What's up brand builders Stephen Houraghan here at BrandMasterAcademy.com and in this video you're
going to learn eight brand communication strategy tips and techniques so you can
strategically shape how your brand is perceived to influence your audience and their decisions
now if you're new to the channel and you want to build brands that go beyond the visuals and
the logo using strategy psychology and creative thinking and you're in the right place hit that
subscribe button and the notification bell if you want to fast track your results make sure you grab
the pro brand strategy blueprint to free download and the link is in the description now the word
branding has many convoluted interpretations and one of the most common is that a brand is a logo
or a visual identity now although the visual presentation of the brand is very important it
pales in comparison to the importance of a brand's communication and messaging strategy a brand is
nothing if not a means to provide the audience with a compelling and consistent reason to choose
one brand over another or to choose that brand over its competitors brands that place a heavy
emphasis on how they communicate their message are at a distinct advantage to those visual brands
so in this video i want to give you eight tips to help you nail your brand communication strategy
and better resonate with who your audience is tip number one segment your market now every
market is made up of different groups of people which are referred to as market segments now the
people within each segment share more relevant characteristics with each other than they do in
those in other segments so when you segment your market and you identify the segments that you
want to prioritize your chances of landing your message significantly increases so make sure you
take the time to dissect your market and identify those who you want to target as a priority tip
number two create detailed audience personas so for each market segment identified you want
to create a highly detailed audience persona to bring the details of that group of people to life
who are they where do they live what do they drive what do they like to do on weekends this persona
brings some individual tangibility to the group of people in your target segments but this is
still just the starting point demographics and psychographics outlining the circumstances and
habits are just the basics but in reality you need to dig a lot deeper to be able to develop
brand communication that really connects tip number three clarify the unique challenges
so what makes one market segment different from the next is not about their demographics or their
circumstances of their lives of course a group of people earning 150 000 or more per year represents
those who can afford more of a luxury brand but demographic segmentation is simply not enough when
you understand their behaviors objectives and more specifically their challenges and the emotions
connected to those challenges you have many different angles that you can truly resonate from
so after segmenting your market and creating your personas be sure to get the clarity of the unique
challenges and pain points that each market segment had tip number four agitate the problem
now when you have clarity of the challenges that your audience has and the potential
impact of those challenges and pain points and fears connected with them to their lives then
you have a problem that you can help to remove now this problem if it goes unresolved will take your
audience in a direction that they don't want to go now some people are well aware of this but others
will happily put their head in the sand until it's too late either way a reminder gives them a chance
to change their course so by agitating the problem and highlighting the potential consequences of a
non-response you really help your customers to see the potential danger and give them an opportunity
to do something about it in that moment of realization of impending danger or consequences
they're significantly more likely to take action to correct their course tip number five speak
directly to your audience persona so when creating website copy or social posts or advertisements or
any other form of brand communication the message shouldn't be directed at the entire market or even
a market segment it should be directed at a single person within that group which is manifested in
the audience persona otherwise known as a buyer persona or a customer avatar brand messaging that
speaks to a single person is far more effective connected unbelievable when compared to messaging
or copy that addresses thousands or even millions of people and this is why creating a detailed
audience persona is so important when you know who your audience is when you know them well enough to
the point that you feel you know who they are and you can relate to them then you can create
messaging that is far more likely to land tip number six use stories to align with their journey
now stories are without question one of the most effective forms of communication
known to man or woman story based communication has been used for millions of years as a means to
pass on valuable information from one generation to the next and this is long before writing or
any other complicated form of communication was formed so the reason that this is so effective
is that it's now in our dna when we hear story we gravitate towards it and it opens a loop
that needs to be closed with a resolution an outcome or an ending so if you can weave your
brand into a story that aligns with the journey that your audience is on your brand will register
with them in a way that fact-based communication just can't compete with tip number seven lead with
personality now at the core of every brand should be a differentiation and positioning strategy
to highlight why the customer should choose them over their competitors now often the differences
are fundamental buying decision factors that compel the audience to take action though these
differences can have some support as humans we are simple creatures and some of our behaviors
are still very primitive for example if i'm in a foreign country in a room full of strangers and i
hear a familiar accent i'll gravitate towards that accent because familiarity represents safety in
numbers on a primitive level if something happens then this person will protect me and i'll protect
them now all of this is subconscious but it really does dictate how we behave the more familiar you
can make your brand feel to your audience the more likely you are to connect and resonate with them
on a personal level and it's a much more effective way to communicate and it makes the brand feel
familiar to who that person is so later brand communication with characteristics and traits
that your audience will gravitate towards and make your brand feel more familiar in doing it
and tip number eight use a messaging framework so before you communicate your brand effectively you
need to know what you want your brand to say now a core message is traditionally seen as a distilled
paragraph of text that represent the meaning you want to put into the market about your brand but a
single body of copy isn't enough to influence your brand perception in the market instead identify
the key messages that you want your audience to understand about your brand and develop a
framework of these messages to put in place into the market with consistency and time these key
messages should shape the brand reputation and ultimately grow the brand's equity now look this
is only a short list of a tips but in reality there are countless ways that you can connect
your brand with your audience once you break free from the idea that your brand is something visual
you can open up the world to what it truly is a way to communicate what your brand means and how
it fits into the lives of your audience it's the minority brands that get this right that have a
distinct advantage to the majority visual brands of the world if you want to learn more about brand
messaging and the six principles you need for an effective messaging strategy well then this
video will help you out until next time brand like a master and i'll see you in the next video