The Quickstart Guide to Brand Messaging
1 | Know your Brand Story.
Consumers prefer buying from companies aligned with their Values. A brand story articulates the most profound truths about your brand, answering questions such as:
Who are we?
Why are we here?
What do we care about?
What do we do?
Why does it matter?
A great brand story becomes a touchstone for the brand, to help customers and partners to fully understand your value and place in the world.
2 | Define your Target Audience.
It is critical to understand your target audience because the language, channels and information you use to communicate with and appeal to one demographic may not be as effective with another. Clearly defining your target audience gives you direction in your marketing, facilitates more consistency in your messaging and allows you to authentically connect with your customers.
3 | Know the problem you're solving.
Having a deep understanding of the challenge you are solving is crucial. To grab your customer's attention, start by solving their problem.
4 | Know your competition and how you’re different.
By knowing your competitors you can find out where you can stand out among the crowd.
5 | Formalize your Brand Positioning.
Brand positioning is the art of creating meaning for your brand in the minds of your Target Audience.
Write out a statement that can clearly and concisely answer these three questions:
Who is the product for?
What does the product do?
Why is it different from other products out there?
If you'd like to go even deeper, create a statement that answers the following questions:
Who is your Target Audience?
What segment of your Target Audience is most likely to buy the product?
In what market category does your product compete?
How is it the same as competitors in the same category?
How is it different from competitors in the same category?
What evidence or proof do you have that your product is different?
What places are your competitors strongest and your brand is weakest that you will need to counteract?
6 | Clarify your Messaging Pillars.
Brand messaging pillars are a crucial element of your brand messaging, and a particularly useful tool for content creators. They are typically three major themes, benefits, or selling points that make your brand unique, and the talking points that support them. By distilling them down into brief talking points, you will identify catchy phrases and keywords you can infuse into all of your content, whether it’s product packaging or a social media ad.
7 | Establish the brand's communication guidelines.
Consistency is a fundamental factor in brand messaging, so you want to set everyone on the team (including content creators, designers, influencers ext.) up for success when it comes to broadcasting messages on behalf of the brand. Communication guidelines set standards that uphold the compliance to essential issues, such as:
prohibited terms
recommended terms
Brand Story
Messaging Pillars
Brand of voice
Brand Personality
how to refer to the public
pronunciation of product names
the grammar and spelling of product names
We recommended a company create a Brand Messaging Document to codify the established communications guidelines.