When starting and managing a business, entrepreneurs at times can lose sight of their long-term vision. Being too worried about costs, sales, and profits, entrepreneurs and executives may make hasty decisions that can jeopardize the integrity of the brand. It is true that our world is fixed on instant self-gratification, but setting your branding on that dial will be more damaging than you realize.
The objective of branding is to give your product or service a way to connect to your customers. Building something for “right now” just doesn’t fit. It’s not sustainable. Here are three questions you should ask when developing your brand.
1. Can fit it the “Zietgeist”?
Meaning the “spirit of the times” zeitgeist captures the mood of the decade, trend, or generation. Coca-Cola captured the spirit in the 80s, Pepsi in the 90s, and I would argue Old Spice is doing it in the Ought’s. Tagging your brand with the times creates nostalgia, meaning, and purpose. Humans do an amazing job associating objects and experiences. Adding your brand to one will create a solid customer base.
2. It is built to expand?
Growing a brand can be tough. But not impossible if you lay the groundwork where it can grow. Being able to offer different products or services, or attract contrast customer bases can be done if your brand is big enough to encompass it all. Back to Coke and Pepsi, they both were able to add product lines under the umbrella without uprooting what they already planted.
3. Can it continuously deliver its message ?
Whether the product or service is luxury, general or commodity, a brand must be able to deliver what it stands for. It must be able to convey trust, integrity and consistency. Once one of those principles have been compromised, rebuilding, those possible, will be difficult. And no one wants to do that.
Answering these questions will certainly put you on the right path towards creating a dynamite brand. Good luck, and let me know all about it.