In short, branding is the process of developing a company's brand, including a name, identity system, and messaging platform; these aspects will develop what is referred to as a brand message, which will then be applied to marketing campaigns to spread that message.

In short, branding is the process of developing a company's brand, including a name, identity system, and messaging platform; these aspects will develop what is referred to as a brand message, which will then be applied to marketing campaigns to spread that message.

What is a BRANDING AGENCY and how it can help your business?

A branding agency is a firm that specializes in creating and launching brands, as well as rebranding. The role of a branding agency is to create, plan and manage branding strategies for clients, but can also involve support in terms of advertising and other forms of promotion.

In order to develop a more profound understanding of the function of these organizations, it is initially important to capture the idea of branding.

A brand represents a promise to your customers, what they can expect from your products/ services, and essentially what differentiates your offering from competitors. It is a vital element across all industries, as it allows organizations to gain competitive advantage, define a coherent brand communication strategy and increase and reach the target market. All organizational factors, whether it is a business nonprofit organization or even a government agency use branding agencies; Most often, organizations look to hire branding agencies in order to produce a brand strategy and brand identity.

Branding Agency vs. Advertising Agency?

There is generally a misconception regarding the relationship between these two agencies; often, branding agencies and advertising agencies are seen as being interchangeable entities; this, however, is not the case and although they overlap in some respects their scope and focus are different.

Essentially, the difference between these two agencies is the difference between strategy, branding, and tactics advertising.

Brands play a role in a firm's business strategy in, fact the terms company and brand are often used synonymously for one another.

On the other hand, advertising is more focused on the process which firms use to market and communicate to existing and potential customers. A branding agency goes beyond this scope and whilst commonly performing similar services to a traditional advertising agency, is involved in a larger strategical process.

Why is Branding important for your business? - understand branding basics and fundamentals

Why are brands important? Let's take a look at one of the best brands in the world. Coca-Cola. The total market value of the company is around a hundred and seventy- five billion dollars, but one asset, in particular, makes up about 75 billion of that, and it's not the secret recipe. It's the brand.

Brands are both strategic, as well as a financial asset. A strong brand creates customer loyalty and that increases the value of your company, value which can grow if you continue to invest in the brand.

There are many other benefits of brands. Brands allow you to set higher prices for your products and services; people associate higher quality to branded products and they'll pay more than for a generic version, even when the two products are identical why because they trust the branded product more.

Brands make and keep their promises. Once your product is branded, you typically earn a higher market share while lowering your cost of sales; loyal customers don't need to be marketed to as much; with an established brand it's easier to launch new products when consumers see the brand's logo on a new product, they instantly associate the brand promise to that new product from day one.

There are other benefits of brands than just the marketing advantages. For example, studies show that companies with great brands have lower employee turnover.

Popular brands help companies recruit the most talented and passionate employees. Brands create status and esteem for your company in the minds of industry leaders, community leaders, the media, and financial markets like Wall Street; but despite all these benefits, it may not make sense for you to create a brand. There are certain business situations where it would be a waste of money, for example in completely new markets where there are very few if any customers, you'd be smarter to invest your resources in growing awareness and interest in the category first. If you're already the leader with most of the market share creating a brand probably won't pay off.

If you're in a highly fragmented industry with hundreds or even thousands of small competitors, a brand may not be able to reach enough customers to make it worthwhile.

If your business is such that you have only a handful of customers, perhaps even one customer like the government, branding won't do much so take a look at your situation before you jump right into it. But if your business depends on creating loyal repeat customers a strong brand is the surest way to do it.

The branding process has five steps:

First, we have to define the brand and everything that goes into it. A brand is a promise, so we have to clearly define what that promise is and the core values behind it.

Think of the values as the DNA of the brand.

At this step we also define how the brand links to your overall business and other brands that you may have, brands don't exist in isolation, so we have to give them a home so to speak, somewhere in your portfolio.

We also have to define what is called brand drivers. Brand drivers define how the core values will be manifested into the marketing mix or key business processes that support the brand. It's all the things associated with a brand that helps you translate its value into actions.

The next step of the branding process is to position the brand; essentially, we are shaping how customers think about the brand, we identify who those customers are, what benefits they seek from your products and services, and what they currently believe about those products and services versus the competition.

At this step, we're making the direct link between the products value propositions

and the brand promise.

Once you define the brand promise and how its position in the marketplace, you need to express the brand; imagine the brand as a person; a person needs a name, a personality in identity in terms of what they look like.

You do the same for brands.

At this step, we create brand names and logos to help customers easily recognize the brand and remember the promise that it delivers.

At this stage, it's time to build awareness of the brand and put it to work for you.

We do that by communicating it and we do that both internally to our own organization, as well as externally to the market.

Why internally?

Your employees and distributors play a critical role in delivering the promise; they create and deliver products and services that deliver benefits that customers expect given the promise the brand has made.

Keeping a brand strong means we have to communicate continuously and most importantly consistently to reinforce the promise in people's minds.

If you don't, brands lose their value.

Measure the value of the brand or what we call brand equity.

It's what you accrue when you develop, promote, and deliver an authentic brand promise.

As brand equity increases company value, measure the brand's performance. Is it living up to the promise? Is it doing what you expected it to for your business?

The brand-building process takes time and money, but if you do it right, you'll create strong healthy brands that make your business more successful.

Growing a brand or re-branding is a tough job. It requires not only creativity but an assessment of your company’s abilities to keep its brand growing.

Get down to it!

If you’re looking to turn your company into a brand, or re-brand specific products or services, it’s best to reach out to an experienced branding agency that has experience in your niche.

Browse through our selection of top-rated Branding Agencies and start planning your branding strategy today.