Branding in terms of hamburgers

When thinking about brands where do you start? The first thing that springs to mind might be a logo or perhaps a signature color. What stays in your memory year after year is the impression the brand makes on you time after time, through color, messaging, photography, graphic design, and more. With brands being more and more visible through social media, there’s never been a more critical time for comprehensive brand identity. Understanding your audience, who they are, and what they respond to, is essential to providing a good brand experience. A good brand goes so much further than just aesthetics. Strong brands are built on the emotional response they want from their audience. Understanding your business goals, unique offerings, and positioning is the foundation of a strategic brand.

Only when you know your WHYS can you design your HOWS. How does Nike empower their customers to feel strong, motivated, and brave? The slogan “Just do it” is only the tip of the iceberg. They consistently create empowering commercials featuring best-in-class athletes and people who have succeeded despite great obstacles. When you buy Nike you aren’t just shopping for shoes, you are buying into the dream of achieving greater things. The logo is just a tiny piece of that.

A bank needs a logo to appear reputable, established, and responsible. An ice cream shop needs a logo that provokes a sense of nostalgia, youth, and fun. Of course, there are aggressive outliers to these tropes, take for example “Liquid Death” canned water, which flipped the typical water messaging on its head and did the exact opposite. Their brand certainly did not begin with the logo, rather, it began with the conversation “What can we do DIFFERENTLY in water and WHO can we serve.”

A strong brand should have the answers to these core questions:1. Who do we serve?2. What unique thing/service do we offer them?3. How do we want our audience to feel?

Want to get to the bottom of these questions and more? We can help!