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Why You Don’t Need To Worry About Branding Until After Product
At what point does a startup need to seriously work on their branding?
The short answer is: after product-market fit, and after acquiring a large number of customers.
So let’s talk about Branding.
Branding is bigger than your product. It’s part of the love affair that your customers, prospects and the market in general, will have with you. It’s what you stand for, the emotions you evoke inside your customers’ hearts, what they will remember from experiencing your product, and it’s also what you stand for in terms of values and causes you may associate with.
Brand power, done well, has infinite value, and it keeps growing almost forever. Whereas market share has a finite limit, mind share doesn’t. The mind welcomes great ideas, makes room for them, and likes to keep them forever as long they bring good feelings, or offer a real benefit.
As a startup, if you begin to worry prematurely about your brand, you are really wasting time.
Airbnb didn’t start working on their brand strategy until their Series B raise of $112 million in 2011. Starbucks only started working on their brand when they already had about 200 stores, and only two of them were in New York.
Startups need to worry first about getting users to use their product. And from a marketing perspective, they need to worry about Messaging and Positioning.
The trilogy of marketing in post product development for startups is: Messaging, Positioning, Branding, in that order. I’ve already written at length on these two topics in The Only 5 Types of Messaging You Need, and Positioning: The Battle for Your Startup.
Messaging must be clear, precise, and targeted. You must speak to your audience and name them inside your message, i.e. for whom you are solving the problem, and then explain the value of your product, service or solution. Don’t delay your Messaging even if your product-market fit isn’t nailed yet. Rather, evolve it every step of the way, as you evolve your product-market fit. Without clarity, you will stumble. Your customers and prospective users will be confused, and they will go somewhere else. Clarity and brevity are necessary attributes to your messaging.
Positioning is everything you say to enter the mind of your prospect. Positioning is not what you do to your product. It is what you do to the mind of people. It’s the position you occupy in it. Positioning is about how you can draw a distinction between you and the competition.
All startups start with low brand recognition, and they grow it initially via increased usage of their product, but there comes a point in time when they have to start putting more wood behind the product usage arrow.
Here’s why Branding needs to be done after you’ve had a lot of traction in the market.
It’s because the initial step in the branding process is to do what is called a “brand assessment”. It consists of asking your customers, prospects and employees some questions in order to get an accurate qualitative picture of what they are thinking. It also includes an assessment of the competitive communications landscape to understand what your competitors are saying. So, you need to have some market footprint in order to extract meaningful data, or your data will not be meaningful enough for your interpretations.
Here are some additional elements of Branding “work”:
- Brand attributes and strengths
- Brand visual identity and design
- Brand communications and propagation
- Living the brand internally and via touch points alignment
Not taking branding seriously when you have reached a large number of users is a serious sin. My rule of thumb for thresholds are $10 Million if you’re in B2B, and 10 Million users if you’re in B2C, after which you must start official corporate wide brand building efforts. And if your current marketing department doesn’t have the chops to do this, then you’ll need to get outside help for it.
Every company has brand strengths and a brand story. It is your job to find them, harness them, live them, communicate them, and exploit them to your advantage. A great product might get you a few million customers or dollars, but a great brand will let you grow forever even beyond that.
Nicely written but I’m on the complete other side of this.
To say that Starbucks didn’t have a brand and consciously articulate it till they had 200 stores is a bit whacko my friend. They started working on their brand from the very first cup of coffee they sold.
Brand starts with formulating your product and beliefs. It is the articulation of that from day one.
That’s not correct Arnold re: Starbucks. Read up Scott Bedbury’s book where he lays out what he did when he arrived there. They didn’t seriously work on their brand til he arrived. He’s credited with making them realize that they weren’t in the coffee business, but rather in the “feel good” business, owning that “3rd place” you go to, between work and home.
http://www.communitech.ca/main-communitech/view-from-the-loo-global-brand-builder-scott-bedbury-on-why-eq-trumps-iq/#.U4xvBZRdW8A
http://www.amazon.com/dp/0142001902/?tag=googhydr-20&hvadid=28618725327&hvpos=1t2&hvexid=&hvnetw=g&hvrand=9156239447393512525&hvpone=13.03&hvptwo=&hvqmt=b&hvdev=c&ref=pd_sl_110k88dcxr_b
Startups need to focus on the product first, and nothing else. Think 5 people sweating in a room. Startups don’t know their real product until after product-market fit, so how can they know what their brand is?
I’d like you to change your thinking, and think startups, not traditional. Even Scott Bedbury is saying now that brand comes after product. That was the main point of the article, and not to dive into every aspect of the branding process. The other main point is that you’ll be surprised to see how many startups have millions of users, yet they have done nothing significant to exploit their brand externally.
We are looking at this differently.
Companies don’t exploit their brand, they sell their product and their products are connnected to who they are. That is what brand is.
More than one way to do anything.
I’ve worked in startups my entire career and in my experience over 10 or so companies, some very very successful, this is how it happened.
Yes, so what I’m saying is to let that footprint swell up a bit before trying to pin it down. I’ve done a few brand assessments, and if you don’t have enough users out there, you’ll be going on partial information.
I’m in COMPLETE agreement with Arnold – i think you are looking at Brand in a really old fashioned way. Brand should drive everything especially user experience which means culture and code.
But startups are different. They have no clue about branding when they start out. What I’m saying is- focus on branding, after product-market fit. Startups typically ignore it. I agree that it should be done as early as possible, but not earlier than that.
There is a chicken and egg situation here. And it has roots deep in people’s connections with eachother.
What makes a good startup. It will do something, yes, but what really makes it special is the connection it makes with people. A really clear message. Something people really identify with and want and can’t get already.
Now that’s potentially a description of a brand.
What can change, however is the product. CocaCola was a medicinal remedy, a way of delivering cocaine. Apple was a computer, was a music player, was a phone, is a medical device…
The name that sticks in people’s minds is what matters. The feelgood images it associates itself with. That applies just as much for the first adopter as the top of the bell curve. Indeed it is more important as the message that early adopter creates is the one which gets millions involved later on. If it isn’t easy to explain in a sentence, hasn’t got a name people remember and doesn’t make people feel good, it isn’t going to catch on, however brilliant it is at what it does.
The thinking described in this article is dangerous. Because it is the same “product before people” thinking which has caused corporations to drift ever more out of touch with the needs they supply. It is what opened the gap for innovation in the first place.
I appreciate your POV and think it is a great topic. However, I like to think a bit differently about this. T. Most people don’t understand branding. In your description, you are saying don’t focus on it until Product market fit but the truth is if you don’t understand your users early on, then you will never achieve product market fit and the first step to branding is understanding your users. The process you mention needs to start from day one – understand a category and the user behavior, create a solution to a pain point or have a POV on a topic that will attract belief and emotional connection and then communicate that POV in a powerful way that gets people internally and externally excited about your purpose. That process is branding and it starts with Listening to your prospective customers. So I couldn’t disagree more with your headline in that I believe branding needs to start earlier than later. I don’t care how great your idea is, if its not born of human insight and you can’t package it to get people excited about it, it doesn’t matter.
What you described later is Customer Development, not Branding. I agree with the first part of your comment, but not the 2nd half.
I agree with what you said completely until the last paragraph. Reality is that in the startup world, you will focus on the product first, getting users second, and marketing/branding third. The brand will take care of itself until you start to take care of it.
hi William, good input for Startups. Yes, I agree we should start branding after the product is ready. And, after that a startup should launch their business and start generating fund before running out of seed capital/Angel Funding.
Reality is that product first doesn’t work. The most important part of growth hacking is product-market fit and that involves understanding the market – I mean really understanding it. The product can change and the whole point of Lean-startup is to get something out there to gauge reaction and understand the market, then re-iterate until you have a product that works.
And a large part of that market is that people like a concept, an idea. The name and product identity you give that idea will affect how they see it, and the pigeon-hole they put it in. If you call your product everyday soup, it will be seen differently than if you call if Ma’s home-made soup, even if it is the same thing. If you package your new soup in a vacuum seal bag it will be seen differently than if it is in a box, or a cardboard cup.
Actually the order that works is to find the need, see what sort of feel a product/service needs to have to fill it, then create that product/service, rapidly re-iterating it until it matches what people really want, with an image which resonates with them, at the price they are prepared to pay.
This is a discussion of ‘branding’ with a capital ‘B’, i.e. the Don Draper Mad Men view of branding for mature products in mass markets. There’s also a different case to be made for branding with a small ‘b’ in emerging markets.
Branding with a small ‘b’ is about the right NAME for a startup—a name that reflects the culture and innovation DNA of a given team. And one way to craft a brand name at that phase is to go for what defines the boundaries of a CATEGORY. Brand names like Netscape, Microsoft, Qualcomm, Intel, Apigee, Softlayer, OpenStack, RackSpace, etc fall into this bucket.
What the right brand at that phase does is catalyze a tribal identity that sustains you in the early market and gets you to the place where traditional Reis/Trout branding best practices can kick in.
Yes, the name is part of the “visual brand identity”, and it’s not enough on its own.
I think gaining market traction inherently develops your brand, therefore I don’t fully agree with the way it’s presented in your post.
Well, brand and brand positioning are not the same thing.
If I may clarify – while gaining market traction, you do gain a lot of data points about your brand attributes and helps to inform your brand positioning. At some point in time, you need to be more self-aware of what your brand means and assert its position the way you want. It doesn’t occur by happenstance, but your journey can inform where you end-up positioning your brand.
Consider the fact that generic (the black and white label) is a brand and that counters the suggestion to hold off on branding until critical mass.
In terms of budgeting, a company may opt to postpone trademarking and dumping a lot of money in a Hollywood-worthy visual identity. However, in today’s market of visually appealing everything, it is essential to do both: develop your product AND define your brand. Otherwise, you risk not being seen even if you have a clear message. You also risk being seen as “cheap” or classified as low/poor in quality. The other issue to consider is that people tend to skim. We live in a 140 character world so consider how many seconds one has to grab then keep a customer’s attention and you’ll realize that branding is less about what you say and more about what you do; showing instead of telling. You must live or embody your brand from inception. Another critical note: Of the five senses, connecting with consumers visually (images then text) is a priority, followed by sound and touch. It is much easier for creatives (designers, website developers, etc.), to define your brand visually if they have a story to match, i.e. brand attributes and strengths.
The best way to approach this is to determine whether or not a startup should be a “business.” If as a startup, or even an entrepreneur, the goal is to be a business, then branding is critical at the onset. However, if the goal is to be a seller or producer of ideas; intellectual property that another business sells, then sure, focus more on the product. However, know that you will still be required to sell yourself and you’ll naturally be branded as something to consumers same as a generic brand. For the record, I’ve seen moderately good products win over a great product due to a visually appealing pitch.
With regards to branding a startup, if your product is any good, and even if it is not, you will become known for something so either harness your brand early or let your customers define your story. The latter usually leads to rebranding and costs more in time and resources–including money. I gather that’s what Starbuck’s experienced…. Since doing business is the primary outcome of those targeted in this article, me thinks branding is essential alongside product development.
Feedback welcomed!
oh, thanks so much. You really helped me in under 2 minutes.
I have a startup. We know exactly our fit and are expecting an A round close on Fall. What else determines the need to brand. You are correct about just focusing on getting customers at first.
Thanks. I’m the accidental marketer for our start-up at the moment so can you give me a bit of advice from your perspective? I’m @robin_solis 🙂
Glad to chat but something more to start with please.
yep. we have a runaway success situation where people are standing in line for the service bc it’s that good. All WOM within the industry. We don’t need to market so I guess your explanation fits our situation but I daresay that this situation more rare than not.
yep, you just needed to explain it better,,,or more.
Hi there Jeff. We started with a lot of industry knowledge after an IPO in a similar vein of the same industry, so I guess that accounts for knowing our goals in the business better than the clients themselves! Later when working with them, we found out hidden details that we let inform and futher the brand idea.
yeah, you see then after we saw what we were dealing with, we could better understand how to position ourselves / our service. So again, I agree with you in that way.
yep. How’s your company going?
OK. I will do that in a subsequent post.
If you reached product/market fit and your messaging is well tuned, that’s great.
But the need to brand strongly may not be so significant initially until your footprint is larger. It depends on your market reach, because it takes some money to implement a brand strategy. Even in the Series A stage, you will most probably be focused on user/customer acquisition.
Well that’s what I thought. Just want to keep up with any new ideas as it’s been a long while between start-ups. Best philosophies stay solid but every situation is different. And of course, the limitation of this type of communication medium is not ideal….though it will have to suffice for now–as you so knowingly pointed out. Thanks William.
Well, thank you so much awaldstein for responding. I guess I was asking for more of your perspective on branding but I would like to save your generous offer for, perhaps, a tougher problem.
i really dont understand what u guys are talking