Brand Consulting: Extensive Review

What is brand consulting?

The most remarkable results of carrying out a business revamping are achieved with the implementation of out-and-out strategy. Defining the consulting for brands, it’s suitable to say that it refers to providing branding services, intended for enhancing experience of engaging with a brand, realising a conception of desirable positioning and analysing the market.

Consulting brand is purposeful for supervision of companies from the moment of their establishment and continues throughout their existence, even when a particular business becomes a part of Fortune 100. Applying for such a service can bring a company two valuable outcomes – the plan of expanding the business with certain steps, tactics that are backed up with market insights and laying the foundation for new breakthroughs in the future.

The Importance of brand consultation for your business

The value of brand components doesn’t lie in their possessing, but comes from the benefits they bring to a business. Without a deep grasp into the market, lack of strategic expertise in, you can’t say for sure if your brand works on its full. Therefore, let’s explore why a consultation is significant for a newly formed business and for a veteran one as well:

Turning your logo and naming into assets

You have probably had a logo and a naming, yet an analysis from a brand consulting agency whose knowledge of the market is comprehensive and understanding of how brand elements influence the business is all-embracive, will be rewarding for your business. There are no limits for perfection, yet with strategic insights you could obtain not only aesthetic lines and graphics, but effective assets that, the concept of something remarkable, going above and beyond itself.

Establishing consistency and authenticity

The publications you post, the photos you choose, the ideas you promote – they should align with your brand’s core, supplementing it in every aspect. There mustn’t be disagreement in your values and your strategy. All the elements of your brand to be effective should be harmonious, regular and true. Consultants, who have been in the trenches, are able to help with setting up the rules of how to follow these guidelines.

Facilitating strategic growth

The aim of market expansion with the proper brand consulting will be easier achievable than random exploration of possibilities. A seasoned expert with verified market data will thoroughly analyse which actions need to be taken in order to appeal to new audiences, maintain loyal customers and stay relevant for a long period of time.

Experienced advisory

Wishing for capturing new markets, forming a group of loyal customers that will wait for every new product or service, winning their hearts over your competitors’ efforts is something that needs groundbreaking decisions. Relying on the feelings and neglecting the deep expertise of the market that could give you a clue whether people are waiting for your offer or what you propose now is outdated and won’t be accepted well, might be a losing game.

Supplements of other initiatives

In the case if you want to collaborate with another brand, launch a new marketing campaign or change some core elements of inner or outer processes inside your company, aid in the form of brand strategy consultancy will be of great use and secure the success of your initiative. Possessing extensive knowledge on the matter of which pitfalls can await, the risk that arose and how to deal with them or even prevent making some unbalanced decisions is beneficial.

What do brand consultants do?

The extent of brand strategist support totally leans on the way this professional works. They can work solely and be a part of an agency that also affects their capabilities. An individual consultant is capable of many things, yet it’s obvious that one’s strategies and competences hardly match the all-encompassing expertise of agencies.

First of all, a qualified consultant, no matter the scale of their workplace, does a thorough review of brands, pursuing every lead such as questioning employees to find out their perspective and identify what could be changed to advance their work experience. Apart from getting acquainted with staff, they outline the major points to refine the essence of the brand, the goals of its owners and expectations.

Having done with brand audit, they approach the creation of a strategy. The process of consulting brand includes pointing out a series of crucial points such as definition of competitors and the audience you want to attract to your offerings. Yet, carrying out a strategy involves much more, for example, determination of a business purpose, singling out the ins and outs of fundamentals, intended to cause emotional connection between your brand and customers.

In addition to this, consultants characterise the essentials supposed to grow loyalty of your audience and help to individualise your brand so it will be different from the competitors.

With the knowledge of the market state, a brand consultation gives a hint on the matter of comprehensive design. While individual strategists do every phase by themselves, in agencies these tasks could be separated in accordance with the size of a vendor’ company. Hiring an agency instead of a solo performer is favourable regardless if you want to apply for a significant amount of services as it takes a lot of time when everything is done by one person.

The designing set incorporates creation of a logo, choosing colours and typography, painting special graphics and characters that can be applied to your website, packaging, promotional materials and so on.

As designs can’t present a full spectrum of brand consulting services, inventive specialists provide help in cover-all writing that is related to formulating the brand story that can be as engaging as a book, forming an excellent naming that is easily remembered supplied with taglines and mottos – short lines, embodying the main purposes of a brand and overall messaging that in an accessible way give people understanding of what your brand is.

To build a needed perception of your brand in your customers’ eyes, strategists take care of positioning. Implementation of the tools that help to point whether your brand belongs to the luxury segment or is opposite to it, is intended to help people without any additional knowledge or is designed for specialists in the industry. The right positioning will differentiate your business and attract the audience you need.

How to find a brand consultant?

The choice of inventive consultant is wide and there are plenty of talents, capable of turning a new leaf for your business. Yet, in every particular situation, it’s important to approach the selection carefully, since your request can be too complicated for some of them or their expertise may fall out of line with your industry. That’s why following the roadmap will be beneficial for you:

Step 1. Decide on the scale of work needs to be done

Brand revamping isn’t about some services you pay for and get tangible purchases. Creation of assets, especially with inclusion of brand identity consulting, influence the criteria like scalability, awareness, loyalty. So, without your understanding of what outcomes you expect, it will be difficult to find a solution that will satisfy you.

The best way is to outline some goals you would like to achieve, so asking for a revamping consultation, you could address them and get the answers whether they possess the necessary expertise. For example, if you need to enhance your online presence, the team you are up to hire should comprehend how to make it possible.

Step 2. Define your budget limits

Agencies and solo strategists provide services with a wide range of prices for brand consultancy, so you will definitely find a supporter, affordable for your mission. It’s recommended not to look for the cheapest option, since it can influence the quality of the work. Starting from the price entirely cuts a plethora of opportunities you can get from this cooperation.

Don’t choose the assistant with the lowest pricing before checking the proven records of their abilities to get your business ahead.

Step 3. Ask your partners and friends or use online listings

Reaching out to the business owner who you know had the experience of hiring a branding consultation is a good way to see whether the cooperation with them can be profitable for you, especially if the outcomes of their work were positive.

If you find that your objectives don’t align with their expertise, evaluation of listings of the vendors will help you as well. The catalogues with professional agencies, sorted by the profile, industries and cities, include top firms with different pricing policies, experience and specialisation, so you could decide what suits you better.

Step 4. Outline the candidates

Collecting the possible brand consultants for the future changes of your brand, it’s important to have several alternatives so you could compare their proficiency, experience and cultural fit, which is always essential when choosing a company you are interested in working with.

Instead of focusing on one criteria – price, location or recommendation, it’s better to assess a set of characteristics that affect the entire process.

Step 5. Evaluate the portfolios and reviews

Before partnering with a brand consultant, invest your time in viewing their accomplishments. The professional strategists have case studies, showcasing their previous deliverables with spotlighting the course of work, specifying challenges they faced and clarifying the outcomes of their meticulous partnership.

Take a closer look at every brand consulting firm testimonials their preceding partners have left. Check their websites as well as independent sources to find out what people say about the way they complete the assignments and communicate, so you could weigh their strengths and weaknesses.

Step 6. Question potential consultants

Having gathered a list of potential partners, it would be wise to reach them out with questions to remove all the doubts and test their communication skills since mutual understanding matters a lot during any brand creation or advancement.

Preparing a questionnaire with clarification of common issues such as what brand strategy consulting is, what their work approach, how they ensure the positive outcomes, the regularity of providing reports and so on. If you have any specific questions about the strategy, identities, additional services is a good time to address those concerns too.

Step 7. Make your decision

When you have checked all the essentials, it’s time to make the final decision. Having reviewed the creative and strategic parts of their expertise, tested the communication, decided on the best form of cooperation – on-site or remotely, analysed the testimonials left and formulated budget, you will be able to form your opinion about a certain consultant and make a choice that will be the most favourable for your brand.

Costs of brand consultancy

The factors that affect the price of a consultancy are various and should be considered while choosing a vendor. First of all, mastery in the industry since asking for assistance from the managers that have revamped Nike, Netflix or Apple won’t be the cheapest option. Secondly, American brand design experts will charge more than European or Indian. Let’s take a closer look at the common costs of consulting services:

Trends of consulting for a brand to sustain your business

There’s no doubt that professional help from an expert is something that can help a business overcome a lot of challenges, face troubles and still stand strong, and be always relevant even when new competitors appear every day with new offerings. Whether a company is recently established or has witnessed hundreds of trends and generations, a caring attitude to a brand is essential and beneficial in both cases.

The trends recommended to follow, capture all the aspects of businesses engagement with customers, the best ways of what can be identified meanwhile brand marketing consulting. First, it’s important to pay attention to the channels of communication and their uniformity. If a company operates only online or offline, they should have a set of platforms to reach them out. Availability of different lines of communication appeal to people more than secrecy.

Another way that will help you bring to your brand more loyal customers is openness. Nowadays, people prefer to know who stands behind the goods and services they apply for, so you have several options to satisfy the need of closeness by entrusting this task to ambassadors or building your personal brand and presenting your business by yourself.

Last not leasts, it’s advantageous to build your strategy driven not only on profit, but on the value your goods bring to your customers. Following ethical norms, supporting cultural and global initiatives as leading fashion brands do, launching supportive campaigns and fairly treating your employees are keys to your brand growth.

Conclusion

The opportunities a professional consultancy opens for businesses are wide, but it’s crucial to choose the right people that will be able to live up to your vision and brainstorm exactly those ideas that will be game changing for your particular case.

If you want to make your brand visible and get branding consultation from professionals that are well-versed in revamping, take advantage of our platform and apply for a project calculation. We’ll help you to find a firm with suitable experience, fair pricing and proven positive performance. Don’t postpone the opportunity to rise to prominence!