Insights
How business strategy should shape your brand strategy
In this article:
- How business strategy, brand strategy, brand story and brand expression fit together
- Why your brand must present your business honestly
- How to make every customer engagement count
- How New Holland’s brand evolution was built on its business direction
Your business strategy sets your goals. Your brand strategy is your plan for how your brand will help achieve them. When the two are aligned, your business strategy informs your brand story, your brand story shapes your brand expression, and every customer engagement moves your business a step closer to its plan.
Every customer engagement is a first date
You’re off on a date for the evening. What do you wear? Most successful dates start with a stunning first impression, so dressing and grooming yourself for the occasion is essential. As you get to know each other, you both try to stand out from other suitors and show that you’re a good match. You end the evening hoping you’ve made enough of an impression to secure, at the very least, a second date.
Branding is much the same. Every time your brand engages with a potential customer, it’s on a date.
Keeping with the analogy, you are your business. How you express yourself during the date is your brand story. Your appearance is your brand expression. How you plan the date and see it through is your brand strategy. Simply put, on a date you are selling yourself.
Plan the date: your business strategy
Before you head off on your date, what do you do? Hopefully, you have time to plan. You’ll have a long-term goal, whether that’s finding a life partner or a casual friendship, and a short-term goal of a successful evening. You want to be memorable, leave a lasting impression and, with luck, start a relationship. You may have a budget for new clothes, a haircut and some grooming, and perhaps a gift to break the ice.
Apply the same thinking to your business. What are your long-term and short-term goals, and your five-year and one-year plans? What budget can your business allocate to branding, so you have enough to make a great first impression and tell your story well?
Your business strategy guides your brand strategy, informing your brand story and inspiring your overall brand expression.
Be yourself: why your brand must be honest
The relationship between your business and your brand must be honest and open. Imagine presenting yourself on a date as someone you are not. As the relationship blossoms and your partner gets to know you, the truth will come out.
Business works the same way. If your brand promises more than your products or services deliver, customers will notice the gap as soon as they experience them, and that disconnect can do lasting damage to both your brand and your business.
What do you want from the date? Your brand strategy
What would you want to achieve on your date? An enjoyable evening, the chance to meet someone new, perhaps the spark of a new relationship? In business terms, you want to inspire passion for your products, convince customers and build new relationships.
That means developing a brand you are proud of: one you take pleasure in using to promote your business, its products and its services. Your brand strategy should be the enabler for your business strategy. If you want to sell more, your brand should help you achieve it, and if you plan to grow your business over time, your brand strategy should have room to grow with it.
How New Holland’s brand evolution followed its business direction
New Holland is one of the world’s most recognised agricultural machinery brands. Its business needed a brand ready for a more accessible, consistent and digital-first future, while keeping the heritage it had built with farming communities over generations.
We began with the business. At New Holland’s headquarters in Jesi, Italy, we led a two-day workshop with more than 15 senior stakeholders, exploring future aspirations, reviewing peers and competitors and challenging established thinking. Those findings shaped the brand strategy: we evolved the iconic leaf into a simpler, flatter and more approachable identity, and developed the brand promise “New Holland is… with you season after season”, designed to work in more than 50 languages.
The evolved identity launched at Agritechnica in November 2023, followed by a global rollout in March 2024, giving New Holland strategic, visual and messaging foundations for a more consistent international brand.
Marrying your business to your brand
As much as I love analogies, comparing business and brand strategy to a date has its limits. Like most relationships, it’s complicated. I hope I’ve presented myself well, and shown why it pays to marry your business more closely to your brand.
Business and brand strategy FAQs
What is a brand strategy?
A brand strategy is the long-term plan for how your brand will help your business achieve its goals. It defines how you position yourself, what you say, how you look and how you behave at every customer touchpoint.
How does business strategy relate to brand strategy?
Your business strategy sets the goals and plans. Your brand strategy sets out how your brand will help deliver them, which in turn informs your brand story and brand expression.
When should I review my brand strategy?
Whenever your business strategy changes, for example when you enter new markets, launch new products or set new growth targets. Your brand strategy should always reflect where your business is heading.
How much should I invest in my brand
Start from your business goals. Decide what your brand needs to achieve to support your one-year and five-year plans, then allocate enough budget to make a strong first impression and tell your story well.
Speak to us about aligning your brand strategy with your business strategy, so your brand helps deliver your business plan.
Five questions to ask yourself that will help your brand’s storytelling
Why, who, what, where and how: five questions that shape a stronger brand story.