In my agency days, I led brand strategy sessions for a lot of our clients. They ranged in industry, size, and type of business — from higher education, to non-profit, to industrial, to big pharma — but over the years, one scenario tended to be pretty common.

A client would come to us because they knew something wasn’t working as well as it could in their business. Their sales team felt disjointed so they figured they must need new collateral. Or conversions were down so the business needed a new website. Or lead gen wasn’t working so they needed a new ad strategy. Or they were getting lost in the sea of competition so they needed sparkly new designs… you get my drift.

For one reason or another, something felt broken in their marketing process, and they thought that if they just fixed this one thing — if they could just slap a quick band-aid on — then everything would come into alignment and the sales would start pouring in.

And, you see, sometimes that is true. Sometimes, if you can find the right band-aid, the bleeding stops and your problem goes away. Those are the scenarios where it truly is just a straightforward issue (the flesh wounds, if you will… *queue Monty Python*) with a simple marketing solution or business tweak to fix the problem. 

But oftentimes, the issue runs much deeper. In these instances, the band-aids are just a temporary fix and the bleeding doesn’t actually stop. So you try one after another (i.e. shiny new marketing solution after shiny new marketing solution) until you’ve wasted lots of money and lots of time, without really fixing the underlying wound.  

But enough bandage and wound talk … I’ve got a weak stomach for blood and it feels like I’m starting to write the next Grey’s Anatomy episode script.

Back to what doesn’t make me queasy. Strategy. And there are two that you should understand (and have in place) that act like miracle cures that get your brand back on track: audience strategy and brand position. You should intimately understand these two essentials before doing anything else. Let’s dig in!

Strategy Steers the Ship

When I say “the issues run much deeper,” what I’m really talking about is strategy (or lack thereof). Brand strategy fuels your marketing. 

Everytime a client would come to us, frustrated by their marketing, the lack of sales, and the disjointed inefficient systems they had, we’d start asking a lot of questions before we even talked about the thing (the website, sales deck, flashy graphics, etc.) that they came to us asking for.

I’d talk with them to peel back their issues, layer by layer, until we could dig deep and identify the root cause. And in nearly every situation, we’d find that their challenges really had nothing to do with their external graphics or marketing deliverables. They were all stemming from something deeper — unclear or inconsistent internal strategy. 

The sales department felt one way about the brand, while the marketing department described the business in a totally different way. Or the business leadership had a specific vision, but the rest of the organization didn’t fully understand it. Or one person thought they were targeting a certain type of audience group, while another person thought a different audience segment was more important. I could go on and on. 

In every situation, there was one critical thing missing — a well-defined, cohesive, and clearly-communicated internal brand strategy. 

Your brand strategy is the single most important internal document to help: 

• Make sure everyone on your team understands the brand.
• Keep all of your projects in alignment with your strategy.
• Make sure all of your external content consistently reflects your strategy in an integrated way.
• Save a lot of money, and even more time, on band-aids.

Now, I’m going to get very blunt with you for a minute (I think you can take it!) — if you’re jumping to project management or visual branding before doing this critical brand strategy work, you’re going to build your business on a shaky foundation. And that, my friend, will eventually leave you with a big ol’ pile of band-aids. It won’t be sustainable for your business in the long run, and you’ll be back wondering why sales are slow and if you need a new website.

There are several components of a well-defined brand strategy, but over the years (and through a lot of these discussions), I’ve come to firmly believe that for ultimate success when growing a business and a brand, you should absolutely know these two important elements: your audience strategy and your brand position. 

#1: Audience Strategy

I can’t say this enough. Your audience strategy guides everything you do. One more time for the folks in the back… YOUR AUDIENCE STRATEGY GUIDES EVERYTHING YOU DO.

If you don’t know your audience strategy, you’re just shooting darts, in the dark, blindfolded, with a moving target, on shaky ground, while juggling fire. I’m kidding…but also kind of serious. I told you we’re getting blunt and direct here!

Your audience strategy informs your…

• Messaging
• Creative tone
• Marketing strategy
• Overall brand

All of these things impact how powerful your branding and marketing can be. And determine how successful and sustainable your sales will be.

Clearly, your audience strategy is a crucial element that you as a business owner must put some serious thought into. But your audience strategy is more than just knowing who you want to serve and sell to. It’s important to define that, but your audience strategy should take it much further.  

To create a strong audience strategy, ask yourself these questions:

• Who are you targeting?
• What do you know about them? What do they need, want, care about, etc.? How well can you describe them? 

And then take it a step further: 

• How are you prioritizing them in your messaging and marketing — yes, you need to prioritize them (you can’t be all things to all people)! 
• Does your audience prioritization (i.e. your primary audience, secondary audience, etc.) support your business goals?
• How closely does your secondary audience align with your primary? 
• Can you speak to your primary audience without alienating your secondary audience? 
• Do you envision needing to reprioritize your audiences as your business evolves?

I do have a full post about audience strategy that I highly encourage you to read. It goes much more in-depth with these and more questions so you can build your audience strategy from a really sound foundation. (There’s a handy downloadable workbook guiding you through it all, too!)

Once you know this essential branding piece, you can think about your brand position, the other important element you must know about your brand before you do anything else in your business.

Related Reading: The First Step to Defining Your Brand Strategy

#2: Brand Position

Your brand position encapsulates all of the critical elements of your brand. And when done well, it clearly articulates how you relate to other businesses in your market in a really compelling way. Because it speaks directly to where you fall in the market, it helps you highlight and express your differentiator, AKA: why people need to work with you.

Your differentiator is a critical element of your brand strategy that concisely tells your audience why you’re better, different, or more compelling than someone or something else. It’s also the stake in the ground — what you want to be known for and the identity you’re building for your business — that your whole brand is built around.

Much like how brand strategy and project management must go hand-in-hand, so too must your audience strategy and brand position. You really can’t have one without the other. Your brand position must speak to your target audience and your audience must understand your brand position to get behind what you’re doing.

Related Resource: Two-Minute Tip: What is a Positioning Statement?

If you can’t clearly articulate what you’re all about, how do you expect other people to understand what you do?

Ask yourself these questions to begin creating a strong brand position for your brand and business:

• What does your brand and your business stand for? 
• What makes you stand out? What makes you unique and meaningful to your target audience? 
• How do you define your differentiator, AKA: your special sauce? 
• What is it like to work with you? What’s your “vibe” or your company culture like?
• What makes your process more powerful/meaningful/impactful than another business?
• Do you know who you are, what you do, whom you serve, and, most importantly, what makes you unique? 
• Do you have a clear way to describe your business and what makes you unique in a way that’s meaningful? 

Related Reading: Positioning Statements: What It Is and Why You Need One

If you’re reading this blog and you feel like your head is spinning because you’ve been stuck in the never-ending band-aid stage of business… that’s okay! It’s alright if you don’t already have a fine-tuned brand strategy (although I’d highly recommend creating one ASAP!). But if I could leave you with one piece of advice to get you started, it would be to pause for a bit and put some thought into the questions above. They’ll help you create a strong foundation for your brand strategy and for all of your future marketing projects. And it’ll save you a lot of time, money, and frustration wasted on short-term band-aids.