Brand Strategy Workshop

Whether you are a small company just starting out, or a large multinational corporation, you have a brand – an image of how you are perceived by others as well as your own employees and community members. You have a brand image whether you know it or not and you have a brand even if you have never done a thing about it (knowingly).

The goal of the brand strategy workshop is to take control of your company brand image, to become the narrator of your unique story. Just like each person has a unique perceived image, every company has a unique image and we are well equipped to curate that image, to manage it wisely instead of others defining it for us.

Participants for the brand strategy workshop should be ​​cross-functional – members from different departments and different backgrounds. Senior members of the organisation need to take part of the workshop for executive support. For an organisation-wide implementation of the results and wider workforce inclusion, the workshop can be followed or accompanied by other similar workshops in different levels of the organisation.

Read more on our blog: 6 Reasons You Need a Company Brand Strategy

Define Your Corporate Identity with Brand Strategy Workshop

2-4 Day Program

Based on the specific needs and organisational DNA, each brand strategy workshop is unique and specifically customized for the client organisation. 

A general workshop structure is as follows:

Preparation

For an efficient brand strategy workshop, we need to start with collecting data – drawing an honest and comprehensive picture of where we are and who we are. These questions need to be answered from both the external (clients, partners, market) and internal (employees, stakeholders) perspectives. It is essentially a 360° evaluation of an organisation.

This assessment can be done in cooperation with an external research partner and/or with internal communication managers.

For a new company or brand, we’ll take a more creative approach to assess the perceived image of the name/idea/market in which the brand will operate. Also, elements that may influence the perceived image – brand of the mother company, founder profile or other.

Cognition

We start off the workshop with a reality check – who we are as a company. We share stories of the good days, the exemplary episodes of the best in us as well as dig deeper into the dark side of our company, our working culture and environment, and our real (not official) values.

We look at the history of the company, its actions and its values. What are the things from history that can benefit us today? What are the things we should let go of? 

We compare our image of the company with the brand assessment research results that we conducted before the workshop to have a clear and vivid reality check between what we think of ourselves, and what others think of us. We determine our brand positioning.

We attempt to put a monetary value on our current brand – how much money does our brand bring in or how much does it cost us? Is our brand helping us sell our products or is it hindering sales? How about our recruiting costs? Or expansion efforts?

It was dynamic and easy to follow.

Alina

Visualization

Once we have done the reality check of who we are and where we stand, we take a tour of the envisioned future and map out where the company, brand, and positioning should be heading.

We start with a visualisation exercise of our perfect company, the perfect working environment, and the perfect common brand. If our company was a human, then who would it be? What would it look like?

We will discuss what we stand for. What are our values and what is our purpose? What do they mean to us? How do we embody these values ourselves? What is our contribution to the world?

We will decide if we, as a company and as a brand are enablers or challengers. Is our brand helping people & companies achieve more (enabler) or is it challenging the status quo (challengers)? Understanding our brand type (enabler or challenger) is crucial for building up the brand strategy, culture and language around the brand.

We take a look at how we can help our customers, our target group or our community outside of our regular service line. We will decide on our corporate social responsibility (CSR) strategy and positioning.

Finally, we conclude the session with a clear mission and vision statement that would consistently integrate the values, the purpose and the essence of the common dream of our organisation.

I appreciate people, who speak confidently about their topic. Erik knows, what he says and it was catchy. He added some fun to the session, too. Also, the place was amazing and cozy.
I have so much brain food now.

Steve

Externalization

The third and final part of the workshop is focused on externalising the company image, and building the brand story. Based on our internal values, contribution, mission and vision, we will create an external narrative for our brand message – generating our unique brand story.

We again attempt to put a monetary value to our redefined brand – how much money should our brand bring in or how much resources should it free up? How will it help our sales efforts, communication, recruiting, expansion and other key performance indicators (KPIs). What are some of the intangible values, our new brand should achieve?

Finally, we will determine how to communicate our story both visually (brand image) and linguistically. We decide on our brand positioning. 

We will document the following steps and roadmap to implement our new brand strategy throughout the organisation.

Workshop Outcomes

The brand strategy workshop results can be used for input within the whole organisation:

• The marketing and communications team can use it for brand positioning, messaging and communications.
• The design and branding team can use it as input for a brand book.
• HR can use it for employer branding and recruiting communications.
• Management can use it for company-wide coherence and communications.

Who is it For?

Company brand strategy workshop suits well for any size company if

• It has not reviewed its brand image, vision and values before or for a long time.
• It has been growing rapidly either horizontally, vertically, geographically or by employee count and the company has changed significantly over the past few years.
• It has recently merged or split.
• There is a feeling of need to change – if the brand, values, vision or other fundamental elements of the company have been outdated.