It’s easy to think of a branding project as an opportunity to look within. That’s natural. Putting your business under the microscope is one part of the branding process. It helps you figure out who you are and what you stand for. But you can’t stop with your own observations. Your emotional connection to your company can obscure and distort the picture.
If you can’t see your business objectively, you’ll need someone with fresh eyes who can. When we start a branding project, we always begin with a forensic review. That’s our term for the detailed research we perform to lay the groundwork for our branding process.
Your brand is about your products, your services, your culture, and your people. But it’s also about how you are perceived from the outside, and from many different angles. It’s about your relative position in the competitive landscape, and the different factors which can alter that environment. It’s about your past, and it’s about your plans for growth in the future.
A branding project is a huge milestone in the life of your business. If you’re going to take the time to completely reimagine your company’s image, you need to figure out the facts first. Our forensic review process is designed to dig deep to uncover the true story behind your brand.
Through interviews with key stakeholders, market research surveys and other investigative techniques, we can uncover themes you may not have known existed. We may reveal hidden conflict you didn’t know was sabotaging your sales efforts. We may find some features and benefits are a mystery even to your internal teams.
We look at all the usual suspects, from competitors to customers to the innocent bystanders (who should be your customers, but aren’t yet.) We profile your target audiences to better understand their needs, desires and concerns. That way, you will be better prepared to meet them.
It sometimes gets messy, but the end result is worth it. A brand that is as authentic and compelling as possible. When your brand gets this real, you can make a real killing in the marketplace.
Don’t believe me? Check out some of our most high-profile cases.