We start every project with our Understand Your Brand Workshop. Two days, eight hours. It’s a significant time investment for anyone, but there’s a reason we spend so much time on “big picture” brand positioning work before we dive into the creative design, development, and implementation process. Your brand’s identity, how you talk about it, how it’s perceived by your audience, the emotion and memories it evokes–that stuff matters (a lot). It fuels our creativity, unites your team with one consistent voice, and gives meaning to what you offer.
Too often, we define something as esoteric as a “brand” by its individual components: A logo, website, marketing campaign, or mission statement. But it’s so much more.
Everything you build, you do, your team does, and your customers are interested in makes up the fabric of your brand. The design, the messaging, the sex appeal–all of that has an important place at the table. But the face you paint for the world to see won’t hide whatever is lurking beneath–the good, the bad, and everything in between.
Understanding who and what you are at the core of your brand—that essence that lies at the foundation of everything that you do—is what we’re in pursuit of and it’s what separates us from a firm that simply creates something that looks good. Above all, we want what we create to work well. If it doesn’t, there’s no point in creating it.
It’s easy to find the pitfall of intentionally shaping your brand based on what you think your market will find most appealing, which is why so many businesses spend more time polishing and perfecting a cardboard perception of what they think the people want, instead of putting energy into building a brand that can’t be ignored.
And what can’t be ignored is what we unearth in these early stages of work with our clients. What can’t be ignored isn’t simply what the CEO says is best, it’s what a team, united in their passion and purpose, defines together to be best.
Don’t hide behind the face you paint for the world to see. Wear it proudly. Be a brand that can’t be ignored.