This article was excerpted from OPEN Book: Branding, which provides tips and advice for building a Booming brand. Follow the evolution of a Cardmember brands featured in our new web series Project RE:Brand in which small businesses undergo brand makeovers by design experts. 

Building a brand requires assessing your own enterprise as well as the environment in which it operates. Here, we walk you through the steps to creating your brand – from defining your brand proposition to managing the design process, to launch and beyond. 

Branding, or rebranding, is your chance to examine, refine and communicate exactly what your business is about. What values underpin your company? What does it stand for? What is your competitive advantage? “Defining your mission as a brand and a company is the most important part of the whole process,” advises Stefan Boublil, Creative Director at The Apartment creative agency. “Every decision that you later make in the life of this iteration will be measured against the principles set forth here, hence it should be should be precise, condensed and honest. Get this right and the rest of the operation shall be a breeze!” 

It helps to visualize your typical customer, including their life stage, priorities, purchasing habits and media consumption. Where possible, back this up with research – look for metrics and statistics in your own business, or a competitor’s if you’re just starting out. American Express Business Insights (businessinsights.americanexpress.com) utilizes competitive and market insights to deliver customized brand research specific to geographic areas. To start a conversation with your customers, you first need to know where to find them; then you can determine how best to communicate with them. Are they local, or passing pedestrian traffic? Perhaps a local advertisement or a revamped storefront is the best way to elicit interest. Are they online, and if so, which sites are they visiting? Check your answers against your list of touchpoints to make sure your brand covers all the bases. 

STEP 3: Get to Know Your Competitors 

Find out as much as you can about your peers and competitors. What are they doing right? How are they advertising to your customers? What makes them stand out? Collect examples of branding you like, whether it’s from your direct competitors or elsewhere. It could be a logo, an advertisement, packaging or a tagline. Figure out why you like it – this will really help inform your own design process. 

STEP 4: Create a Brief 

Once you’ve defined your touchpoints and conducted some basic competitive research, you’re ready to start the design process. First, you’ll need to put together a brief to distill all your thinking and requirements into a plan of action. Ask your branding agency if they have an existing brief you can follow. The brief is a document that will guide the design and development of your brand. It should summarize your research, best practices by competitors, elements of other brands you find relevant and reasons why. It should also include your mission statement, your required touchpoints and any current branding (if you’re an established business). Essentially, it should contain everything your design team needs to know to create something that’s right for you and for your business. Once you’re satisfied that the brief document does this, you’re ready to pass it to the design team. 

Make sure you agree on a budget, process and a time limit for the design phase in order to avoid spiraling costs. As a basic rule, it’s a good idea to have at least one rough draft of designs, after which you’ll give feedback, followed by two or more rounds of design refinement. Your design team’s first presentation may take the form of a mood board – essentially a visual scrapbook that captures the essence of your brand. Is it formal, carefree, smart, fun, outlandish, traditional? It’s vital that you’re in agreement. 

Next, you should see the design team’s initial ideas for some of the core brand elements, such as a logo or logotype, tagline, brand-positioning statement or even product names. When reviewing any materials, ask yourself: Is it aligned with your brief? Does it reflect your mission statement? Did they capture the true essence of your business? 

The next check-in point should include several different designs for your core brand elements. At this stage you and your team need to make several critical decisions – which design you prefer, color palettes, and any major adjustments needed. Circulate the work to others not as immersed in your brand as you are, including friends and family, to see what type of response it elicits. They may identify things you don’t see, as impartial observers. The next time you see the revised designs, they should need only minor tweaking. At this stage, you should also see how the new brand looks applied across the major items on your list of brand touchpoints. 

STEP 6: Bringing the Brand to Life 

Launching the brand to your team should inspire and empower them to become its guardians. Unveil all the elements of the new brand including your brand guidelines and enthuse the whole team about your new public face. (See page 14 of this guide for more on creating effective brand guidelines.) 

GLOSSARY OF BRANDING TERMINOLOGY: 

Brand Elements 

Brand elements are the various items that together make up your brand’s visual identity, such as a logo, color palette, and typefaces.

Brand Guardian 

Your Brand Guardian ensures that your brand elements are applied correctly – they’re the “go-to” person with whom to raise any brand-related questions. 

Brand Identity 

Together, all of your brand elements (see above) make up your cohesive brand identity. 

Brand Proposition 

Your brand proposition is your elevator pitch, encapsulating what your brand stands for, what makes it different, and where it’s going. 

Brand Strategy 

Your brand strategy is your plan of action, including an overview of your strengths and opportunities, brand values and proposition: it’s a blueprint for where your brand is going. 

Brandmark 

A brandmark is a graphic or illustrated logo (as opposed to a wordmark – see below). 

Brief 

Your brief is a document containing everything your design team needs to know to properly capture the essence of your brand, including proposition, values, an overview of your audience and competitors, your objectives, touchpoints and deliverables. 

Logo 

Your logo is the visual shorthand for your brand, and can be either word- or image-based, or a combination of the two. 

Tagline 

A tagline is a slogan that communicates the essence of your brand and is used alongside your logo or in advertising as a sign-off. 

Touchpoints 

Your brand’s touchpoints are the ways in which your consumers encounter your brand, be it in-store, online, a business card, packaging, or advertising. 

Wordmark 

A wordmark is a logo that’s a typographic treatment of your brand name. 

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