Developing a minimum viable brand

There are so many definitions of ‘brand’ out there, that it makes it very hard to know where to start developing one – so we go for the obvious – the logo.
“Many of the startups and early stage businesses we see have a very simplistic view of branding,” says Lorinda Wyatt, Managing Director of creative consultancy, Zoo Group in Canberra.
“The perception is that once they have a logo and website they can tick branding off their ‘to-do’ list”.
It’s important to remember though that branding is about relationships. If you think this refers to your customer’s relationship with your brand and how you create and manage it, you’ve missed half the story. The relationship is the brand! Everything you do and don’t do forms this relationship.
Both new businesses and those looking to launch new products into the market need to understand that your brand both fulfils a utilitarian function – fulfilling a promise through a product or service; and it has an emotional impact – that of solving or not solving a problem for a customer.
“Just like a Minimum Viable Product or MVP is about eliminating waste to test the market; an MVB or Minimum Viable Brand eliminates the waste of building a brand that no one wants a relationship with,” says Lorinda.
“While larger or more established organisations have the time and money to conduct extensive brand research, for startups with short runways developing an MVB means you can spend as little as possible in terms of time, effort and money to develop a connection with your customer and learn about what creates value for them.”
Read the full story on Canberra Business News