25 October, 2013

Barriers of a Brand/Branding

Building a Quality brand

Last week, I talked about ways/steps to build a Quality Brand. I gave tips that would take you step by step into creating and selling your brand i.e. Identify what a Brand is, what are the components of a Brand, Packaging, Brand management and Strategies to sustain your Brand.
Strategies to sustain your Brand are the things you have to do to keep your brand trending. Its all about AIM, MARKET AND STRATEGY.


Before creating your brand you would have an AIM (what you hope the Brand achieves), MARKET (your prospective consumer/customer/client) and you would need to put the right STRATEGY in place to get through to your preferred MARKET.
To get through to your preferred market, the strategies you employ must overcome/break certain market barriers.
I should begin by stating that the growth of a Brand is determined by the barriers it’s willing to overcome, the tools being used and the timing employed.
To stand out as a Brand, you have to know the right tool to use which would save you cost and time to give you outstanding results.

Some of the barriers includes but not limited to:
Competition: what is your close substitute or major competitor in your line of business?
Your answer to the above question would help you with your feasibility study (identify their selling point & market response). You can then develop your product with improvement to the market demand which would give you an outstanding result because you just filled a need.
              Location/localization: where your product is going to sell from is an important key.I would advice that your feasibility should be well conducted to put you in the right location where you have easy access to raw materials, production equipment and your preferred market.
 Technology is an important tool to use to get your product out. So your location can also be the internet (website, social media etc).
Whatever you do, be accessible.
Timing: time is an important factor in life. There is a cliche that says TIME IS MONEY.
Your response time to demands sells a message of your Brand. You need to put TIME in consideration for any thing you hope to do i.e. production time, service time, response time etc.
Financing: do I get a sigh…hmmmmmm? We all know that finance is key to production. We need money to buy raw materials, market our goods and services, pay employees etc
Always try to buy what you need. Carefully plan your funds to give you optimum return on your investment.
Consistency: the idea your brand sells to your customers is what they would take to their friends (good or bad). Coca cola as been said to be the world’s no.1 brand by many certifying body. Why you may want to ask? Consistency
Every bottle of coke you take gives you the same taste and refreshment that you desire. That’s consistency of a Brand. You need to be sure that you can be consistent at delivering the service /product the way your consumer/customer/clients want it because in the end a Brand is made by its purchase.
I believe you have been able to learn something from all I have said. Please, feed us back to serve you better. Post a question, comment, tweet, RT, Facebook it to empower more people.

Warm regards,

Oyebolu Abiola.