ampersand Creative

Last time we looked at what people in the creative industry say about branding.

‘Brand consultancy’ approach of branding specifically.

Business owners know branding is important, but many of them do not want to go to brand consultancies for a ‘proper’ branding exercise.

They think the consultancy approach is expensive, not flexible, and slow.

It is quite common to see many local businesses, SMEs and startups jump straight into brand buildings, i.e. advertising, marketing and PR, without first defining their brands.

These are two extremes.

For businesses who want to go for the ‘lean’ approach (whether they are startups, SMEs or even more established businesses that are not there yet to spend huge amount of money on brand exercises), these are the very essential questions to ask:
- where you are
- where do you want to get
- how to get there

A good brand strategy derives from these.

It is all about self understanding, to put aside all technical jargons.

These three questions, form one of the very basic thinking structures in coaching, A ---> B
A is where you are
B is where you want to get
---> is what need to be done to get there

People who start and run their businesses believe they know the answers to the first two questions, but simply do not know the third.

Both consultancies and coaches agree that people do not often know A and B, but jump straight to finding --->. But the reason it is difficult to find --->, is people often misunderstand their A and B.

The consultancy approach uses research findings to tell clients that they have got their A wrong, tell what their B should be, and propose ---> that can take them there.

This can be a very expensive process.

More important thing is, is research always right?

Should research go slightly side tracked, or it overlooks something (which often happens in every discipline, right?) then whatever based on the findings can go totally wrong direction.

Research findings are mostly about current problems, however B is not always a solution of current problem but can be totally away from the problem.

As one of the world’s most reputable branding guru Wally Olins put it ‘some people believe that through thorough, systematic and careful research, you can arrive at a creative conclusion that will be successful in the marketplace. I don’t […] research is useful in telling you what people currently think and feel, but it’s not much use at directing the creative process’.

This is best exemplified by comparing two models in product development:
- the release often model
- the great product model

The former releases often and gets feedback from users then refines and re-releases. Microsoft is an example of it.

The later has a big vision, how the product should be, then focuses on making it as great as possible before launching to the market. Apple is an example.

Both works.

The point is you do not have to have big data to come up with your big vision. And as long as your vision is big enough, you can succeed. Many great brands and products came from this route, they are not result of data.

But to have big vision, you have to have at least the most basic understandings about yourself: what do you want to achieve, where you want to get, who do you want to be?

And these, you can answer yourself, you are already an expert of your own questions.

Coaching simplifies this self understanding process, reduces the chance of fixing on a certain factor too soon (sometime caused by research findings) then overlooking other things.

Business owners do not think a proper branding exercise is needed does not mean they do not have a brand. Whether they are conscious of it, they still have a brand through whatever marketing means they take.

It is therefore sensible to give it some thoughts even without a brand consultancy.

You can be your own brand strategist with the help of a coach, that is a much more efficient and flexible way for SMEs and startups, even for more established companies that want to stay agile, flexible.

© ampersand

What do people say about lean branding?

‘The challenge for a start up is simply to accelerate this process and to be willing to make changes faster to improve the brand. The unspoken restraint here is that start ups are unwilling to invest into good visual design […] it seems self indulgent for them […] to be continually improving their brand. This is because most start ups misunderstand what design really is. Good design doesn’t just make a product look good […]

Clarity is the key to lean branding. A clear strategy will be repeatable and articulable to all of your team members. It will help guide decision making. A clear set of language to describe your brand and to persuade your audience will be more likely to be useful and therefore used […] Clear visual identity, through colours, fonts and shapes, increases the chances that your brand will be applied by the team members in a consistent and high quality way. A lean brand has a clear strategy, a clear message and a clear look and feel.’
—Peter J Thomson

‘…a lot of people interpret “lean” as stripping your product naked and throwing it into the woods. Of all the things left out of a lean process, branding is usually one of the first things to go. This is a big mistake.

It’s a mistake because you have a brand whether you like it or not. It’s a lot like a personality in that regard […] With your brand, this personality is the feelings and experiences people have when they interact with your product or service.’
—A Hundred Monkeys

‘Our business is infested with idiots who try to impress by using pretentious jargon.

Every advertisement should be thought of as a contribution to the complex symbol which is the brand image.’
—David Ogilvy

What do all these say in common?

A lot of people try to jump straight to creating a logo, advertisements, marketing materials, a website, without understanding what their brand is about, and they all have reasons to believe this is practical .

Just because you don’t want to wait until you have a perfect brand identity before you do anything, does not mean that you can do without the basic self knowing.

What people say about the brand consultancy approach? One example:

‘Expensive

One-off

Opaque

Late

Never Wrong’
– Adrian Howard

Lean branding is what smaller, new businesses do. The concept ‘Pivot’ in Lean is not about rushing to advertising, marketing and doing PR first, without the branded defined, then continually redesigning the brand, that is just waste of effort and money.

Just because you want to keep it lean does not mean you can skip the crucial self knowing part.

‘Lean Startup = Brand Discovery

Great Brand = Product/Market Fit

Branding ≠ Bullshit

Bring branding into the Lean fold’
– Adrian Howard

It’s all good, now the question is, how to do it?

Here is one approach, brand coaching.

We shall talk about it later ;)

© ampersand