Where is your brand today?
We live in a changing marketplace. Consumer perceptions are ever-changing as well. Consequently, we must assess and refresh our brands.
A brand audit provides an opportunity to evaluate the strength of your brand, to underscore the value of your brand with customers, and to reposition the brand, if necessary, to reflect changes in the marketplace. What’s more, it helps you and your staff recommit to the vision and goals of the business. Finally, it ensures accurate application of your brand across the organization.
We evaluate your brand from both internal and external perspectives, identifying the gaps between what you want your brand to represent and how your customers perceive your brand in the marketplace.
Internal Brand Audit
We evaluate existing marketing strategies, materials, media and communications. We engage with key management to obtain internal perceptions of your brand and how the company competes in the market. We interview employees across multiple levels of your organization to assess differences in internal brand perceptions. And, we review your most current existing customer and market research, including customer satisfaction surveys.
External Brand Audit
Based on the outcome of the internal brand audit, we conduct an assessment of external audiences and their brand perceptions. Depending on your company’s existing and/or ongoing research studies, our team develops a market research program that may include any number of the following types of external studies: existing customer brand perception, research on a competitive set, and prospective customer attitudes and perceptions.

Successful brands stem from solid brand strategies.
To effectively build your brand and create a fully-integrated brand management plan, you must first develop a solid brand strategy. Understanding measurable results to date, specific industry trends and issues that impact growth of the business serve as a foundation for developing and building your brand.
Our process for building a brand strategy centers on:
• Developing the core elements of your brand
• Defining what the brand is intended to represent
• Outlining key business objectives
• Reaffirming target audiences and product/service offerings
• Identifying key differentiators and competitive advantages
• Connecting brand positioning to desired business outcomes

Building on a foundation of careful research and defined business objectives, we develop innovative brand strategies that work. Our brand strategy helps align internal and external perceptions about your brand and creates a framework to address critical issues among your business, your employees and your target market.

Creating a Roadmap for Your Brand
A brand management plan is a roadmap to direct the execution of your brand strategy. It serves as a detailed guide for traveling from your current market position to your desired destination. It also is a tool to ensure that everyone is following the same set of directions and is focused on reaching the same destination. There may be several routes to that destination—some more lengthy, some requiring more detours around unexpected obstacles—and your brand management plan helps everyone navigate this journey successfully.

Building on a solid brand strategy, we follow a three-step process to create a comprehensive 12-month brand management plan.
1. Brainstorm
Using our brand strategy as the guide, we brainstorm with your team about programs, activities, materials and other appropriate marketing and communication tactics.
2. Identify and Prioritize
Our team combines the ideas generated in the brainstorming session with the experience and know-how of our strategy team to identify, select and prioritize the programs, activities and associated tools that will most effectively and efficiently drive business to meet or exceed your goals and objectives.
3. Plan
Based on the outcomes of the first two steps, we develop a detailed 12-month tactical brand management plan that:
o outlines individual activities for implementing initiatives across the company
o designates priorities and assigns timelines
o identifies and appoints the responsible entity for each activity
o details the role of each activity in achieving business goals and objectives
o estimates the approximate costs associated with each activity

Putting Your Brand Into Action
A plan is only as good as what you do with it. MarketPoint works with its creative affiliates and your in-house team to make recommendations and provide strategic marketing direction to help you implement your brand management plan.
From marketing communications initiatives to customer service training and process development, we access the right resources for bringing your brand management plan to life. In turn, your plan gets executed (not stashed on the shelf) and you have the strategic marketing support you need to implement the tools and tactics designed to strengthen your brand.
Working with our affiliate network, we can assist with implementation of projects from concept development to design and production, including:
• Brand identity / Corporate identity
• Brand seminars / Brand training
• Communications materials
• Copywriting
• Customer acquisition campaigns
• Customer service scripting & training
• Financial modeling
• Graphic design
• Internal communications
• Leadership development
• Organizational development & training
• Promotional campaigns
• Public relations
• Sales training
• Search engine optimization & e-marketing
• Web site assessment
• Web site development

Maintaining a Successful Brand

As a brand management firm, our goal is to provide guidance, strategic thinking and brand expertise—not total dependence. That's why knowledge transfer is a critical step in the brand management process. We recognize that part of our success comes from helping you gain the knowledge and skills to effectively manage and implement your strategic brand management plan on your own.
On the other hand, we don’t just up and walk away leaving you to your own devices. Our brand maintenance program provides an alternative—the right balance of support and independence. With our brand maintenance program:
• You have ongoing access to our strategists and their thinking
• We stay abreast of changes in your business and the results of your planned efforts
• We meet quarterly for a team review of your brand management plan, making any adjustments or modifications necessary
Why is this important? Because your plan isn’t static. It needs to be flexible enough to adjust to changes in your industry and in the marketplace. Our commitment to your success extends beyond the plan, but without forcing co-dependencies.

Brand doesn’t happen only in the marketing department.

The process of establishing and developing unique and compelling brand equity focuses an entire company on inspiring its customers. Brochures are not enough.
Every contact you have with your customers is taken into account on a “brand ledger” in their minds. What you say. How it is said. Your actions—and inactions. How you react. How you develop and maintain relationships. Your physical presence. How you handle billings and collections. The effectiveness of your customer support. The quality of your products and services. Your business model. All of these are part of your “living” brand. And they don’t all stem from the marketing department.
That’s why a successful brand strategy requires more than brand positioning and traditional marketing. Creating an integrated approach to communicating and managing your brand is essential. It is only through careful brand management that each individual can identify and champion their role in building your brand—in turn, creating a competitive edge in the market that is increasingly hard to find.
Creating a Roadmap for Your Brand
A brand management plan is a roadmap to direct the execution of your brand strategy. It serves as a detailed guide for traveling from your current market position to your desired destination. It also is a tool to ensure that everyone is following the same set of directions and is focused on reaching the same destination. There may be several routes to that destination—some more lengthy, some requiring more detours around unexpected obstacles—and your brand management plan helps everyone navigate this journey successfully.

Building on a solid brand strategy, we follow a three-step process to create a comprehensive 12-month brand management plan.

1. Brainstorm
Using our brand strategy as the guide, we brainstorm with your team about programs, activities, materials and other appropriate marketing and communication tactics.

2. Identify and Prioritize
Our team combines the ideas generated in the brainstorming session with the experience and know-how of our strategy team to identify, select and prioritize the programs, activities and associated tools that will most effectively and efficiently drive business to meet or exceed your goals and objectives.

3. Plan
Based on the outcomes of the first two steps, we develop a detailed 12-month tactical brand management plan that:
o outlines individual activities for implementing initiatives across the company
o designates priorities and assigns timelines
o identifies and appoints the responsible entity for each activity
o details the role of each activity in achieving business goals and objectives
o estimates the approximate costs associated with each activity

Brand Development Isn’t About Your Logo
Branding is typically mistaken for corporate identity, naming or logos. But these are merely vehicles that help communicate your intended brand. Simply put, your brand is a perception—a concept that exists in the mind of your consumer. It taps into the rational and emotional aspects of your customers’ decision-making process, and creates a point of distinction between you and your competitors. In fact, your brand is the only thing your customer will ever know about you.

A.A.Alvi
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