Marketing 101

How to build a brand strategy from 0-1: a checklist for startups

Reminder: Brand strategy should be done WITH your Head of product and Head of Ops vs presented to them. This creates buy-in and alignment on why this is important from day 1.
Brand strategy is NOT a marketing plan. Brand strategy is WHY you will win. Marketing plan is HOW: levers you will pull to hit your goals.
Step 1: Review Competitive Landscape. Do tear downs. Understand leading value props. Interview users of your competition to understand what’s working, what’s not. Know who the players are and where they play vs where you will play.
Step 1b: Create your “ONLY” statement. Complete this sentence. We are the only brand that does x, y and/ or z. Are you better, faster, cheaper? What makes you different and how would you say that efficiently.
Step 2: Identity customer segments. Data helps. If you already have a product, know who is already a purchaser and why. Otherwise, create user personas of ideal customers. Have fun! How do they get news? What social accounts do they follow? What shows are they watching?
Step 3: use 1 & 2 to create your brand pyramid. A brand pyramid helps you to think about the core essence / brand sentiment. How do you want to make someone feel (image reference)
Step 4: Bring that feeling to life - VOICE. Create your voice & tone of your brand. Use statements like: We are this, not this. Eg: we are bold, not judgmental. Eg: we are funny, not crass. Pull together examples of social captions, welcome email and product copy for North Star.
Step 5: Bring that feeling to life - VISUAL. Pull inspirational photos to guide a designer to create 3 mood boards for your brand to react to. Use the brand pyramid to guide you. Refine and get to your MVP quickly. Don’t obsess over every pixel in the beginning.
Step 6: Learn and Iterate. A brand is a living thing. Just like a human it learns and grows as new pieces of information from customers, product and market. by @AmandaMGoetz

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