Zesty | Branding Agency Vancouver, Package Design, Graphic Design

Branding Agency Vancouver

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Branding & Package Design in 2018

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The brands we buy are an extension of our identity. Products are more than just products, they’re a signal to who we are and the values we hold.

The job of branding and package design is to reflect those values back to the customer. When it comes to adventure brands, we want the products to look and feel exciting and capable. Wellness brands should ooze a healthy and wholesome vibe. Luxury brands need to convey a sophisticated language and personality and their packaging should be high quality.

Many of the trends we will see this year are largely based on the buying power of Millennials. They’re influencing how brands respond to consumers shifting values. Consumers in the 18-34 age bracket are demanding higher standards of design and a consideration on environment and sustainability.

Brand these days need to be more honest and authentic than ever before. The traditional power dynamic where the brand has more power than the consumer is long gone. The Millennials are so well-connected that they know if a product is inferior, the service bad or if the brand is not being authentic. In today’s market, consumers can find an alternative almost instantly or publicly criticize a brand, using social media.

Consumers want a story. They want to know “why” you’re selling your product or service, not “what” you’re selling.  Recent research supports the importance of good brand stories, finding that a brand, its zest-factor and even its font style and color scheme were accurately recalled in the context of an original story.

Retail spaces are becoming brand experience spaces. How you behave is as important as what you say and smart brands will reinvent their spaces for people to connect and interact with the brand in person, versus just online through social media and web.

The key takeaway is to be more authentic and more personal through design.

 

How-to create a successful product launch

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Getting your idea to the shelves

The process of getting your idea to the shelves of major retailers can feel overwhelming. And once you’re there, success not only requires a viable idea but an alluring brand, scaleable business model and healthy supply chain.

Understandably, we all want the instant product success and the brand recognition of companies such as Herschel, Burt’s Bees and Air BnB. But what does it take for a brand to truly break through in today’s crowded market?

It starts with planning. First, you need to define the purpose and value proposition of your product—at our Vancouver branding agency we ask: What’s your zest-factor? Second, you need to focus on storytelling rather than on selling a product.

Your Purpose

It takes more than a great product to pitch the retail buyer. You need to know what you do and why; it’s also important to define what you don’t do.

For your product to stand out, you must have a purpose. And you’ll need to really think deeper on this—it’s a nice sentiment to try and make the world a better place, but ultimately that’s just a vague comment that doesn’t capture attention. Instead, look at your target customers and decide how your products will enhance their lives and solve a problem for them.

Create a story

Stories are the best way to distinguish yourself from the other brands. Why?Because people always remember a good story. If your brand is going to succeed, it has to become something more than your products. You need to tell stories that touches the hearts of your customers.

Great stories have several key ingredients, here are a few to consider:

Theme

Something important the story tries to tell us. A theme ties the character’s (customers) concerns and passions and it will keep your brand on-point with every decision and communication.

Example: Toms shoes, improving lives.

Plot

A conflict or struggle that the main character (customer) goes through and the sequence of events inside a story. Conflict translates naturally to storytelling in products. People use your product to solve a specific problem or to get a specific job done. What will their experience be from purchase to usage and beyond?

Example: Endy Mattress. By offering home delivery in a compact box, the company takes the stress away from the mattress-buying process and even makes it enjoyable in its un-boxing.

Setting

A place and time that gives a vivid mental picture of the world your characters are in, as such, when you can create a setting that your product lives, it gives people a feeling of stepping into a whole new world with your brand.

Example: Is your brand about; the natural environment, a fun atmosphere, on an adventure in the backcountry, a luxurious evening etc? Once you define this, you can enhance and embellish.

Style and Tone

The language that feels right for your story. A brand’s tone of voice should be distinctive, recognizable and unique. It’s job is to communicate effectively with the customer.

Who are your customers

This is one of the first questions I ask my clients. Yet so many times I hear “Everyone. My target is whoever wants to buy my product”.

Knowing your demographic is essential so that we can understand purchase habits, what other brands appeal to them and with whom you might be competing with for their attention on the shelves. Knowing your target market allows us to establish a brand personality and design language that speaks to them.

Understand the space your product will live

Research your ideal retailers and list the type of products that they offer. Look for gaps where your product fits and where there are no competing products. Or if there are competing products see where your direct competition sells and how their product is positioned. Are there advertisements, point of purchase displays, or end-caps dedicated to your competitor’s product or brand? If the answer is yes, you might have a harder time out-marketing them, but, does your product offer a different value proposition or go after a different niche?

Your pricing structure

Obviously you need to do your homework on ingredient/material costs, the cost of your co-packaging or manufacturing costs, any broker or distributor fees, as well as any packaging, design, engineering and freight costs. Beyond that, you need to look at how the brand relates to the price. If you have an $8 box of crackers that will sell at Whole Foods, it should look and feel like an $8 box of crackers in order to appeal to the customers you’d like to target.

A smaller budget and lower retail price doesn’t mean your packaging can’t be well-designed and on-brand—but it’s very important to look you want to achieve with a specific project budget. If your product is purposefully economical, it shouldn’t look like a luxury brand—there would be a disconnect with the customer.

Keep your retailers happy

If your product isn’t selling, it won’t be reordered. It’s as simple as that. You need to make sure your product is top of the list for a purchase order. This means understanding their needs and how you can help make their life easier.

Make your best effort to keep stores informed and educated about your product. This means in-store demos, providing helpful marketing materials and even producing in-store displays or coolers that assist with telling your story for you.

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For more help with launching a product, drop us an email!

 

Brand consistency is the Zest-factor

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Here at our Vancouver branding agency we lead ambitious companies to become brave and captivating brands.

Regardless of what we’re working on for you, our approach has a potent focus on consistent brand experience—That’s how you build an authentic brand that people desire.

The zest-factor

When you’re getting to know a person, you start to feel more and more comfortable. You learn about their positive traits, personality and how they make you feel. Effective branding is exactly the same. Branding is not just about looking good and getting your name out there. It’s about helping customers get to know your brand on a personal level.

Is Arc’teryx hands-down better than every other outdoor apparel brand in the world? Probably not. Regardless, it has countless diehard fans who search far and wide for their perfect Arc’teryx technical shell—even if they see a similar brand with essentially the same features, quality and warranty.

Consistency translates to dependable

We are surrounded by a multitude of these similar brands every day, whether we realize it or not. So why do we choose one brand over the other? Consistency is one critical component. It’s the way the brand makes us feel over and over again. A brand is a person’s gut feeling about a product, service, or company and this gut feeling determines our likes, dislikes, and most importantly, our brand loyalty.

This is where the importance of brand consistency comes into play.

Trust = Reliability + Delight

Ultimately, what you are trying to do with your brand is create trust between you and your customers so they don’t have to think too hard about their choices. They automatically pick yours. Trust is a result of your reliability and the delight you deliver. The more choices people have the more you need to work on the delight portion of the formula. We make our decisions very intuitively even though we try to be rational, the human brain is not powerful enough to make complex decisions rationally. So in the end we rely on trust.

The Trust Formula: T = R + D (Trust = Reliability + Delight)

Great branding makes customers feel like they know your brand and that your brand can be trusted. Arc’teryx does this very well. Their purpose is to create apparel and gear that gives users the confidence to perform at the point of extreme need and their goal is to create equipment that enables a person to be immersed in the moment of doing, regardless of external conditions. They evoke emotions with customers over and over again in their brand communications, marketing, events, graphics and brand touchpoints.

In contrast, Mountain Hardwear has similar quality products, but they simply aren’t as good at telling a story or evoking emotions in customers. Good quality can only carry you so far, and so they become just another brand that pales in comparison to Arc’teryx.

The zest factor is when customers feel like they know you and can trust you and when they identify with your purpose. Only then will they become loyal brand advocates who recommend you to their peers.

How to become a captivating brand

I’ve heard many clients say if they could just get customers to try their product or service they’re sure they would like it. It doesn’t work that way. You must start by putting a consistent brand message in front of consumers.

Interesting in learning more?
Chat with us today about becoming a brand leader

 

Branding vs. Marketing

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You’re not selling features and benefits. These days it’s critical to dive deep into meaning and belonging. Alter the thinking of tangibles to the intangibles people desire.

Often people think of attracting customers by finding a large group of possible targets, make shiny things to attract them followed by sending a bursts of messages. This is a fools errand. You need to start by designing a world they will wish to inhabit. You need to cultivate meaning in order to captivate an audience—Branding.

Branding is a gut feeling

Everything people buy adds to their identity. As such, customers make decisions based on emotion or gut feelings. They see themselves and who they want to be in the brand.

The difference between branding & marketing

Branding is why
Marketing is how
Branding is long-term
Marketing is short-term
Branding is macro
Marketing is micro
Branding is strategic
Marketing is tactical
Branding is a pull tactic
Marketing is a push tactic
Branding drives enduring reputation
Marketing drives periodic sales
Branding is the reason someone buys
Marketing is the reason someone thought to buy
Branding builds loyalty
Marketing generates response
Branding creates value
Marketing extracts value
Branding is the being
Marketing is the doing

Simplify to Amplify

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Before trying to manage communications your brand must be stripped down to its simplest form: one big idea that everything else builds on.

If it can’t be said simply, how can you expect customers to quickly connect with the heart and value of your brand?

Simplify to Amplify

It’s common to want to list every bell and whistle on your brochure or package design, but your customers will be overwhelmed. In a world of increasing complexity, a clever bunch of organizations have found that embracing simplicity can deliver far-reaching results.

At our Vancouver branding studio we teach clients to simplify. Our client HITCASE for example could say all of the reasons why their product is great for surfing; waterproof, durable, comes with flotation attachments, has a super cool variety of lenses to snap on, etc etc. Instead they say one thing “Made for this”. In taking this strategy they achieve everything they want and evoke emotion—with only three simple words!

Brand differentiation

Branding is a way of clearly highlighting what makes you different, and more desirable than the competition. Effective branding elevates a product or organization from being just one commodity amongst many identical commodities, to be something with where there is no substitute.

You don’t need to have an exciting product or service, you just need to have courage and imagination. Even though every brand wants to lead, unfortunately most end up doing things that are very similar to their competitors…blast everyone and anyone with confusing and complex messages.

A better brand experience

A great strategy to start simplifying your brand is customer journey maps. When you understand each and every point of interaction with your brand, you can more easily maintain a seamless experience. The more you know, the better able you’ll be at striking a chord. And the less value you’ll see in a shotgun approach.