Brand, branding, positioning, messaging, content, copywriting, communications…it’s hard to make sense of all these activities and determine which ones to prioritize as your company grows.

 

Even the most innovative products and promising companies can fail or fall short of their full potential if they don’t have the right foundational positioning and messaging strategy to inform and guide their marketing investments.

 

When it comes to realizing the best return on your marketing investments in any the following activities, ensuring they are aligned and guided by a customer-focused, data-driven strategy will yield better results, every time.

 

First, let’s look at the business definitions of these essential marketing activities:

 

 

Brand is a product, service or concept that is publicly distinguished from other products, services or concepts so that it can be easily communicated and usually marketed.

 

Branding is the process of creating and disseminating the brand name, its qualities and personality. Branding could be applied to the entire corporate identity as well as to individual products and services or concepts.

 

Well-known advertising copywriter and ad agency founder David Ogilvy defined a brand as: "the intangible sum of a product's attributes: its name, packaging, and price, its history, its reputation, and the way it's advertised."

 

Positioning establishes your brand in the mind of your customers. It’s the articulation of your brand, the experience beyond just a tagline or logo, brand positioning is the strategy used to set your business apart from your competition and truly connect you with your customers.

 

Strategic Messaging is the clear articulation of the value a company brings to the world within the context of their customer, the current market, and their competition. It’s used as a framework to communicate with employees, prospects, customers, partners, investors, and other stakeholders. It’s the map that guides who you are, to whom you sell what and why it matters.

 

Content strategy is the guiding plan that outlines the decision-making process behind whom your material will impact, how it will cut through all of the noise, and what you hope to achieve in smaller, more measurable metrics – defining content success.

 

Copywriting is a technique consisting of the creation of external facing content that directly engages potential clients or customers to act. Copywriting is informed by messaging strategy.

 

Marketing communications - (also known as marcom) is the messages and media that marketers use to communicate with target markets. Examples of marketing communications include traditional advertising, direct marketing, social marketing, presentations and sponsorships.

 

 

You’ll need to execute all these activities eventually, but for your initial marketing investments to pay off, the approach you take is key to long-term success. At Savvy we know the difference that solid, strategic messaging makes when it comes to marketing, particularly in the B2B technology space. Comprehensive foundational messaging creates a powerful platform for businesses to define and differentiate their value within the context of their unique market and competitive landscape. When done correctly, that platform will flex and grow in lockstep with your company, providing continuity and clear direction that strengthen your business success, brand value and market share as your business grows and evolves.

 

Fast-track your startup success with the right foundational messaging, right from the start.