Becoming a Brand Strategist │The Brand Identity System Fundamentals

1. Introduction: Hello, I'm Liz, a brand strategist and a content specialist. I'd like to welcome you to my class becoming a brand strategist. The brand identity system fundamentals. I help small businesses and entrepreneurs to share the brand messages, branded content and branded stories with authenticity and confidence. And in turn, because they're doing it with authenticity and confidence, they attract the ideal audiences. And these lead generation, I've been in the branding and marketing industry since 2013. I've worked in corporate where I helped to develop brands and I hope to work on the marketing strategies that span across multiple media, from social media to television and to print. I also know I'm very passionate about training and facilitation teaching, where I share my knowledge and help marketers and entrepreneurs to empower themselves through marketing and branding. I created this class because I've seen that designers, one to branch into brand strategy. They want to offer brand strategy as a service to the clients. Since I'm very passionate about branding and brand strategy, I felt like I can share my expertise with you on how to become a brand strategist. Seth Godin says, a brand is the set of expectations, memories, and relationships that taken together account for consumers decision to choose one product or service over another. When we're helping clients with their brand identity, it's important to understand that branding is not just a logo, it's not the visual look of a brand. It's really more about the brands billing, the brand experience. That's the, and how customers experience that friend. In this class thing, we're looking at the brand identity system elements. And understanding those elements will help you to take any brand and help them to be different in any market. Because we're looking at the elements that really make that brand. And becoming a brand strategist. And knowing the brand identity system, you can help brands make more meaningful decisions when it comes to the marketing strategies. Because you are helping them to understand the fundamental elements necessary for brand to be different than the market. So here's this class. For, this class is for designers who would like to offer brand strategy as a Service offering to their clients. It's also for marketers who need to get back to the fundamentals. You need a refresher on the brand identity system. And then it's also for entrepreneurs who'd like to be more empowered or take control of their own branding and marketing. Thank you for watching. I look forward to connecting with you in the class. Bye. Bye. 2. Class Project: I always enjoy when lessons are actionable. And this is why a class project has been included in this master class. For this class project, you can access your worksheet on how to create a brand identity system. You can go through this worksheet in your own time. As we go through the lessons of this class, you can create a fictional brand or use one of your clients brands to fall in this worksheet as we go along class project deliverable is the positioning statement. I want you in that worksheets specifically to focus on the brand positioning statement. The brand positioning statement is essentially where all the brand elements come together. The recipe for the brand positioning statement will be there for you to follow it easily. And then I'd like to share that statement in the discussion section on the project gallery. In the project section, you will also find a link to your brand identity system worksheet. It is a Google doc and the specific instructions on how to copy the Google Sheet into your Google or how to download it as an Excel spreadsheet for you to work on. I'll also leave some other resources and links there for you to read up on brand strategy and the brand identity system as a whole, which can be very useful new career as a brand strategist or designer. And remember, Dan is better than perfect. We are all learners myself included. The purpose of sharing your positioning statement is to get recommendations and feedback. So don't feel shy, share it. You'd be surprised at what type of feedback you can get to spark more ideas for your brand identity system. 3. Defining the Brand Identity System: Before we get going on the separate elements of the brand identity system, I wanted to offer lesson just on what the brand identity system is. And we, I've gathered my information. I've looked at multiple different specialists and branding and deciding what would be best for this class. I've looked at acres brand identity model. I've looked at killers brand pyramid. But I ended up choosing a more simple understanding of branding. And this was color insulins brand identity system. Color insulin is a brand professional and she's also the owner of the brand school in South Africa called beggar. She also has quite a lot of academic articles and a worker is also present in academic textbooks. The brand identity system essentially looks at the core essential elements of what makes up a brand identity. I will take you through color insulins, brand identity system. And in detail, look at those elements, will look at brand purpose, brand vision, the brand's values, the brands mantra and tagline, the brand's persona and personality, the visual and verbal language. And then lastly, we'll also look at a brand positioning statement. So don't wait any further. Jump into the next lesson. 4. Brand Purpose: In this class, we will look at various brand elements that a brand strategist might look at in order to inform the brands day to day behavior. The first thing that's really quite vital in understanding the brand is to really understand the brand's purpose. Now, if you've worked in Corporate, you might have seen that a lot of companies use brand purpose, vision, mission, and value statements, specifically on their websites or company profiles. The brand purpose is important because that purpose is what drives the day-to-day actions of the brand. It's really the most meaningful reason for brands existence. And it's important to understand that because it will essentially give a reason to believe in the brand with its external stakeholders like customers, or with its internal stakeholders like the employees of the brand or the intrapreneur near that runs the business. They need to understand the why. And when it gets tough, they need to really understand what we drive them forward in those moments that it gets tough. It's that goal, the thing that they're looking forward to achieving. Some people describe the brand's purpose as the brands soul or the brand's essence. When we're looking at the soul of the brand or the essence of the brand. We're looking for the real meaningful existence, that more personal connection that a brand has and the impact that brand wants to make. Another way to think of brand purpose other than the brands most meaningful reason for existing is the brands. Why? Now, Simon Sinek speaks about as leaders that you need to start with why? That organizations and companies need to start with the why. Rather than explaining to people what they do or how they do something, it's more important to understand and explain why they are doing something. And this is exactly what purpose encapsulates. It is not only your personal, why is why others should believe in your brand. It's also important to consider that why it should be authentic, it should be something that's real and not a falsehood. Because in the world today, because of the way the internet is, we have access to information in ways that we didn't have before. And we know we are skeptical essentially in a consumer's world of brands narratives. So when a brand says They purpose is that it should be something that is authentic and real and not something that is fake and just used for the sake of getting new customers. Other than needing to be authentic. It also needs to be actionable. It is something that she can put into action, not something unrealistic and unachievable. Brand purpose is essentially the core identity of the brand. And it is what will carry the brand. And it will also impact all the other brand elements that we'll be discussing in this class. According to color insulin, a brand professional and the owner of a brand school called Vega. She explains that brand purpose is central to the brand's positioning because it is essentially how the brand wishes to be experienced and perceived by stakeholders. She goes further and says This implies that a brand was defined and express its purpose for being its value add to people's lives to confirm its uniqueness in relation to competitors. Let's discuss why understanding brand purpose within brand strategy is important. The brands sets the tone for the rest of the brands actions for brand strategists to implement messaging effectively for a business that brand strategists needs to really understand that businesses purpose. When I'm talking of brand purpose as needing to be actionable, We can look at a brand like Warby Parker. Warby Parker is a brand that provides glosses. These types of homes. Two people of the world. And although they do state the purpose and vision and values on their website, they really do action, the purpose. You see that purpose on a larger scale. So it's not just what they say, they actually do to match what they say, to give you an indication of what I mean when I say that they do this, is that the purpose is not something that's purely functional. And lots of times, a lot of companies think they purpose is functional. We're not looking at the functional benefits of a brand here when we're talking about purpose, we're really talking about the more meaningful, emotional, a type of purpose statement that a brand needs to have in terms of how a brand wants to impact the world. In looking at Warby Parker, they functional purpose might be to provide glosses to the world. But for them, the essential core purpose is that they believe that everyone in the world should be able to see that everyone should have the privilege to see, not everyone in the world has access to affordable IK. How is Warby Parker looked at this in terms of the brand purpose? Now, with the brand purpose is wanting everyone to see in the world, they have a business model that actions it called the buy one, give one model. Every time someone purchases a set of glosses from them, they donate a set of glasses to summon the wool that we'd need it. They work with various other organizations to accomplish this goal. Reflecting on this, the purpose is meaningful, the purpose is valuable, the purpose is actionable, and the purpose is authentic and real. That's how you want to look at purpose. In the next video, we will cover brand vision. 5. Brand Vision: In this video, we will specifically look at vision. So what is vision? Vision is essentially a brand's voice at reasonable reason for existing right, its purpose, but in its envision future, it is what the brand hopes to achieve in the future. What type of impact at once to make on the world with its purpose. Important to note that it's not always something that is necessarily actionable right now. It is something that they look forward to in the future that they work towards. It's an aspirational goal that they set for the brand. Color insulin explains that the vision of a brand expresses the purpose for being in the form of an envisioned future. Again, like with the purpose statement, it should be something that is really meaningful. It shouldn't be an empty statement. It should be valuable, authentic. It should be what the brand is really trying to aim for in the future. Its relationship with brand purpose is quite interesting because you might think of it as the brand's purpose and its future form. But you can also think of it as the thing that propels the brand's purpose, right? It's what moves the brand's purpose forward to a specific vision and a specific point in the future. It's also that element that really motivates and inspires stakeholders. Specifically internal stakeholders, the employees, the staff of a company. When I speak about the example later, I will clarify what I mean when I say that motivates the stakeholders. Why is it important to consider a vision for a brand? The world is getting more complex day by day. We were seeing that companies are not always having a really good relationship with the world and its people and with the planet in itself. There's not always a positive impact being made. Or sometimes the impact is the opposite. It's a negative impact and footprint for the future of the world to really change. Companies need to change. And that's what vision comes in. A company that has a vision that works towards a specific goal, is a company that has sulfur way that considers their own imprint on the Wald. It's a company that knows that they need to do specific things if they want to meet that future and if they want to continue into the future. And this brings me to step two of why vision is important. Let's look at relationships to people who want a relationship with one another, need to have the same vision and values. They need to share that because they need to go into the same direction. And they need to understand each other's values or at least respect each other's values. In a relationship where each other's values aren't respected. Or when two people are hitting in completely different directions, the relationship might not work out. Similarly, a brand's relationship with its stakeholders, whether it's the internal employees of a company, or whether it is customers, for instance, need to have shared vision in order to work together to have a good relationship with one another. Statistic shows that customers really care about that. They care about brands who share values with them because they want to support brands that they feel make an imprint in the world and the way they would like to make an implant in the wall. Essentially, brands are making it easier for customers to bring their own personal vision and to live. So if a customer, for instance, once to be more eco-friendly, they will support a brand that makes it easier for them to be more eco-friendly. This is a vision really comes into play. Why is vision important for brand strategists specifically? So full brand strategists, that's quite simple. If you want to work with a brand, if you want to be able to help them with marketing content or with the marketing strategy. You need to first understand way that businesses going. You need to understand where they're headed and why they want to hidden that specific direction. As an example, again, I would recommend to go and look at Warby Parker is vision because I think it's very authentic and meaningful. But let's try a different brand for fun. Let's look at pixel. Objective really has been to combine people's imaginative abilities, the skill set with technology that is available to create memorable characters and awe inspiring stories. Those are stories that really make people feel a specific way, that imprint people in a specific way. It makes an impact. If we're looking at the vision, they stated the vision is to make a great phones with Greg people. Think about that from an internal stakeholders point of view. Think about an employee and how valued they feel when the company that they work for acknowledges they all great people, that they have a great imaginative ability. It motivates them to work for the business. That is how we need to think of vision, right? It motivates those stakeholders. And also it does propel the purpose. Saying, making great films with great people. Essentially, the objective is to make memorable characters. So the vision and the purpose of going hand in hand with one another. So that's it for this specific video. In the next lesson, we will be looking at brand values. 6. Brand Values: In this lesson, we will look at a brand's values. When we're looking at values, we're looking at those belief systems that drive a brand's behavior. It drives the brand's purpose, it drives the brand's personality values when we're looking at humans, it's really what brings us to live to each other. If we're looking at the example of two people in a relationship with one another and having shared values. It's all about them sharing some kind of mindset. Sharing the beliefs they might have of the wall, sharing the philosophies of the wall they perspectives with one another. Let's take me as an example. In my company, one of the most important things is education. Education is a value, I believe in that we can uplift ourselves through learning. It's important for me to commit to something like Skillshare. We, I like to share my knowledge with other people so that they can empower themselves through that knowledge. If education is a core value, It's something that I'm bringing to life in my day-to-day living as a teacher and within my business. In terms of training and development, that's how values work. Again, at something that should be sincere, that should be authentic to the company. Values should be action than a company. They shouldn't just be aspirations that accompany works towards, but something that the people in the organization really believe about the brand and it does bring that purpose to life. You can think of those types of values, the beliefs systems. You can think of it as a compass and the business, It's something that puts the business specifically on a specific journey. If you follow that compass, you will reach that journey. The end point of the journey might be the vision. The purpose is what the brand is doing now, and then the values guide that purpose towards the vision. Why our values really important when we're looking at a company structure and the brand of a company, values are important. Specifically, I think because not just that they guiding the company, but because it's very easy for a customer to see when a brand is being insincere. Values are important because they all that compass, that moral compass that drives the company's actions. And it needs to be sincere in the sense of what a brand does and what a brand says needs to be aligned. Values are also really important because it helps stakeholders, specifically internal stakeholders like employees, to have guidelines on how to work with the brand. So they can try and incorporate those values into the day to day work with the brand when that compass isn't day to guide people when those beliefs and value systems aren't the thing. Stakeholders might not feel as invested to carry on the brand. How the brand might want to be carried on. The brand strategists role is to understand the brands beliefs, understand the value, understand the compass. It's important for them to understand that because they need to create messaging or content or strategies that are all aligned to those value systems of the brand. You might be wondering how do we get to those values? A brand comes to me with a list of 15 values, and I'm not sure that those values necessarily mean anything. What would you do? So here's my little checklist. Firstly, you need to evaluate the brand strings. Look at what the brand is already good at internally, then you need to look at what matters to the brand. Next, you can look at what does the brand stand for. So those belief systems that really matter, those things in the wall that the brand really cares about and stands for what are the consistent behavior as a brand takes? So what actions come up, essentially, what actions are aligned to the strings, what matters and what they stand for. And then lastly, you can also look at what values are needed to implement the purpose and vision. So what values are needed to take the brand from point a to point Z? When we look at, will be pocket as an example, again, looking at the values. They treat their customers the way they would like to be treated. They like to create an environment where employees can think BIG, have fun and do good. They believe in getting out there and they believe green is good. Our customers, employees, community and environment, all stakeholders. We consider them in every decision that we make. Now, looking at the buy one, give one model that they've got. These values feel aligned. They care about, they imprint on the wall. So they care about sustainability. They care about people because they are creating something for people and they're adding value in a different way. So all know when we're looking at those values, those values are sincere. Those values are actionable. Those values, they don't have a long, super long list of values. But there are four core values that they focus on that are actionable. The values are also specific and relevant to them. The values are measurable, Right? They something they can measure the green imprint. They can measure how they work with employees. They can measure how they work with the community, for instance. It's also the values are interrelated. They connect with one another. They are not islands in the sense that these values don't feel like they resonate with each other. For instance, you can't be a brand that k is about values like legacy and tradition. And then also have values like innovation and moving forward and being original and changing things. When you have those values, they don't align or reasoning with each other. Warby Parker, though, those values are interrelated and connected and they work towards the same thing. That's how we want to think about values. In the next video, we will look at brand persona and brand personality. 7. Brand Personality: In this lesson, we will look at brand persona and brand personality. There's been a lot of debates about how brands should connect with people, essentially comes down to, with a brand should be more humane or more human. What are the ways in which brands do this is to bring in a persona or personality. What this means is that a brand looks at specific characteristics, personality traits, and emotions that define the identity of the brand. It's all about personifying the brand so that the brand can connect more easily with people and that people can resonate with brands as if brands were a type of personified identity or entity that they could engage with and purchase from. Collar insulin explains that brand personality presents the character that upholds the brand purpose and that is dedicated to the brand vision. It brings the brand to life. When we're looking at a brand's personality, we're looking at the brand's tone of communication, the brands behaviors. We're looking at, the consistent actions and consistent behavior that carries a brand shoe. And how those behaviors are personified in terms of personality traits. The difference between values and personality traits. Or that values really keep the brand on a specific path. It's that directional compass. Personality traits bring the brand's purpose to life. It brings it to life with emotion and characteristics. Or the way you can think of it is human characteristics that are attributed to a brand, just as the personality should flow naturally from the purpose, vision, and values, it should also come through in terms of the company's culture, the brands messages, the customer experiences of the brand. So why is it important for brands to have a persona, to have personality traits? Essentially, it makes the brand feel more real. It adds layers to the brand, that the brand isn't a clinical entity. That's just the two Saul, Saul, Saul. But that it's an entity that does a lot of many different things towards the goal, the purpose. It makes it more fleshed out. It makes it more relatable for people to associate with a specific brand. So think of a brand like McDonald's. What would you say is the personality of McDonald's? Potentially you'd think happy, fun, friendly, accessible. Most of us would likely have those types of associations with McDonald's. On the other hand, let's take a different brand, perhaps a brand like Microsoft. What do you feel of that brand? What do you think the personality of Microsoft is like? You can only stereotype Microsoft into being a little bit of a nerdy guy. A person who is very knowledgeable, who is very passionate about technology and innovation and wants to share that with the world. So brand personality really makes us think about brands in a very specific way. And without it, brands can feel a bit cold, disconnected from our day to day life. Why is it important thing for brand strategists? If a brand strategist has to help a brand to become alive, to help them across all those brand contact points, right? The contact points, the brand has a point of contact with a customer, for instance, or whether it's through the marketing material. Essentially, the brand strategist needs to understand the brand's personality. They need to understand what type of person the brand would be into, how it communicates with the world. Brand personality could be a little bit more difficult for brand strategists to help a brand with specifically in terms of identifying it, in explaining it, or adapting it. There are few fun tools that you can use to really explore this idea of a brand's persona. The first tool being humans, archetypes, which have been translated in use by brand strategists for brands. So it's brand archetypes. These are 12 archetypes that has defined that people's personality traits. So they personification really fits into, you might find very similar types of personality tests available on the Internet like the Myers-Briggs personality test. This is the same thing, but it fits you into specific archetypes so that you can work with that archetype in yourself. Brands can do this too. And a brand can then be personified with one of these types of archetypes. Archetypes or the caregiver. The rebel, the outflow, the lover, the ruler, the creator, the innocent, the sage, the explorer, the magician, the euro, the lover, and the Jay sta. To explain these archetypes, Let's look at three specifically. Let's look at the creator. The creator is defined by innovation. A brand like Apple really fits this type of archetype, apples about creating innovative technologies. It's about creating new things and changing the way we think about the world through these technologies. The creator is someone who likes to come up with new things to change the world and make a difference in the world. Let's look at the explorer. The explorer is defined by wanderlust. They want to find meaning in the world and explore as much as they can. This is typical of people who liked to go travel a lot. They feel that explorer blood in the minutes part of their personality to travel and see the world G, for instance, fits the explorer. Jeep is about exploring new terrains within the vehicle that you purchase. It's all about if you have the explorer personality like we do, you should drive a jeep. And then we can look at a brand like Nike. Nike really plays into the hero archetype. If you're looking at Knox specifically, there's this athletic drive, this extreme focus, and night really facilitates it. Nyc might be the euro, but really what they try and do is to connect to the euro. Another tool to explore this idea of the brand persona is to go through a brand's personality traits, look at which human characteristics defines the brand. This is when you'll make a long list of human characteristics, personality traits, and making sure that they should focus on the ones in the brand messaging that are aligned to the purpose and vision and values. Using the personality traits tool, if we look at a brand like Nike, the personality traits might be focused, inspirational, proactive, spirited, exciting, provocative. If you've watched one of those Nick videos on YouTube, you'll know exactly what I talk about when I say the brand is inspirational and provocative. It's almost like their main toward driving you to be the Euro. And those personality traits of inspirational and focused and driven really come through the questions to the questions to prompt specific questions that makes the brand or the people the brand. Think about the brand as if the brand was a person. Questions you can ask. What is my brand sound like? One of my brands behaviors? What clothes do my brand way? Who am I brands friends. You can also play a little bit with a brand and ask them questions like, if my brand was a celebrity, who'd my brand B, it will give you an insight as to how the brand personifies themselves. The brand personality is something that you would also plays into the brand style guide when you are designing a brand guide, when you're developing a brand. In the next video, we will be looking at the brand mantra and the brand tagline. 8. Mantra and tagline: In this lesson, we will look at a brand mantra and a brand tagline. Essentially, these are both slogans that the company uses, their short, impactful phrases. The brand mantra is an internal slogan used to inspire and motivate internal stakeholders like employees. The idea of the mantra is that it really needs to capture the brand's essence. It needs to capture that soul, that magic of the brand. It's important to capture the soul because it's really how internal stakeholders will be driving the brand's promise and the brands messages to the outside world. The tagline is also a short impactful slogan, but it's used for external stakeholders. So specifically in a brand's communication to the external stakeholders of the brand, like the customers. The tagline can also be referred to as the strap line. And it stayed to help customers and audiences understand very quickly and clearly what the brand is about. As such, it's important for their tagline to be emotionally connected. You'll often see that taglines are evocative. They're very clear, they're very simple. They're under five widths and total so that they can be easily remembered. The mantra is also like that, but it doesn't necessarily always have to be that catchy. It rather needs to convey information for the internal stakeholders like the other brand elements. The brand mantra and the brand tagline really needs to flow naturally out of the purpose, vision, values, and personality. It's very important for the personality to really come through with the mantra and the tagline. Another quick note is that these phrases can be changed over time. You'll see that Coca-Cola many times have changed the tagline. For instance, this is good. It shows that a brand is flexible, not stagnant, and that they're changing with the times. It should just not be changed too often. To confuse anyone. What does it matter with a brand has a mantra or tagline. So as I mentioned, we, the tagline specifically gives another type of depths to the brand. It's really there to give that extra flavor. Imagine like without its, just do it. Imagine Apple without its think different. Imagine Disney without weird dreams come true. So it really adds that more emotional connection, that memory ability of the brand experience. The slogan as well. If you don't have a slogan that conveys the essence of the brand in a very quick way that gives that information. Your internal stakeholders, your employees, they might feel lost in the process. They might not know how to really convey the essence. So it's almost like a little quick manual that tells them how to interpret and use the brand and present the brand. Why is it important for brand strategist to work with a mantra and tagline? Very often brand strategists will help companies craft a brand mantra and a brand tagline. And it's important that they understand the purpose of the mantra and the tagline so that they can help brands crafted in a meaningful way, in a way that's strategic and that will really make an impact. With taglines. We will be more familiar with them because taglines are open to the public. We know what the strap lines of multiple brands. Whereas with mantras, they aren't open to the public. They're used internally in the company. So let's go through some of these again. But we'll look specifically at it's complementing of mantra as it is the two Dr. employees, for instance, let's start with NYC. The tagline is obviously just do it. But the mantras speaks a little bit more in terms of the technical essence of the brand. Nike's mantra is authentic athletic performance. The one part of the mantra that stands out for me is authentic. Authentic shows that they're away, that the people need to understand that authenticity is important in the representation of the brand. Now let's look at Apple. I think different is the tagline. But we were looking at the mantra. The mantra is smart, technological listen to music. It shows that they understand the value of things like music and what that could mean for the individual. It shows them that these creativity and that as an employee they could be more creative and possibly open minded about the work they do at Apple. Now let's look at Disney. The tagline is we dreams come true. Which makes a lot of sense if you think about the Disney movies and theme park experiences. But what about the mantra? Disney's mantras probably the most exciting for me because it's so easy and simple. Disease mantras, fun, friendly entertainment. So again, that would match externally for a customer, for instance, of a theme park, that they focused on fun friendly entertainment. But for an employee working in a theme park to know that they're all about fun, friendly entertainment. They didn't know how to be fun and friendly and offer entertainment in the theme park. It's so simple and it's so clear that such a great example of a brand mantra. In the next lesson, we will go over visual and verbal identity. 9. Visual identity: In this lesson, we will look specifically at the visual identity of the brand. If you are a designer and you're looking at now becoming a brand strategist or incorporating brand strategy into your work as a designer. This is where your area of expertise will lie. Most people also associate the word branding with visual identity. It's all about the logo and the style guide, and the visual representation of the brand. The visual identity does make a large part of the brand, and it is very important. It is essentially the visual code of the brand. It considers the elements like the brand's logo, the brand's symbols. Looking at the visuals and videos that the brand posts on social media, the visuals the brand might be posting on campaigns. It also considers the personality treatment of the brand in terms of its visual look and feel. So things like typography, colors, and graphics and the way images are treated. That is very important to the visual identity because it relays the personality in a more visual way. The visual identity can also make a brand more unique and more differentiated. Because it's the first thing we see. That's why the visual code, the visual language, is so important. Because it is the first of contact that many people will have with the brand. With it. It is seeing an advert on social media, the bread that they've not known before, or whether it is driving down a street and seeing a brand like McDonald's on the side of the road. Moreover, it's important because it really makes the brand unique in terms of recognizability. Why one phosphate brand looks different to another brand. It gives that additional layer of differentiation. It's also a great opportunity for brand to tell the story of themselves in a visual way. Why is it important for the brand strategy is to understand the visual identity. Why should the designer be the only one who cares about it? Often a designer and a brand strategists can work hand in hand. And it is important for the brand strategists to really look at how the brands messages are going to come to life in a visual way. It's also important for the brand strategists to be part of the visual identity process. Because the brand strategists will likely be the person that looks at that level of consistency that needs to be carried through visually to make the brand very specific and unique and recognizable throughout its lifespan. Let's look at a fun example. I want to show you Burger King's re-brand and how that's really changed. Because they haven't changed their branding and quite some time. And then when they did, it was done very successfully. When they did this re-brand, what they focused on was to make it more modern and to make it more relatable to people. So what they did was they created the logo in terms of the Whoppers, so recognizable as the Whopper, they added Burger King as the ingredients between the two burger buttons. It's a very fun treatment of changing the logo. But more than that, they changed the visual code to include a different color palette because according to them, blue's not a food color. That's not something people associate when they think of a phosphate brand. So they went with a different color scheme that really showed the personality in a different way. It's made the bread or modern. But it has this retro feel to it, which I think is quite cool as a personality trait for the brand. And then they modernized it. These business simplification to logos where the sharp edges, color schemes are not gradient focused anymore. Flat colors are used, lines are more simple and sharper. And that made the brand feel a lot more modern. When they've done this re-brand. Essentially they rebrand the visual language reinterpretation shows the start of a new era. In the next video, we will look at verbal language. 10. Verbal identity: In this lesson, we will look at verbal language, like the visual language, which is the Visual Code of a brand. The verbal language is the verbal code of the brand. The verbal code is really about what the brand sounds like, but also how a brand speaks. That's often how we interpret things like the brand's voice. These are tone of communication. And it's all day to bring the brand to life again, to bring that personality into life. But in a way that's recognizable in terms of how the brand sounds. It's very important for brands to sound a specific way and that they articulate clearly so that when people use the brand, they know exactly what brand it is. They don't need the visuals to know which brand it is the same sheet. I believe that behind each brand is a storyteller. That's storyteller helps the brand come to life. So just as how they are different authors that write books in a specific tone and a specific style. A brand will have a specific tone in this specific style when it comes to the verbal language and communication. In short, it's the verbal expression of a brand. If you're wondering and which elements the verbal language might be apparent. It's very simple. It's unwritten languages well, so we're looking at articles, we're looking at media releases, we're looking at the captions of social media, not just things like a podcast or a video way. A brand has an opportunity to use voice and like with the visual language, why it's important is that it differentiates the brand. It brings the brand to life. It adds another layer to how the brand is experienced and it really makes the brand more recognizable. Also important about verbal language way a visual is very quick in terms of its interpretation. You see an image and that's it. You have the opportunity with verbal language to go on in a longer format, like in an article, you can capture a lot more information and personality in 500 words. Then you can in a social media post with a few lines of caption. Why is it important for the brand strategist? Well, the brand strategist will be vital and bringing the brand to life. So very often, the brand strategists will be part of curating the verbal language of the brand or facilitating consistency of the verbal language of a brand. Again, it's not just the copywriter that needs to be part of the verbal language process. I think it's important to really consider few guidelines when it comes to crafting a verbal language. What would it even mean to craft how a brand speaks? Water brands sounds like it can be as simple as what we say versus what we don't say as a brand. It can also be something like how you have a style guide with your visual language, like a visual identity style guide. You could also have a grandma guidelines guide. This could cover things like capitalization, abbreviation, contractions. What's the vocabulary of the brand? Does the brand use emojis? As an example, looking at emojis, does your brand use emojis in it's Twitter conversations? How does the brand sound? Does the branch sound friendly and accessible? Does the brand sound very serious and authoritative? So these are things that can be added in the style guide, grandma guidelines. What type of vocabulary as excused? So these are the types of things that can be added into the style guide to bring that brand to life in terms of its verbal language. An example that I'd like to use your Starbucks. It is also something fun about the language in the sense that there is a specific coffee lingo that they use and that customer use that familiarizes the brand and makes it more recognizable as Starbucks. And using the word vein t obviously adds to the personality of Starbucks and differentiates them from other coffee brands. But it's also about the brand being more expressive. It shows that they are really passionate about the coffee story. Using a word like venti adds to the coffee experience, rather than using the word Lodge, which might not add anything to the coffee experience. So they treatment of that type of language really makes the brand come to life in a different way. In the next lesson, we will look at brand positioning. 11. Brand Positioning: In this lesson, we will look at brand positioning. I see brand positioning as all the brand elements in the system coming together now, to create a little mini plan of action, it looks at a way forward. It looks at a statement that you can use on a marketing labels specifically. Let's jump right into it. Brand positioning is essentially the brand understanding its position in the market. It is way the brand now citrate. Let's solve in terms of its target market and in terms of its competitors. It flows naturally from the purpose as well. So it's more of a lengthier statement that comes from the purpose. And it shouldn't be created in conjunction with the brand mantra. Because it is an internal statement. It's a statement internally for the brand to use so that the brand and its people understand with saturated than the market. Other ways to think of brand positioning is to almost think of brand positioning as the unique selling point. It's what makes the brand different in the market. There's two terms that I'd like you to consider. The first is positioning and the second is differentiation. Positioning, according to linear Ellis is a meaningful and distinct competitive position in the target customer's mind. So what does this mean? This essentially means that a brand's customer has a very specific perception of a specific brand. So I might have a very specific perception of McDonald's in comparison to KFC. I think of them differently, but in my mind, they different for specific reasons because I've had a specific brand experience with them. My experience has been informed from the actual customer experience of visiting a McDonald's or KFC, or whether it has been from my interactions. The brand on social media, for instance, positioning looks at the target market. Differentiation, on the other hand, is a set of meaningful differences to distinguish a brand from the competition. So it takes it a step further. It makes sure that the brand is differentiated in the market. Looking at other brands who possibly do something similar to watch your brand, does. It gives someone a reason to choose one brand over another. And that's why none of the fast food places in the world look exactly the same. Why is brand positioning important? Essentially, it helps the branch understand the position in the market. It helps them to understand whether they are truly unique and making a unique impact on the world. It also helps the brand to craft a specific perception to make the brand feel more unique. So it's about being more unique, but it's also about helping a brand to craft a unique spot in the market. Why is it important for brand strategist? While brand strategists, that is their job. Their job is often to help position the brand differently in the market so that the brand has a better chance in the market. They are they to help the brand be more unique, to be differentiated, to have a unique position that can come through and helping them to craft brand messaging, hoping the brand to remain consistent, or helping them to craft a brand identity. You might also need to craft a brand positioning statement as a brand strategist. So how would you do that? Brand positioning statement follows a very specific recipe. This recipe contains the following ingredients. A target market, a brand, the brand category, the differentiator of the brand. The target markets need the brand promise or the brand's reason to believe this might be phrased differently depending on the specific race be followed. Some recipes might also include the benefits to the customer. So how their target market need is solved. Or the reason to believe might be the brand promise and certain recipes. But at the core it's actually the same thing. So let's look at an example. So we've dealt specifically with NYC now of u times. And when we looked at night, we looked at Nike persona of the euro. We've looked at the personality traits of being athletic, of being inspirational and focused and driven. Then we've also looked at the brands tagline and the brands mantra. So just do it and athletic performance and authentic. So let's bring this into the brand's positioning statement for NYC. They statement is, for serious athletes, not gives confidence that provides the perfect shoe for every sport. Again, this isn't tonal statements, so we're not a 100% sure that this is Mike's 100% positioning statement. Knowing what we know from like, this is a good statement to look at because they is something true about it. And it will illustrate the example. For serious athletes, that's the target market. It's people who are really serious about the sport that they're in. These are people who are athletic or have a drive to be athletic now gives confidence. So that's essentially they reason to believe they brand promise. They are saying that if you weigh Nike shoes or neither athletic way, that you will feel more confident. And most people looking for athletic way, that's essentially what they want to feel. They want to feel comfortable and confident that they know that they are secure in this way when they are doing the sport. That provides the perfect shoe for every sport. That shows the category or the brands also exist within that category, like Adidas for instance. But way the differentiator really comes in is to speak about that reason to believe that benefit, that brand promise. If you're looking at that, it's not just promising any issue. They've promising the perfect shoe. So we're in the mantra, they focused on performance. You can see this null. There's a perfectionism, the perfect shoe, they promise that they can give you the perfect fit, the comfortable fit, the fit that will make you feel comfortable when you read that shoe. Thank you for watching. These have been the core videos for the class. In the next lesson, I will take you through a summary and final thoughts on the class. 12. Final Thoughts: Thank you for watching and joining me on this journey of brand identity elements in the brand identity system. It's going through some key takeaways of every lesson. Firstly, we looked at brand purpose. Brand purpose as a brand's most reasonable reason for existing. And it's the COI identity of a brand that propels all of the other brand elements for it, the vision of a brand is what helps the brand to achieve its future goals. With both of these elements. These elements need to be sincere and authentic and meaningful, real to the brand. It shouldn't be fake and insincere. It should be something that's really close to the heart of the people who created the brand. And it should be something that the brand incorporates into the day-to-day actions. Next up, we dealt with values. Values are the beliefs of a company. It's the guiding compass to the personality of the brand. Brand personality and brand persona, or brand character traits that uphold the purpose. It's also represented through the verbal and visual language of a brand. We then looked at mantra and tagline. The mantra of a brand is an internal phrase, or the internal associations that motivates internal stakeholders on the brand's presence. The tagline is a phrase that emotionally connect external stakeholders or the brand and brand communication. The visual language is the visual identity elements, the Visual Code of the brand that brings the brand's personality to life. The verbal language is the verbal code that expresses the brand verbally and brings the brand verbally to live. Those are things like tone of communication, brand voice, or a grandma guidelines. Lastly, we looked at brand positioning and brand positioning. We looked at in terms of the brand positioning statement, which helps brands and brand strategists to really understand the position of the brand and how they are different in the market. Feel free to connect with me and other ways as well. You can join my educational Facebook group called conscious entrepreneurs building brand glove. You can also subscribe to my YouTube channel and watch some of my content on branding and business on YouTube specifically. It's different to this because this is more educational nature, but it is nice channel to follow nonetheless, for brand and marketing content. Links for my Facebook group and the YouTube channel will be posted. I'd also like to invite you to kindly leave a review of this class below a reminder, there's also a class project which I encourage you to do because it allows you to really attempt creating your own brand identity system and to attempt being a brand strategist. You can post that either in the discussions on the project section of the class below. And I'd be happy to provide feedback as well on that. I look forward to connecting with you further in the discussion section on the links provided. Thank you. Bye bye.