The importance of a strategic route for a successful brand campaign

Looking for the essentials

Developing a brand campaign starts with making choices. Because with clear choices, you can make your message more focused, stronger and therefore more powerful. Choose to be chosen. You may think: but then I won't show you everything about the product or what we can see!? That's right. This is because effective campaigns are created by mainly choosing what you don't tell and focusing as specifically as possible on one aspect of your brand.

The essence of strategy is choosing what not to do. - Michael Porter

How do you make the right choice?

Let's say you're a brand that wants to sell electric bikes to young people. A great challenge, because there are now many electric bike brands and they all sell bicycles with two wheels, a battery and a steering wheel :-).

So what brand campaign strategy do you follow? What makes your brand distinctive and unique? What are the wishes and challenges of the target group? In the case of the electric bike, there are several pillars to choose from. Are you going for safety (such as Volvo)? The lowest price (like Easyjet)? The hippest model that all influencers have, so your daughter should have too (think Adidas Originals)? Do you opt for a bluetooth connection with your mobile? The long warranty period? Or the range of the battery? And who is your target group; the parents or, on the contrary, the young people? In short, there are plenty of choices; they all provide a different focus and brand story.

If you incorporate multiple storylines into a brand campaign, your brand story becomes diffuse and undistinctive for your target group. It only becomes interesting (for your target group) if you know how to get to grips with the most specific feature of your brand as possible. We call that the Sweetspot.

Sweet spot

Many brands look from the inside out. What do we want to say, what do we want the target group to hear? Understandable but not necessarily desirable. Because what you want to say (and how) isn't always what the target group is waiting for. So look for the sweet spot! The place where the goals of the organization and the interests and needs of the target group meet and touch each other. The sweet spot is where your brand campaign starts.

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Zooming in on strategic routes

When choosing a strategic route, there are actually no wrong choices possible. It's about choosing. There is often a good case for each route, but if you peel the onion critically, you'll notice that one of the routes makes the most sense. The route that often also gives you the most energy. Don't throw away the other routes. Perhaps you can use it next time.

Strategic route as a basis for your successful brand campaign

By choosing a strategic route, you have, as it were, familiar with color. The picket posts have been set and provide the basis for the development of the creative campaign concept. Of course, this reflects the principles from the strategic route. The image of the campaign will also be in line with the chosen strategic route. Of course, it can happen - that happens to the best - that the creative translation from the strategic route is not immediately spot on. No problem, but the strategy must remain intact. You then just take one step back, but not two.

Just roll it out!

Where the strategic route leads to a creative concept, the latter is the breeding ground for further development in campaign resources. An important part of this is copy. In fact, more and more marketers are discovering and recognizing the power of copy, especially short copy. Hitting your target group in a few words is the trick.

Claim your spotlight

You shouldn't ask for attention but deserve it! Wise words from our own Simon. Many services and products look alike and that will only increase in the future. But where is the news or innovation that deserves attention? Force yourself to create or invent something new and use it as a strategic starting point for your brand campaign. By the way, you can also safely use us for this :-) Because sometimes something small and existing is unconsciously something very big.

Coming back to the brand campaign for the bicycle brand. The strategic choice for the brand campaign occurs where the power of the bicycle (concept) affects the consumer's interest or problem. An inspiring example is the swap bike with the distinctive blue band. The success of this concept shows that consumers are increasingly valuing utilization instead of possession. So does your brand campaign focus on the product or are you developing a new service that includes your product? That question alone is an interesting strategic insight to consider during a nice bike ride.

So yes, every brand campaign starts with a clear strategy. This is a tough and sometimes confronting exercise, but one that lays a strong foundation for your brand campaign. Do you want to know how we can help you with that? Then get in touch with Marlous!