How to Build a Brand: 5-Step Checklist

Now that you know what brand is and why it’s important, here’s how to get started building yours:

1. Take a Market-In Approach to Building Your Brand

When building a brand, the key to success is sticking out from the crowd and connecting with your audience.

Many founders take a product-out approach. They decide what they want to build or what they want to say based on their own experiences, and then they bring it out to market. The market-in approach, on the other hand, relies on data to inform your decisions.

Market-in is so important for brand building. Only when you know your competitors, comparators and overall market like the back of your hand can you truly define your message and how you deliver it. If you don’t know exactly who you are — and even more importantly, who you aren’t — then how can you expect your customers to do the same?

When you try to be everything to everyone, you end up being known for nothing. If you go too broad in your messaging, you may miss the boat with your core audience. But on the other hand, if you keep changing, you are never known for one thing. There is a balance, and it comes down to messaging.

2. Develop a Messaging Hierarchy

What do you want to be known for? How do you then take that message further, find out what makes you different and develop a unique point of view? How can you start sharing it with the world over and over again? That’s what we call drumbeat marketing: an approach to brand building that emphasizes messaging, discipline and consistency.

A messaging hierarchy defines exactly what your company wants to be, do and say. To create yours, ask yourself the following questions:

• What is your vision?
• What is your mission?
• What do you do?
• Who do you do it for?
• How do you do it?
• What are your differentiators?

3. Identify Your Marketing Channels

The next step is to take your clearly defined message and shout it from the rooftops.

By taking a market-in approach, you should know who your target audience is and where they congregate online. Identify the best channels to reach them and filter your message through those channels in creative but repeatable ways.

An ebook can turn into multiple blog posts, which can turn into even more marketing emails. Or a webinar can turn into multiple YouTube videos, which can turn into even more LinkedIn videos.

Be disciplined. Don’t try to be everything to everyone, everywhere.

4. Be Consistent

Consistency is the key to branding success. From a strictly marketing perspective, only by repeating your message over and over again will it become part of your core strategy and resonate throughout your market.

At a higher level, think of your brand as a consistent set of principles that guides everything your company does: building and selling your product, interacting with customers, hiring employees, etc. When a potential customer reads your blog, watches an executive in an interview or sees your LinkedIn ad, those experiences should all align with how they perceive your brand.

5. Put Your Face Out There

As you develop your startup’s marketing strategy, there is no silver bullet to cut through the noise and have your company be heard. You don’t have the time or resources to do it all, but you can’t ignore it either.

So, start with this mindset: Be OK with the fact that you are the face of the company, and the line between your personal brand and your company’s brand may be blurry.

Leverage your network. Unified voices are powerful, and they give you credibility. The more people that know about your startup, the more it builds up your brand.

Building a Brand Foundation

With the market-in approach and drumbeat marketing, you’re building your brand by delivering a relevant message to the right audience across all of your owned (and later, earned and paid) channels. Every social media post, blog and press release is adding to the foundation. Keep building on that and eventually your point of view becomes associated with your brand in your market — and that’s the ultimate goal.

Remember, every touchpoint that someone has with your startup is an opportunity. If someone walks away unsure of your messaging, it is a lost opportunity. Keep going! Keep building that brand daily!

Does your startup need help with branding and marketing? Reach out to our advisory services team!