Brands Are First Created By Visionaries

In our last blog post, I brought to you the idea that companies need visionary leaders. Leaders who are strategic risk-takers and that this is crucial to the success of the company.

I believe that another crucial aspect of your success is your brand.

This may be glaringly obvious, but in the day-to-day management of brands, especially in large corporations, it’s easy to forget that “back in the day” someone created the brand. A deep and clear understanding of that person’s vision and what they intend to create and build is important. All too often, brands that fade forget this, and instead start chasing and following others, versus embracing and owning their original vision.

When creating a brand, visionaries focus on three things:

Gaps and Opportunities:
Visionaries see a gap or an opportunity which is not being met by existing players. They don’t always look at how categories are defined today, but rather think about what the end user needs and wants – instead of trying to fine tune and tweak what exists.
Uniqueness:
Visionaries have an idea and angle that is different, unique, or better at meeting their customer’s needs than their competition.
Clear and Simple Rallying Cry:
It’s something for employees and end users to identify with. Visionaries have passion, persistence, and philosophy, and a rallying cry to focus and motivate the masses. It’s not constrained by the status quo that many markets settle into and existing players work towards.

For branding to play a pivotal role in the company, it has to have strong support from the leadership team. Only when your strategy is aligned with the branding strategy will the company attain a unified direction both internally and externally. Further branding equity can be optimally leveraged only if branding allowed and supported to play the following roles:

Shapes the organizational culture
Creates a consistent organization-wide mindset
Creates employees who fight for the company
Causes others to notice the company’s impact

Many of our clients struggle to put their vision into action. Luckily, we’re here to help. Reach out to us to get started today.

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