The Importance of Regularly Assessing Your Brand’s Performance

Save time, stay on course, build brand momentum

 

As business owners, it’s too bad we don’t have a crystal ball to see what steps we should take to grow our business more effectively. There’s no doubt we would all peek into the future to help guide us if we could.

When our efforts seem endless—from marketing activities, to brand development and implementation, to employee recruitment and hiring, to process development, to market and world conditions—where can we look to find confirmation that our businesses have continued potential to grow?

Instead of hoping for a crystal ball, try this: stop what you’re doing and assess how your business is currently performing. Start looking through a variety of lenses, based on immediate past performance. Focused, highly targeted assessments can often times expose huge, undiscovered gaps and help not only streamline our actions moving forward, but uncover several ‘low-hanging fruit’ areas that can have an immediate bottom-line impact.

Business assessment tools are the closest we will come to the crystal ball and will help us save time, stay on course, and build momentum. Let’s take a closer look at brand assessment. For example:

• Save time by asking pointed questions like: “Do our employees behave in ways that reflect our distinctive personality and core values as a brand?” or “Does our leadership team’s behaviors serve as a positive role model for employees?” Honest answers to these questions could open up new areas of focus, especially in the non-tangible discipline of brand management. Once you identify key areas that are either in need of attention or that are working well but enhancements would make them work better, you save time by getting to the heart of the matter.
• Stay on course through well thought out, targeted questions that are posed regularly. Consider this question regarding your online web presence: “Does the site meet or exceed expectations, based on the desired brand perception?” Have your marketing team discuss and analyze this on a regular basis and you will help your company stay on course. Your online presence will continue to be one of the most valuable elements due to our technologically fueled global economy. Make sure you are leveraging powerful technology to its fullest.
• Build momentum with the actions and behaviors that are introduced as a result of your brand assessment questions. But don’t let your brand momentum be derailed by poor use of your brand identity. Evaluate responses to statements like: “We consistently utilize our brand’s font family (from logo) in all of our marketing materials and web site,” and “There is a specific, relevant story to tell about our logo.” Understand how well the brand identity is being visually communicated from the top down. This type of assessment saves time, so you can focus on staying the course and move the brand forward.

You’ll find that taking regular targeted assessments to determine how your business is living up to both your brand and your business plan can have a significant effect on your bottom-line and how fast you get there.

But don’t stop there. Carefully crafted assessments that focus on highly targeted areas across the business should be used over and over and over again. This will help isolate key issues before they become roadblocks, allowing your business to stay the course and build momentum. You can then manage the exposed gaps quickly and elevate the way you run your business.

That’s why Brand Ascension has designed six critical tools to help you assess your business against the leading practices of highly successful brands. Go to www.branddnaproducts.com for more information. It’s a small investment with great return to keep your brand on track.