4 Basic Rules for Brand Survival

brand strategy

4 Basic rules the top brands are using to ensure brand survival

Branding is one of the key areas a business should focus on in order to differentiate themselves within a crowded market. Brands that we have grown to love, would not have had such an immense impact if they had a weak brand. To become a truly successful brand within the market, businesses need to get their branding right. It needs to be based on a defined set of guidelines, which can be used and applied across all chosen communication platforms.

Brands should be working towards creating a brand that is trusted, reliable and loved. Here are four branding rules which facilitate brand survival:

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1.Be unapologetic for your brand’s strength: in order for a market to improve and progress, a very simple process needs to occur – weak brands must die and strong brands must be the ones that kill them. Within overcrowded markets, characterised by many brands providing the same offer of value, competitors need to be eliminated in order for the strong brands to truly delight customers.

brand strategy

2.Don’t forget where you started: a brand should ensure they always maintain the core reasons for why the brand exists. While changes to accommodate for evolving market trends is necessary, the underlying benefits should always remain the same. A brand usually starts with a founder investing their own identity and experiences into a vision, and creating something truly special, and this should always be maintained to create a compelling differentiating factor.

branding strategy

3.Understand your consumers: the level of information a brand possesses about its target audience has a direct correlation to the brand’s overall success. Some of the most successful brands have accumulated decades of market knowledge, and still continue to invest heavily into acquiring new information about their target audience. Market knowledge allows a brand to position themselves in a manner that is intriguing and relevant to the target market, allowing for greater success.

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4.Embrace disbelievers: it is almost impossible to create a message, solution or market offering that caters to every person’s individual needs. Consumers possess varying beliefs, preferences and tastes, which are all satisfied differently. ‘People pleasing’ generally leads to creating offerings that are generic and lacking of any authenticity. As a result, a brand should never endeavour to satisfy everyone, and disbelievers should not be taken as a negative sign, instead it should be taken as a sign of market success.

New brands come and go all the time within any market. The ones that possess true staying power are the ones that are relentless, understanding and authentic. If you look at any of the most successful brands in the world, they have adopted each of these rules to a certain extent. From Apple to Google to Coco-Cola, they are happy to go head-to-head with smaller brands, they remain true to who they are, they have a comprehensive understanding of their consumers and they embrace disbelievers, but maintain focus on their supporters.

Simon Wang
Strategy Intern

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Photos by Sushobhan Badhai, AbsolutVision, on Unsplash, Pixar & Apple.

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