Brand Messaging
What is it you want to say to your consumers? Your brand message is the underlying value and proposition you are making to your customers. It’s what makes your brand relatable and compels your audiences to choose you. Under your overarching brand message, you may then have key messages under that, and a messaging funnel – allowing you to tell a richer and ongoing story.
Might be of interest – Why Branding is So Important
Key Audiences
How you communicate will vary depending on each audience segment – a female in her 20s likely does not have the same motivations and drivers as a male in his 50s. Your brand is going to mean different things to different people, so starting with buyer personas will help you see things from their perspectives.
Communication Channels
Sending your brand message out in a newspaper when 90% of your audience is getting their content from social media isn’t an effective use of your investment. Find out where your audiences are consuming content, and craft your message to suit that format. Wherever possible, avoid looking like an ad and provide content that is meaningful or useful to who you are speaking to.
Why is Brand Communication Important?
The marketing landscape is ever-evolving. Gone are the days of one-way communications touting product features. Today, even our most successful platforms are under the threat of obsoleteness. People’s priorities and lifestyles are also changing, and they are demanding brands prove their place in consumers’ lives. A brand communication plan makes sure you are being strategic and effective with your time and resources, and are maintaining your brand equity.
Brand Communication is a Process
There are many ways to communicate with your audience including social media, email, phone calls, YouTube, and many more. By reaching out to your audience on a range of different platforms, you can gather data on your audiences as well as your creative. As you start to send out messages, you can learn who it resonated with and potentially uncover new audiences you’d never considered. You can also AB test and see what imagery or copy performs better. This is a progressive process and as you go you will hone in your communications.
What is the Downside?
There is a lot of clutter and competition within the information space. For every blog you produce, a competitor will have produced a longer and more in-depth blog. Perhaps your product or service is not unique, but your brand should be. A brand should be as unique as a person is, so having a strong brand foundation will help you stand out in your communications.
Quick Guide to a Brand Communication Plan
Here is an outline to get you started:
Brand Strategy
You are going to struggle to create a brand communication plan, without a thorough understanding of your brand. Make sure you have gone through the brand strategy process to identify key areas like your brand proposition, positioning, and values. Your brand strategy can also define your personality and Tone of Voice which are integral to your communication plan development.
Set Your Audience
Who is your brand for and what audience should you be reaching out to? What need or purpose does your brand fill within these audiences’ lives? Consider audience demographics, geographics, psychographics, and behavioural traits.
Define Your USP
This is your Unique Selling Point. What is it that makes your brand different from your competitors? This may be a product feature, how you deliver service, or what you believe in.
Research Your Competitors
What are your competitors doing? Understand what they’re doing so you can learn from their success and failures. You can also consider benchmarks, these are brands that are at a more developed stage, and how they got to where they are.
Keep a Consistent Brand Identity
Other than your verbal identity, ensure that you are keeping your visual identity consistent. This relates to your graphic language, colour palette, photography, logo usage, and typography (where possible).
Communication Channels
What communication channels do you have available to you, and which ones are your target audience using? Ensure you are developing something that is suited to the platform. Have a look at some effective ways your brand can communicate.
Measuring Success
Identify what your measures for success are before launching. This may be CTAs, impressions, phone calls, or sales. Understanding these will allow for future benchmarking. Brand awareness is tricky to measure, but not impossible if you have the right listening tools.
Concluding a Brand Communication Plan
Let’s round up what we’ve learned in this journal entry.
A communication plan is a strategy for how your brand can effectively communicate with your target audience. The plan will help you drive sales and increase your audience’s awareness – carving a space in consumers’ minds above your competitors. To do this successfully, you will require an understanding of your brand, audiences, benefits and negatives, competitors, and channels.
If you would like more information on brand communication plans or would like to engage Fellow as your creative partner, please get in contact.
