Branding is not a one-time process.

As the world changes at a faster pace, consumers’ feelings, needs, and behaviors constantly evolve with it. ZeBrand is a branding platform that allows you to build, maintain, and continuously grow your brand so that it always keeps up with changes in the world.

The optimal branding approach from start to growth

At ZeBrand, we offer branding through a foundational process of Define, Design, Deliver, and Refine. This allows you to strategically build a brand while taking the time to revise and assess it, ensuring that it continues to meet your business’ needs.

In this article, we will explain how this process works in practice and what to expect in a brand-building journey. Remember, brand journeys are rarely linear and no two brands are the same, so consider this a framework from which you can find a pace that works for you.

Phase 1: Strategize your brand

The first phase is to build your Brand Strategy framework, where you will define the core pillars and DNA of your brand. Start by defining your mission, vision, and core values, then determine your business idea, target audience, and brand personality.

In this phase, we answer all the foundational questions that your business is based upon: What needs is your brand addressing in the world? Who is your customer and what are they looking for in making a purchase decision? Who are your competitors and what other brands are you most comparable to? What is your purpose and long-term vision that keeps the company moving forward?

If you are unsure where to start or need assurance on whether you’re on the right track,, don't worry: ZeBrand also offers 1:1 Brand Coach sessions with a professional brand strategist to help you polish your strategy and better position your brand.

Features to focus on:
-Brand Core (Brand DNA)
-Business Idea (Brand DNA)
-Mission, Vision and Core Values (Brand Strategy)
-Brand Coach

Phase 2: Design your brand

Next, design how your brand looks and feels: What colors best express your personality? What font best matches your tone of voice? What kind of imagery will you use in communication and marketing collateral? All of these elements–including logo, colors, typography, and photography style– should be informed by the Strategy you defined in Phase 1.

Your design elements will be neatly laid out in a Brand Guidelines document, which can be shared with your team to ensure that everyone is aligned when creating branded assets. Having a consistent look and feel across all media makes you brand that much more memorable to your customers.

ZeBrand also collects your brand assets to your Asset Library, where you can organize, manage, and download the assets you need.

Features to focus on:
-Logo, Color, Font and Photography (Visual Identity)
-Brand Guidelines
-Brand Assets
-Brand Coach

Phase 3: Test & refine your brand

Once you have created your visual identity and brand guidelines, share it with your team so that they can begin applying the brand to marketing materials and collateral. As the team begins to create brand materials, you are likely to encounter some parts of the visual identity or strategy that are not working as well. This is called stress testing when the team tests out the new brand elements and rules to see whether it actually works for their needs. Gather feedback and take notes on what’s working vs not. Then revisit those parts to improve and refine them so that the brand elements better fit the needs of the team.

Continue this process of refining and testing across Phases 2-3 to get your brand in optimum shape. It’s completely normal not to nail the visual design in one go– in fact, refining ensures that your designs are usable and functional, not just beautiful to look at. Again, if you need further guidance or advice on refining your brand, you may consult a Brand Coach at any time.

Features to focus on:
-Brand Guidelines
-Branded materials
-Star Review
-Brand Feedback

Phase 4. Socialize your brand

Now that you’ve gotten your brand in an optimal spot and created branded assets, it’s time to deliver your brand to the world. This is both the most rewarding and most nerve racking phase for your brand as it gets shown to external audiences for the very first time.

To get a sense of how external audiences perceive your brand, use the Brand Feedback Form to take a survey of your customers about your brand’s impression. Their feedback will help you gauge whether your brand is landing with the right audiences and being perceived and communicated as intended. If you discover that there are major gaps in your brand perception, adjust as necessary. Again, this is the same process as in Phase 3 with testing and refining, but now by involving your external audience.

Once you’ve socialized your brand out in the wild for a while, use the Brand Score feature to track and monitor your brand’s performance over time.

Features to focus on:
-Brand Feedback
-Brand Score

Phase 5: Assess and grow your brand

You’ve now mastered the art of testing, gathering feedback, and refining your brand, and as a result, your brand is thriving in the world! When you get to this phase, Take a step back and reevaluate how well your brand is aligned with your business. Do your brand strategy and design still reflect your business today, or are there gaps and misalignments that have emerged over time? This sometimes happens when the business goes through change such as a change in leadership, pivot in business, or team growth. It’s completely normal for a company to outgrow its brand after some time, but it’s important to notice it and pivot the brand to match these changes.

If this happens and you find that your brand and business are misaligned, revisit your Brand Strategy (Phase 1) and Visual Identity (Phase 2) to revisit elements and update your brand as needed.

Features to focus on:
-Brand Strategy
-Visual Identity
-Brand Coach

Conclusion

Once again, branding is not something that is done once and done– it’s a continuous process of creating, testing, reassessing, and refining. This ensures that your brand always reflects your business at any time in its growth, as well as keeps up with changes in the world. We hope to support you on this journey through useful features, reminders, and in-person support so that your brand is able to grow and evolve into its best version, every time.