The Lean Brand Sprint
By: Nick Lehrain
Tags: Branding, Lean, Innovation, Brand Strategy, Lean Startup

Part 1. Telling your Brand Story

Our MVB starts with our brand story. This is where we tell our audience what it is we do for them, and why we’re different from similar products or services. We need to understand our positioning in our competitor landscape and also identify the best possible brand experience we can deliver at every touchpoint along the customer journey. Through a set of collaborative exercises and a whole load of voting we create the following chapters in our brand story;

Primary Persona — If we could only get it right for one audience group who would that be? What aspirational state could our brand help them reach and why would they choose us over our competitors?

— If we could only get it right for one audience group who would that be? What aspirational state could our brand help them reach and why would they choose us over our competitors? Positioning —Arguably the most important task when establishing your brand story. Here we unpack what makes us unique, the value that brings to our customers and where we sit in our competitor landscape.

—Arguably the most important task when establishing your brand story. Here we unpack what makes us unique, the value that brings to our customers and where we sit in our competitor landscape. Personality — Exclusive, mature and classic, rebellious or authoritative? Agreeing on our brand personality establishes the shape of our messaging going forward.

— Exclusive, mature and classic, rebellious or authoritative? Agreeing on our brand personality establishes the shape of our messaging going forward. Promise — Can we distil our positioning statement into a short memorable tagline?

— Can we distil our positioning statement into a short memorable tagline? Product Experience —How can we provide the most authentic and optimal brand experience for our customers before, during and post-conversion?

—How can we provide the most authentic and optimal brand experience for our customers before, during and post-conversion? Pricing — Cost, value or competition based? How we price our goods and services is a huge part of brand perception. How much are your customers willing to pay for a relationship with your brand?

Part 2. Outlining your Brand Strategy

Once we have our brand story straight we need to consider the appropriate way to communicate with our desired audience. Do our customers spend all their time on Instagram? Are they avid blog readers, or are they most likely to be impressed by seeing your partner with their favourite celebrity? Together we will decide on the highest value channels to deliver our message, then discuss the right tone, timing and technique for each of those channels.

During the brand strategy workshop we will create;

A channel strategy map

A tone of voice guide

A set of brand communication values

Part 3. Creating Brand Symbols

By this stage, we should have the first draft of our brand story and brand strategy written up and circulated with all stakeholders. It’s now time for the design team to knuckle down and create the bare essentials required to launch the brand’s visual identity confidently.

In four days of solid design effort, regular feedback with the team and a clear list of deliverables the first iteration of our visual identity can be defined. The output of which should look something like this;

Responsive logo (a logo that folds down or grows in detail depending on it’s display size)

Colour palette

Typography

Imagery (Illustration style or photographic art direction)

Collateral as requested — This is a list of the essential items required to launch the brand. It may include; A landing page, stationery, web banners, signage, email signatures, presentation templates, email templates etc.

Time to test…

Following five days of design effort we should now have a Minimum Viable Brand (MVB) book comprised of our three volumes; Story, Strategy and Symbol. This should be at just the right fidelity to test with our primary persona as identified in our first workshop. Given the speed of our efforts, it is also not the end of the world if our brand is received poorly — although if you’ve got your brand personality right and you’ve nailed what makes your primary persona tick, you should have hopefully designed something that hits the mark!

Having scheduled interviews with 5–7 people that match our primary persona as close as possible, we can now conduct individual 45-minute interviews in which we present our MVB and use a variety of testing techniques to gather genuine responses to our brand.

Some aspects of our MVB are likely to be quite subjective, particularly tone of voice and visual components like the logo and colour palette. While we may not be able to satisfy all tastes, we can still learn from our interviewees’ reactions. For example, if a certain colour is not favoured by one of our test participants, we can ask them to describe the emotion or sentiment it provokes, and we might find it’s performing exactly the job we intended. It is also advisable to have the interviewee believe that the person asking for feedback is not the person who designed the brand, as this may encourage the observer effect to creep in.

Summarise findings and finish up

After 5–7 interviews, you should have a solid understanding of what parts of your MVB are working, and what needs further development. The last two days of the sprint should be spent distilling findings into a report, covering off any critical visual changes and preparing the remaining items of collateral required to launch the brand. Should the brand require significant revision, the team can decide to commit to further design time but limiting it to 2–4 days before re-testing.