What Is Brand Strategy
the issue
The biggest issue in business is convincing people to buy from you. Unless they decide to buy from you, you won’t be able to sell to them - so simple, and yet so difficult!
The Consumer’s Mind
The mind works in a “feel-do-think” sequence. Buying decisions are first made emotionally in the subconscious mind and then confirmed rationally in the conscious mind. Without emotion, no decision can be made.
Brand marketing is, therefore, in essence, a battle for the subconscious mind of the consumer. The biggest challenge is not only to get it to open up to your brand message but also to convince it to buy from you - especially since it does not understand language, resists change and conserves energy to deal with potential threats.
The Planning Tools
Traditional brand planning tools such as the Bulls Eye, the Brand Ladder, and others were originally designed with a think-feel- do understanding of how the decision making mind works. Their structures capture mostly rational brand information for the design of superior value propositions, rather than to persuade the subconscious mind with emotion.
The language of emotion
Evolution primed the subconscious mind to think and learn with story. Stories turn facts into meaning. Stories teach, model, unite and motivate by transporting people emotionally with the help of mirror neurons – when someone tells us a story with the data tucked inside, our brains lock the data onto the feelings we experience while listening to the story.
Emotions are not evoked by the content of the story, but by its structure – the one thing that traditional brand tools were not designed to achieve.
Because stories evoke emotion, clothing your brand truth in stories is the most powerful way to get people to open the doors of their subconscious minds to the truth that you carry.
All great marketers are great storytellers because they know that the brands that win, are the brands that tell the best story.
