Brand mapping. It helps you see.

Mapping a brand with words, is a good place to start to peel away and discover a brands’ DNA. I introduce, Brand Mapping.

Brand mapping can provide 3 key insightful representations. First, when you create a brand map you can explore / articulate its meaning as it is understood (represented with big words, usually). Second,  brand mapping ultimately (its obvious) V I S U A L I Z E S the  intangible ideas that make a brand – mapped out, showing inter-relationships, lines, arrows – to help brand managers discover opportunities to further enhance and deepen a brand connection with it’s consumers. And lastly, you can see ‘competitively’ what attributes / benefits you drive to your consumer. There are many objectives for your own brand map, I have only listed 3 ways of using them as an example. The point being, visualizing information may lead to seeing connections, which may lead to insights and strategies – that is, all illustrated through a diagram. Open powerpoint, or a big piece of paper and start. So stop writing long explanations and boil it down so that ideas are easily explained.  That is being creatively strategic.

Excellent Examples
The nice people at Google have organized a library of resources as related to this topic: Brand Mapping.

// Writers note: Thank you Charlie & Co. for your Big Paper. Finally, since the subject here is about Brand “Mapping”, the idea of writing something long winded was not smart.

Brand, as concept.

The new brands of today can’t start with a product alone. What does it stand for? What does it mean in the context of culture? What do you want it to represent? How does it connect? … questions that are important to answer when entering a new product or service into the market, as well important aspects in creating a brand people can connect with. Connection means more loyalty, and loyalty mean more engagement. In a nutshell: brand as concept > brand persona > better consumer connection > delight > loyalty > business growth.

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Detail, defining benefits.

Semiotics Applied

Storytelling is Brand Engagement

This is going to be a short post, as the world doesn’t have much time to read nowadays!

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Six Principles of Strategic Positioning (M.Porter)

Turning the business strategy for a reminder of some important principles, below are Porter’s six – enjoy.

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Trust

The case for social media based marketing: let your audience do the marketing for you.

Business & Brand Alignment

I am writing this to remind a few businesses that I have spoken to in recent months that branding isn’t just an add on. It is very well established as a strategic component to business success, look up a HBS article using the key words “branding business performance”, read about Apple, or any great brand – they have what I call, “Brand / Business Alignment”.

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The People Factor in Branding Financial Services

Its far more difficult for private banks, family offices and financial firms to manage their brand when your product is your service. In a business, a brand’s identity is manifested though people, brand promise and services itself.

The most common place to start is the people / brand communications congruence. How do you speak to a client, does everyone do it in a similar fashion. For instance, does everyone “think smart”?…as your brand campaign states. Often the best brand campaign is sprung out from a solid brand platform – one aligns the organization and culture to deliver your brand promise. But if a person behavior changes, as we know it does – this is a far more complicated matter. If the premise for branding a service company is “delivering on the promise,” half of the challenge is making certain the advisors and relationship interface, or people on the front lines live the brand values. As we know, if you say something in marketing – it better well be what is delivered as a service experience.

Your People and Your Brand
The behavior and attitudes of people are a key input to the brand image and its’ reputation. However, the quality and effectiveness of service delivery personnel in financial services is an important aspect to manage, especially if your product is your service. I have done some research about this to learn more about the dynamics, since the we I do is in brand communication design. With regard to managing a bank’s corporate identity, the findings suggest that the design and control of the corporate behavior component is possibly far more difficult and complex than is the management of the brand / messaging component.
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Financial Services Marketing to Boomer Women (50+)

Visual Research
Understanding how a women react to images is important to creating effecting brand communications for advisor firms. For those firms that focus on working with women, there are some things I uncovered in recent research study with Boomer women.

The Findings
Boomer women evaluated the ads that financial service firms were using to engage them.

The most common complaint? Showing women in a dependent posture towards men. These images may be the most common among financial service firms, yet none bother Boomer women more. Remember that only 3% of women expect to depend on their husbands or other men in their lives for their financial security. Too many financial service ads show women in the arms of men, standing behind men, or embraced by men. I suppose that marketers assume such images will remind women how much their husbands love and support them.

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