Brand Strategy Roadmap: One-page strategic plan for your brand

Graham Robertson, Founder of Beloved Brands

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Brand strategy decisions must answer, “How can we get there?” Most importantly, strategies must provide clear marching orders that define the

strategic program you are investing in, the focused opportunity, the desired market impact, and the payback in a performance result that benefits

the branded business. The strategic choices depend on market opportunities to build on your core strength, create a bond with consumers, battle

competitors, or line up with your business situation. Every brand should have a long-range Brand Strategy Roadmap document that includes the

vision, purpose, values, key issues, strategies, and tactics. Alternatively, some call it a long-range strategic plan or even a Strat Plan.
 To illustrate, click to zoom in on our brand strategy roadmap example.

Brand Strategy

Brand strategy + Brand Idea

As well, the Brand Strategy Roadmap uses the brand idea to deliver a consistent brand across the five consumer touchpoints. These touchpoints

that reach consumers include the brand promise, brand story, innovation, purchase moment, and consumer experience.

Your brand strategy should help build relationships with your stakeholders – employees, customers, suppliers, and community leaders.

Importantly, I believe branding is an essential part of the business that needs to be aligned with the business goals. To illustrate, read our story on

the five steps to building a brand strategy.

 To illustrate, click to zoom in on our brand strategy roadmap process.

Strategic Plan template

Vision:

First, the vision in the brand strategy roadmap should answer the question, “Where could we be?” Put a stake in the ground that describes an ideal

state for your future. It should be able to last for five to 10 years. Essentially, the vision gives everyone clear direction. Most importantly, the vision

should motivate the team. Write the vision in a way that scares you a little but excites you a lot. Importantly, the vision steers the long-range

strategic plan.

Brand purpose:

Next, the purpose has to answer the question, “Why does your brand exist?” It’s the underlying personal motivation for why you do what you do.

Furthermore, the purpose is a powerful way to connect with employees and consumers, giving your brand a soul.

Values:

Then, layer in values that should answer, “What do you stand for?” Your values should guide you and shape the organization’s standards. Values

connect your beliefs, behaviors, expectations, and motivations. Above all, the brand must consistently deliver each value.

Goals:

Your goals in the brand strategy roadmap should answer, “What will you achieve?” For example, the specific measures can include consumer

behavioral changes, metrics of crucial programs, in-market performance targets, financial results, or milestones on the pathway to the vision.

Accordingly, your goals set up a brand dashboard or scoreboard.

Situation analysis:

Use your deep-dive business review to answer, “Where are we?” Your analysis must summarize the drivers and inhibitors currently facing the

brand. As a result, the analysis must discover future threats and untapped opportunities.

Key issues:

The key issues answer the question, “Why are we here?” Look at what is getting in your way of achieving your brand vision. Then, ask the issues as

questions. Moreover, these strategies are the answer to each issue.

Brand Strategy:

Next, use your brand strategy decisions to answer, “How can we get there?” Your choices depend on market opportunities with consumers,

competitors, or situations. Notably, the strategies must provide clear marching orders. Above all, the brand strategy defines the strategic program

you are investing in, the focused opportunity, the desired market impact, and the payback in a performance result that benefits the branded

business.

Tactics:

Finally, the tactics answer, “What do we need to do?” Framed entirely by strategy, tactics become action plans with clear marching orders to your

teams. Decide which activities to invest in to stay on track with your vision. The best ideas must deliver the highest ROI (return on investment) and

ROE (return on effort). Finally, with a long-range strategic plan, you don’t have to get too specific with the tactics.
 To illustrate, click to zoom in on our strategic planning definitions.

Below, we have a rough draft of the long-range strategic plan elements for Gray’s Cookies. We include the long-range planning elements of the

vision, purpose, values, goals, issues, strategies, and tactics.

 To illustrate, click to zoom in on our elements of our long-range strategic plan.

We have the strategy tools to help you build your brand

At Beloved Brands, we have created a Brand Toolkit that includes every slide you need to run your brand. We include our one-page Brand Strategy

Roadmap. Equally, if you are looking to build out your marketing plan work, you can engage our Marketing Plan presentation template.

Importantly, if you are looking to find the right brand positioning on your brand, we do run consulting workshops with teams to help come up with

the ideal solution.

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brand that consumers will love. At the heart of our book is how to think, define, plan, execute, and analyze. Learn about strategic thinking, brand

positioning, writing plans and creative briefs, how to make advertising decisions, brand analytics and finance 101 for marketers.

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Organizing brand idea

Your brand idea is at the heart of your brand strategy

When we help find your brand strategy, we use a brand idea to represent the inner brand soul of everyone who works on the brand, inspiring

employees to deliver the brand promise and amazing experiences. Importantly, the brand strategy must be ownable, so no other competitor can

infringe on your space, and you can confidently build your brand reputation over time. Equally, make sure this work is based on your brand

positioning statement.
 To illustrate, click to zoom in on our brand idea.

Brand Strategy brainstorm

In stage one of finding your brand strategy, we hold a keywords brainstorm for each of the five areas. To start, brainstorm 20-30 words that

describe each of the five elements of the brand idea.

Next, in stage two, we turn keywords into key phrases for each of the five areas. Then, get the team to vote to narrow down the list to the best 3-5

words for each section. You will begin to see certain themes and keywords. Take those selected words and build phrases to summarize each

section.
 To illustrate, click to zoom in on our brand idea brainstorming.

In stage three of our brand strategy workshops, summarize everything to create a brand idea. Once you have phrases for all five areas of our brand

strategy model, the team should feel inspired to use their creative energy to develop the brand idea. Importantly, find a summary statement that

captures everything around the circle. Try to get a few options you can test with consumers and employees.
 To illustrate, click to zoom in on our brand idea process.

Once you have the brand idea, create a brand idea map to steer everyone who works on the brand

We use our Brand Idea Map to stretch the brand idea across all consumer touchpoints. We include the brand promise, brand store, new product

innovation, purchase moment, and the consumer experience.

 To illustrate, click to zoom in on our brand idea map process.

Brand promise:

Using the brand idea to inspire a simple brand promise separates your brand from competitors. Essentially, position your brand as better, different,

or cheaper.

Brand story:

When you use a brand story to bring the brand idea to life, it helps motivate consumers to think, feel, or act while it works and establishes the ideal

brand’s reputation to be held in the minds and hearts of the consumer. Above all, the brand story aligns all brand communications across all media

options.

Innovation:

Using the brand idea to build a fundamentally sound product helps stay at the forefront of trends and technology to deliver innovation.

Furthermore, steer the product development teams to ensure they remain true to the brand idea.

Purchase moment:

Using the brand idea to move consumers along the purchase journey to the final purchase decision helps align the sales team and set up retail

channels.

Consumer experience:

Finally, turn the usage into a consumer experience that becomes a ritual and favorite part of the consumer’s day. As a result, the brand idea guides

the culture of everyone behind the brand who delivers the experience.

Example of a brand idea map

Below, we use our Brand Idea Map to stretch Gray’s Cookies’ “guilt free” brand idea across all consumer touchpoints.
 To illustrate, click to zoom in on our brand idea map example.

Now, you can get everyone on the team to keep the Brand Strategy Roadmap and one-page brand plan handy.

What I recommend is to laminate two documents back-to-back. Having both documents on one page keeps everyone focused and aligned on what

they must deliver. For more info on our one-page brand plan, click on this link: You will love our one-page Brand Plan
 To illustrate, click on the Brand Strategy Roadmap and the one-page Brand Plan example.

Take a look at the key elements in building your plan

To illustrate, click on the Brand Plan presentation above, and use the > to move the slides

Tesla Strategy

Tesla's Brand Strategy

Tesla started with a desire to shift the car market from gas-powered to electric (vision). While most other electric car companies failed, Tesla cars

are remarkably different, as they score high for performance and style (focus). Tesla saw an opportunity to break the usual thinking that energy-

efficient meant ugly, slow, and always needing a charge (identified opportunity).

Tesla has capitalized on the consumer’s readiness to do something for the environment and has created a movement. So, Tesla took a different

approach. They started at the high end to create a strong desire for their beautiful cars.

And then, they moved down to open up to the masses (market impact). Well, the elite mass! Their cars remain a high ticket item. Finally, following

the release of the Model 3 in 2018, their quarterly sales jumped 4-fold over two years (performance result), and the stock price is up 10-fold.

To illustrate, click on the Tesla brand strategy.

Tesla's Brand Idea Map

We use our Brand Idea Map tool to show how Tesla stretches their summarized brand idea of “designed for our future” across five different

consumer touchpoints. Brand Promise. Brand Story. Innovation. Purchase Moment. Customer Experience. The Brand Idea Map ensures all are lined

up to consistently deliver the same Tesla brand. To illustrate, click to zoom in.

 Brand Promise: The leading electric car, backed by simple software, drives high-performance and stylish designs.

 Brand Story: Tesla has built a movement that stands alone with an intense desire from brand fans.

 Innovation: Our engines are designed like technology, and we are always investing in getting better.

 Purchase moment: Simple. Order online, no dealers, sales reps, or negotiations.

 Consumer Experience: Tesla is a statement brand that creates desire and envy among friends.

To illustrate, click on the Tesla brand idea map.

Tesla's Brand Strategy Roadmap

With Tesla’s strategy and brand idea map, we can now construct the Brand Strategy Roadmap for Tesla. We include the long-range planning

elements of the vision, purpose, values, goals, issues, strategies, and tactics. Then, we layer in the brand idea map elements of the promise, story,

innovation, purchase moment, and experience.

To illustrate, click on the Tesla Brand Strategy Roadmap.

Examples of brand strategy

Consumer Healthcare
B2B Industrial Tools
B2B Equipment
Pharma
 To illustrate, click to zoom in on our B2B brand strategy roadmap example.

Brand Strategy Template

The brand strategy roadmap aligns and focuses everyone

Always look at a long-range strategic plan as an opportunity to make decisions on how to allocate your brand’s limited resources. Apply those

resources to the smartest ideas that will drive the highest return. Make the best financial investment choices. Furthermore, the long-range

strategic plan forces you to make the best decisions on how to deploy your people.
To illustrate, click to zoom in on our brand strategy roadmap template.

Learn more about our Brand Toolkit template

Use the brand strategy to steer everyone who works on the brand

The best brands consistently deliver. Use a cross-functional team, including salespeople, R&D, human resources, finance, and operations. Their

participation is one way to gain their buy-in. But that’s not where it stops.

Use your internal brand communications tools to drive a shared definition. Get everyone to articulate how their role delivers the idea. Give the

external and internal brand story equal importance to the consumer experience you create for your brand.

Brand Strategy

Does your brand have unrealized potential?

Here are five questions you need to be able to answer about your brand:

1. First, can you describe your brand in seven seconds in a way that motivates consumers to engage and in a space that is own-able for your

brand?

2. Second, are you making the right investments to create a market impact for your brand and lead to a performance result for your

business?

3. Next, does everyone on your team know their role and how they contribute to building a successful brand?

4. Does your marketing execution establish your desired brand positioning and move customers to purchase?

5. Finally, are you investing in your people to ensure they make smarter decisions and produce exceptional work that drives business

growth?

If you cannot answer these five questions, your team will be confused. Clearly, your brand investments will be scattered and won’t pay back. You

will see inconsistent execution in the market. The consumer will not know how to define your brand. And you won’t grow! It is time to make

decisions.