Tag: brand audit

Make Your Brand a Consistent Statement Throughout Your Business

Welcome to another installment of 10-minute branding!

10-Minute Branding Refresher: How do you build your brand 10 minutes at a time? You start small, and you simply begin. An excellent way to convince yourself to get going is to plan your ending. You can even set a timer. Then, be sure to bask in the success of your huge accomplishment of actually beginning and also appreciate the amount of work that got done. Then, repeat the process tomorrow. And the next day. And so on. You will be amazed at your branding progress . . . 10 minutes at a time.

So how do you make your brand a consistent statement throughout your business . . . in 10 minutes a day no less?!

The endeavor sounds so much harder and more intimidating than the actuality.

ENSURING BRAND CONSISTENCY: THE PROCESS

Day 1: Collect all the physical documents that your customers see.

(Remember that any task taking more than 10 minutes gets paused to continue the next day.)

Day 2: Make sure each collected piece fits your brand — logo, company colors, tag line, etc. Put any off-brand item aside.

Day 3: Repeat the process for all current advertising.

Day 4: Go through your website and any other online materials. You can bookmark any item needing to be addressed.

Day 5: Repeat the process for any signage, noting items in need of change.

Day 6: Fix identified issues. One piece per day is probably a reasonable goal, though more complicated items may need to be spread across multiple days.

And then you’re done! The process may takes weeks to complete, but if you approach it in a organized manner and commit to 10 minutes per day (no more or no less), your brand will be consistent in no time . . . without having to take away from the business of actually running your business!

GOING FORWARD

Having this process fresh in your mind will help you be attentive to branding your materials in the future. Still, you may want to put a reminder in your calendar for one or two years ahead (whichever seems more reasonable based on the quantity of materials you have) to repeat this process.

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New Year Resolution: Perform an Annual 5-Step Brand Wellness Checkup

As I write this article, a New Year has just begun . . . bringing a much-welcomed fresh start. 

We all hope (and optimistically expect) that 2021 will be a much better, more normal year for all of us – including small businesses that suffered such hardships during 2020.  For them (our primary audience), I offer my best wishes for a strong start as well as a suggestion for an additional New Year’s resolution:  performance of a simple “annual brand checkup” to identify and make any needed adjustments.

Please note that I have chosen the word “checkup” very carefully to suggest a simple self-help exercise – not a complete “brand audit” that can be highly structured, very time consuming, and quite expensive when third parties are utilized.  As a quick DIY alternative that can, therefore, be accomplished much more frequently, the 5 Steps of a Brand Wellness Checkup include the following:

  1. Examine all of your advertising, web site, and collateral sales and instructional material to make sure the documents conform to your Style Guide.  If they do not, you need to determine whether the materials or the guide need updating.
  2. Determine whether the qualities used to define yourself and, therefore, your brand are still the right ones and are practiced daily by your staff and operations.  To do this, talk to your employees and check in with a few of your regular customers.  (Since we are talking about a checkup – not an audit – a number of informal conversations might be all that is needed . . . as opposed to surveys, telemarketing efforts, research focus groups etc.)
  3. Look at your logo and branding statements with a fresh eye to determine whether they still reflect who you are and want to be.  If not, incorporate a gradual revision into your plans – allowing sufficient time and resources to do the job well.
  4. Revisit your customer service protocols to make sure they are delivering the level of excellence you seek, making any needed adjustments to your practices.
  5. Reinforce your branding message with your staff to make sure your identity is getting communicated to customers in the intended way.

Remember, the point of this exercise is to make sure that at least once a year you stop and revisit your most basic branding decisions and their implementation.  By doing so annually, you can make sure you do not unwittingly drift off course . . . and can make minor adjustments to right yourself before a major, potentially difficult, and expensive overhaul is required.  (To learn more about activities associated with the items mentioned above, visit our menu item labeled “Your Brand:  The Beginning” or visit this page.)

While most New Year’s Resolutions are abandoned by February, this goal is one that can and should be done as early as possible at the start of the year.

Good luck . . . and keep thinking positive thoughts about 2021 and beyond.