7 Qualities and Characteristics of a Brand that Make Your Business Stand Out
Certain qualities and characteristics of a brand can distinguish it as a leader and powerhouse in any industry. A brand is the sum of everything you do. It’s not just a logo or tagline but your promise to customers and stakeholders that sets you apart from your market competitors. Your brand isn't just what you say about yourself; it's also how you behave toward your customers, conduct your business practices, and navigate your competitive landscape.
1. Purpose
A brand must have a purpose; a brand purpose explains why your company exists, what it stands for, what it does, and wants to achieve. The best way to present your brand purpose is through a positioning statement. This statement should be short, simple and memorable. It must communicate your brand's essential values and philosophies and how they are applied in practice through your business.
2. Clarity
Clarity is the ability to communicate a message in a way that is easily understood by your audience; it’s an essential part of brand identity and can make or break your business's success.
Being clear in your brand messaging through your visuals, statements, business practices, and beliefs contributes to the transparency and credibility of your brand. Clarity in your brand is deeply rooted in your brand values and core principles that guide and define its essence. It ensures that your audience knows exactly what your promises are without worrying about fine print or unspoken words that would cause cracks in their trust.
3. Consistency
Consistency helps convey authenticity and integrity to potential clients and customers. Trust is built by repetition through consistency, which is heavily reflected in the ISDL strategy and brand workshops. Consistency builds credibility with your customers because they can rely on your company to provide consistent products and services whenever they interact with you. Customers know exactly what to expect and feel safe building an ongoing relationship with your brand.
Consistency in your brand identity, messaging, and visuals proves that your brand is unmoveable and reliable. It can navigate the competitive landscape to stand the test of time without losing focus on its purpose.
4. Simplicity
Similar to clarity, simplicity is an essential quality of a brand because if your target audience needs time to figure out your brand, they may turn away.
Simplicity in developing a brand also takes a ‘less is more’ approach to design elements. If your business is in a more complex industry, it’s all the more effective and crucial for your brand to simplify. Try to keep things simple whenever and wherever possible, even if that means doing away with some bells and whistles. Present your information clearly to make it easy for your target audience to connect with your brand.
Avoiding over-complicating things that don't need to be complicated and remove anything that may block a customer's buyer's journey and dull their experience.
5. Authenticity
Honesty, sincerity, and genuineness are essential qualities for any brand. You risk losing their trust if you're not honest with your customers.
Authenticity encompasses all facets of your brand and translates into your brand identity. Your audience will be able to know if your efforts are authentic or not. Your brand purpose is represented and exercised through business practices and interactions with your audience.
Creating an authentic brand identity is the best way to build rapport with your target audience by understanding and capturing their demographic and psychographics that define their universal desires. Suppose you are a company that targets individuals in their 20s. You’ll create a brand and conduct your decisions that speak to this demographic, and as a result, your company will look different from that of a company in the same industry that targets individuals in their late 40s.
This research and attention to detail prove that you’re looking to attract the right customer. In that case, they'll be more likely to develop a lasting relationship with your company than if they feel they've been sold something fake or insincere.
6. Distinctiveness
Your brand should be unique, not just a copy of another brand. It’s essential to have your own identity and not just be a carbon copy of another company or business. Your company needs to be memorable and recognizable in customers' minds so they can easily identify with it and remember it when searching for products or services online or in person.
A distinctive and thorough brand should have secondary and complementary assets to offset the primary assets. Whether this is represented through additional visual assets such as colour palettes, statement art, typography, patterns, photo treatments, or even through the products, packaging, swag and services of your company, it must be more than one simple logo.
This attention to detail sets you apart from your competitors and supports your brand purpose by laying down the foundation of a distinctive brand that's here to stay.
Laws and Regulations
Another consideration and benefit around ensuring your brand are distinctive is awareness of laws and regulations. Creative branding laws and regulations are complex and oftentimes jurisdictionally distinct; certain laws and regulations can vary based on the industry. Industries such as cannabis and alcohol will have tighter branding regulations than the fashion and consultant industries. This requires all business owners to conduct their due diligence to ensure that all aspects of their branding are in place to avoid copyright infringement and legal action from competitors and other businesses.
7. Persona
Your brand persona is your brand's personality, a combination of your values and beliefs reflected in how people perceive you.
When building a brand persona for your business, think about what kind of person or character best represents your company in the eyes of its customers. Utilizing personification and analogues can help draw contrasts and comparisons, which can help identify your brand’s specific archetype and bring a universal quality and authenticity to brands. This will help you create an image that will give customers an idea of what they can expect from their interactions with you.
Harness the best qualities and characteristics of a brand so your business will stand out.
These are key characteristics and qualities of a brand that can help businesses stand out. A brand is more than just a logo; it’s the many aspects that make people choose you over your competitors. It is what sets you apart no matter what industry you’re in.
A successful brand has qualities and characteristics that make them leaders in their industry that can leverage their influence to help their target audience. The next step in your branding journey is developing a brand name for your business.
Thinking about re-branding or launching a new brand? Take a look at our blog post on How to Come Up With a Brand Name.
