned your desired brand position, your communication will automatically align your company’s value with what your audience seeks.

That will give your brand the right voice, flowing into your brand’s promise.

Now, to bring these elements together coherently so that what you want to say does get to your audience, you need to get the most crucial aspect of branding right – Brand identity. Getting the brand identity right will make you authentic, a requirement of nearly 88% of the customers you’ll likely encounter. While there are multiple elements of identity that you must focus on, for now, let us take a closer look at five of the most crucial among them.

Name of the Brand

It all starts with the name. You cannot choose something too mundane, but staying away from something too complicated is also important. The perfect brand name immediately encompasses the idea, the experience, and the expectations of your brand. It may sound abstract, but that must be your thought process when coming up with a brand name.

Brand Logo

Now comes the factor of presenting that name with a unique look. And that’s where a pogo comes in. A good logo is conceptual and balanced. It utilizes the space correctly, contains human elements, is readable, perfectly sized, and above everything else, unique. Focus on one aspect you want your audience to focus on and subtly add other elements to it. This approach will put your brand’s uniqueness at the front and center.

Color Palette

Before the eyes comprehend the shape, they see colors. So focus on creating a color palette that is suitable for your brand. Do you run a high-style clothing company? Go with sharp palettes and concentrate on the darker elements. Are you running a spa? Hints of blue across the logo will create a much better image. Think of how you want your brand to make people feel, and pick the color that does it best.

Graphics and Images

While defining the graphics and images to use is hard, the clearer the values you are, the clearer it gets. However, keep in mind that, like the color palette, consistency is the key here. Pick a set of graphics and images that suits your brand’s message while using a color palette that focuses on how you want your audience to feel, and you will be done. Make sure that you keep the style of those images the same across all the social media platforms at all times. One mistake and your customers will start dissociating from your brand’s message.

Website

The website is the melting pot of your brand’s identity. It is where the graphics, the images, the colors, the logo, and the name come together to give your business a unique look. While the look of the website must align with your brand, its functionality must align with what your audience wants. They want simplicity, flawless navigation, and content they can relate to.

Let your Brand Leap To the Top

It is one thing to talk about the elements of the brand; it is another to bring them together to yield positive results. At Leap Interactive, we leverage our multicultural diversity and experience to bring the disparate elements of your brand together naturally so that your voice stays unique and your value shines brightly.

Reach out to us if you want your business to leap to the top.