Brand Strategy
Let’s talk in simple terms about the journey we’ll go through together
126 places creativity at the forefront of all marketing processes to give everyday things a unique, personalized touch and create a one-of-a-kind market offering that resonates in the minds and hearts of a specific audience
At the very beginning, before we dive into work, it’s crucial for us to take an honest look at our own product. We unpack the business to gain a clear understanding of the big picture
We examine it with broad, insightful strokes, aiming to understand how the business appears to those who may not be familiar with marketing
When building a brand, our goal is to make it a pop icon and scale it up. Our brand exists through the people who are interested in it. Without an audience, there’s no brand
We analyze all the audience segments in the market and choose the one to target. We need to understand what excites them, what concerns them, and what we must offer to make them choose us
We focus on a group of discerning customers who always face challenges. By understanding their problems, we can grow in all directions
We will need to work out the strategy not only for the brand but also for the product. For example, questions like these may arise:
«What product is needed right now, what is the demand?»
«We want to create a service and make sure it will work»
Let’s imagine we own a kiosk near a coworking space and can sell anything there. We look at the product and category through the eyes of potential customers
We conduct 10-20 interviews with representatives of the target segment to understand how they perceive our product, what needs have been voiced but remain unaddressed
We research the market and immerse ourselves in the business of the most successful competitors. We aim to understand what drives them, what attracts their audience, and how they sell
It's not enough to simply love or hate them - we need to experience their strategy firsthand. We use various tactics to get them to try selling to us, then we thoroughly examine their entire approach and draw insights
The best part is that we take what works, adapt it to our own strategy, and place the negative feedback in the "taboo" shelf, leaving behind what doesn't align with our vision
For one day, we pause all operational activities and focus entirely on refining our brand.We analyze our competitors and strategize how we can dominate the category. We craft a portrait of our muse - the ideal customer in the category through whom we’ll grow. At this point, it’s just how we envision them
We work to make our brand’s muse more human, imagining who really lies behind the cold, dry research data. We transform into our fiercest competitors, critically assessing them, identifying their biggest flaws, and highlighting the juicy advantages of our brand
By the end of the day, we come up with a brand matrix hypothesis - a positioning proposal for our client, written in their language
A big birthday for our brand is coming. On this day, we’ll unveil the strategy - the guiding vector for all our actions: what we do, what we offer to our people, how we speak, and how we present ourselves
A strategy is needed not only for advertising - it influences the product and internal company processes
We’ll open the world of our brand:
The enemy we are going to fight
The position that will set us apart from competitors and resonate with our audience
Our role in the client’s life
Our mission - the purpose of our existence
What we want to say to the people
The brand will have its own unique voice and character, because the same message can be communicated in countless ways
To ensure the strategy doesn’t die on the slides, we bring it to life in the real world
We’ll create a practical guide for its implementation in our business - a brand book, guidelines, a landing page into the brand world, branded merchandise, and a sticker pack
The problem with a strategy in a PowerPoint presentation is that you don’t want to follow it. A successful slide should be easy to turn into a sticker. If we’re too embarrassed to put the brand mission on our laptop, it’s time to rethink the mission
Now that we know what to say, we need to figure out where and when to say it. With a defined segment, strategy, and media budget, we create a battle plan to capture people’s attention
To do this, we research:
What media does our audience use?
How many competitors do we have?
Is there any advertising at all?
We analyze all this and turn our findings into a comprehensive media plan in a large Excel spreadsheet
We work across all possible channels and combinations, with a clear focus on smartphones (Phone channeling), but we don’t forget about traditional media channels either
After the strategy presentation, the work of the strategists doesn’t stop
As John Hegarty (or someone else) said, there’s no such thing as a good strategy - there’s only good advertising
We need to fuel creativity with one simple, standout message that we want to shape into something creative. The brief also serves as our opportunity to share key insights and findings from the interviews that could spark the next big idea
After the briefing, we remain actively involved in the review process to ensure that the message is effectively conveyed in the creative
In an ideal world, the team would have no questions or disagreements after the briefing, but we know that real creativity often comes with discussions and refinements. Our role is to guide the team, ensuring the strategy stays true throughout the creative process
Once the strategy is implemented and clients leave, one by one, without hesitation in confessing their love for us, we continue our market research. We plan how to capture new segments and attract more experienced (and wealthier) players
Because they still don’t know what we know
That you are the best thing that can happen to them in the market
Your brand isn’t money - it won’t please everyone. But at 126, we know exactly how to ensure that no one stays indifferent
