Tribal Branding: Know Like Trust Series

This post is the final installment of the 3-part series on how to get customers to feel that they 'know, like and trust' your brand. The series was motivated by the need to create social media management (SMM) strategic content pillars. I think that, if I applied the 3 target behaviors / feelings to top, middle and bottom funnel positions, each one would apply in that order; ie 'know' will apply to the top, 'like' to the middle and 'trust' to the bottom. ... or depending on market needs, like when an unknown brand faces a huge challenge of gaining trust in expertise regarding a high-stakes problem, 'trust' and 'like' may overlap or be swapped within the cycle (of a month or whatever your expected cycle period towards conversion).

Even if your marketing campaigns have been successful in getting many people to know and perhaps even trust your brand, that does not mean that they will necessarily like your brand. You therefore need to connect emotionally, to have an emotional relationship with your market, ie you need to build brand affinity with customers. Afterall, brand affinity transcends brand awareness (which, as illustrated below, is only the first and most commercially beneficial of 4 levels of brand affinity). If developed successfully, brand affinity can motivate evangelism, the highest of the 4 levels. By such a point, customers make favorable purchase decisions based on emotional bonds with your brand. Needless to say, when measuring levels of affinity, the emotional connection is most important.

 

Brand affinity levels	Nature of consumer relationship with the brand
1.brand awareness	Consumer seeks to meet basic needs. Any product that does that meets basic needs will do. Won't go out of their way to get the brand.
2. infatuation	Consumer trusts the brand because the brand adds some value to their life. Consumer feels affection, appreciation or even obsession towards the brand.
3. fidelity	The consumer can truly relate to the brand values*. Consequently, the consumer feels an emotional connection and seeks out your brand specifically.  * Here are examples of core values to which consumers may relate. the style and image provided by a clothing brand very high quality images taken from Apple iPhones
4. evangelism	The consumer believes in your brand to such an extent that they want others to use the brand.

 

For the sake of making this post on the consumer's 'liking' or 'brand affinity' with a brand as clear as possible, I will discuss it in its extreme application; 'tribal branding'. However, recognize that, depending on the brand, tribal branding exists on a continuum. For instance, on one hand, Apple has applied it to the maximum extreme, while un-branded commodities not at all on the opposite extreme and  finally, most other marketed brands fall in the middle with varying levels of moderate tribalism. The majority of brands are in the center because they know that tribalism is hugely profitable but respond with only lukewarm attempts to tribalize consumers by claiming the most recently trending core values (like eco-friendliness). However, their corporate strategizing never quite achieves the same tribalism as Apple. 

Seth Godin's book 'Tribes' explains how to create tribes. Here is a quick breakdown of the take aways from that book along with some of my ideas on corresponding content pillars.

Lesson 1: Connection

Connection is the sine qua non of successful tribalism. Tribes comprise a group of people connected to each other, a leader and an idea. The idea may be based on anything like religion, politics, racial or other basis of marginalization, sports and so on. The communication is critical because back and forth messaging among members intensifies core values and attracts new like-minded members. Essentially, the communication is a catalyst for growth. Needless to say, social media communication makes tribalism easier than ever. In short, to transform any group of people into a tribe, 2 requirements must be met as follows. 

1. a shared interest
2. communication among members

Needless to say, connection is associated with the strategy of growth and tactical content pillars like ''Traction', 'Core Values' and, if you ask members to support each other and or ask qualification questions (about interests) as a pre-requisite to membership, also 'Ask / Participate'.

Lesson 2: Pull Marketing

Because the interest is so niche, the messaging is tailor-made to narrowly attract only the tribe's members (not everyone). It therefore pulls only those who share the tribe's passion. (See Push & Pull marketing). Needless to say, pull marketing is associated with the tactical content pillar like 'Core Values' with very specialized content. One option is to use specific questions from the consumer's perspective as the titles of your posts, ie rather than write generic titles. Social listening tools can help you to generate questions. For instance, rather than write a title as 'product x [your brand name]', write it was 'Is method a-b-c the best way to resolve problem y? -- or -- solutions for problem y'. Either way, establish the details in your brand voice and tone. 

Lesson 3: Leaders are heretics.

Heresy relates to having beliefs that go contrary to norms that are generally accepted in the broader community (like religion, sexual preferences and so on). In other words, they challenge the status quo. Example(s):

• When it was generally felt that computers would not be desirable at home, Steve Jobs, the founder of Apple suggested otherwise, likely seeming a little crazy by most who could not imagine his vision. However, Apple's Macintosh computer introduced the world's first home computer and therefore revolutionized the modern world. 

Lesson 4: Tribes are assembled, NOT created.

Godin explains that, before the formation of a tribe, its eventual members, although still disconnected and scattered somewhere in the world, they lay in wait to be connected. At the sight of a catalyst, they will join and do not need to be schooled on the interest.

• Black Lives Matter (BLM) and Black Twitter followers were not trained in a class room. Instead, they suffered for while and eagerly awaited their opportunity to be connected. Consequently, when the opportunity arose, they were eager to join.

Lesson 5: The tribe is not for everyone.

This is where I think many businesses fall short of the full tribal glory. I think this failing is due to lack of authenticity. Tribalism is about true believers with a burning desire to connect with other true believers. Their efforts are not staged through corporate strategy (alone) and so they can become cohesive simply because their intrinsic interest in the cause is sufficiently strong to sustain their focus. In other words, the focus is not about vanity metrics such as likes and views. Rather, they are more interested in drawing their members closer (than growing numbers). Wired Magazine's Kevin Kelly suggested that tribes only need 1,000 true members, ie enough for a core group of passionate, deeply 'heretic' members to sustain them. In short, leaders focus on their tribe, ignoring everyone else. This lesson corresponds with the tactical pillars 'Transparency' (Authenticity), 'Values' and 'Beliefs'. The rules for these pillars will suggest unapologetic specificity in content, brand voice and tone, etc. Some might even encourage exclusivity.

• White supremacist (WS) groups are unapologetic about their zero tolerance policies regarding membership.

As far as possible, managing a corporate tribe should involve having only the right partners, suppliers, employees and so on. 

Lesson 6: Tribes become movements (with the help of leadership)

After membership has reached critical mass, the tribe becomes a movement, ie it can bring about change in the world. Do not take this power lightly. Social media movements have swayed elections. The movement comes into being when the leader does the following.

1. Tell a story (to people who really want to hear). The story highlights the vision for a better future (whatever that means to the tribe).
2. Connect the tribe members to each other and themselves
3. They lead the movement with direction and purpose.
4. They make change occur in ways that no single member could have done alone.

Lesson 7: Leaders use a combination of the & leadership Cs

Leaders all accept their leadership roles and use a combination of the following elements. They

1. challenge the status quo.
2. build a culture
3. are curious  (about the world, how it works and how their vision can work)
4. are or become charismatic to attract and motivate followers
5. facilitate communication among members and themselves
6. commit to the cause
7. facilitate connection among members.

Video (above): Tribes by Seth Godin, Animated Book Summary by YouTuber MentalEFit Book Club.

Video (above): 'How the Dogtown Z-Boys changed skateboarding culture (tribal branding)' by YouTuber Intermark Group. 

The Dogtown Z-Boys was a small group of skateboarders in the early 1970s with an intrinsic interest in skateboarding long before the tribe formed. The earliest skaters were outcasts or 'heretics' by nature. The concept of skateboards was an adaptation of ocean surf boards that were adapted to the land. Their membership was exclusive on the basis of psychological characteristics and unique skating styles that evolved naturally into being from their interaction with each other. For instance, given their ocean surfing background, they did things that other land-only skaters did not, like bring their bodies close to the ground, touch the ground and so on (in other words, an aspect of their 'heresy'). They mastered this style inside of empty swimming pools at homes up for sale during a Californian drought. Craig Stecyk of a local newspaper  (Dogtown Chronicles) assumed the leadership role by publishing the group's symbols, images, core values and ideas. (Keep in mind that this occurred several decades before the internet). This leadership brought together like-minded, otherwise disconnected members and established their culture. They also wore uniforms to demonstrate to the world and themselves their cohesiveness. They even had a physical location where they met each other. Ultimately, the tribe transformed the initially basic trends of skateboarding into its current status as a mainstream extreme sport of skating up smooth vertical surfaces of modern day.

Apple has been able to create a loyal tribe that is willing to wait overnight outside of their doors for new releases, with hopes of paying much more than the competition for their products. In keeping with lesson 1 (regarding a shared interest for being outstanding in graphics and creating a space to encourage easy, direct communication), Apple engages heavily with its market over social media platforms. For instance, its Instagram posts have featured very striking images from customers using their latest iPhone model. Starting from their revolutionary 1984 introduction of home computers for personal use, they go out of their way to establish the idea that the brand is different, in an unapologetically superior way. Their tagline 'Think different' reflects this and is somewhat of a call to action for persons wanting to be seen as an outsider, non-conformist and revolutionary like the brand was in 1984.

TO DO

1. Research and identify your tribe as intimately as possible. To this end, create a target customer profile.

2. Be clear about your unique value proposition / UVP.  The UVP does not need to be only one value. It can be a collection of those values that are most meaningful to your target market.

3. Engage with your tribe, listening closely and responding accordingly.

4. Connect emotionally with your tribe. (This is a must).

5. Create strategic content pillars that incorporate the elements of tribalism. Here is a rough example that incorporates elements of brand tribalism for introducing a new brand whose state of being unknown must overcome sales objections of distrust based on the market not knowing and consequent distrust of the brand's expertise. Notice how the same tactical pillars are applied to each of multiple segment-specific thematic pillar (like plus-sized women's wear, regular-sized women's wear and so on within a single women's line). Those tactical pillars were inspired by the concepts of tribalism and Fastnet's 9 tactiical pillars. 

ToF lead generation  / Objective(s): to be known (through trust, seek qualify members)

• Thematic pillar 1 of .. segments
• Traction
• Value
• Results (Pull title)
• Authority (expertise)
• Social Proof (Pull title)
• Transparency
• Thematic pillar 2 of  .. segments
• same as above (s/a)
• Thematic pillar 3 of  .. segments
• same as above (s/a)

MoF lead nurturing  / Objective(s): to tribalize customer (like, trust)

• Thematic pillar 1 of .. segments
• Value  (Pull title)
• Transparency
• Results (Pull title)
• Heresy  (Pull title)
• Ask / Participate
• Solution
• Thematic pillar 2 of  .. segments
• same as above (s/a)
• Thematic pillar 3 of  .. segments
• same as above (s/a)

BoF lead conversion / Objective(s) to sell and retain customer with trust inspiring content)

• Thematic pillar 1 of .. segments
• Solution  (Pull title)
• Ask / Participate (Community communication)
• Thematic pillar 2 of  .. segments
• same as above (s/a)
• Thematic pillar 3 of  .. segments
• same as above (s/a)

CONTENT RELATED TO BRAND LOVE (TRIBAL BRANDING)

• Know, Like and Trust Series
• Tribalism is an extreme form of lifestyle branding.
• Brand voice and tone
• This article relates to B2C tribal branding / brand affinity. However, B2B brand affinity is also noteworthy. Third party research suggests that that clear top drivers are Trust and customer service. Read third party articles about this topic by Marketing Charts.
• When done correctly, tribalism is able to get customers to make buying decisions based on emotional bonds.
• Emotional branding and marketing.
• Branding: Core values
• Social media content management
• Persuasion technique
• Noteworthy case studies of corporate tribes not include in this post are Tesla, Nike

Psychological Pricing

Psychological pricing is the practice of setting prices to appear subconsciously more appealing to a target market and to therefore positively advance the buying decision. This desired effect on demand is the reason behind establishing price points (like MAP prices, MSRP and so on). However, since there are different types of psychological pricing, it is essential to understand their differences and select the appropriate one for your brand.

• Prestige pricing
• Charm pricing
• Reverse charm pricing
• Innumeracy
• Urgency / limited edition pricing (previously discussed in full in another article)

Prestige pricing refers to setting prices higher than normal because lower prices will turn off the target market. This is therefore common for brands that are associated with luxury, high quality, high performance, exclusivity marketing triggers or some other type of unique value proposition (UVP) or brand position that carries a premium from which you can profit. Be sure to stress the UVP in the sales pitch, whether in packaging quality or words on the package.     

Charm pricing is a popular pricing strategy used in retail. Since humans (used to reading from left to right) tend to focus more attention on the digits to the left, retailers often reduce prices like $1.00 to $0.99. $0.98 or 0.97. Although the difference is marginal, people generally consider it a more significant discount than a 1-cent increase to $1.01. In short, consumers perceive the small discount to be larger than it really is. 

To test whether this can work for your brand, simply change your price accordingly and compare the market's response. 

Needless to say, charm pricing has become so popular worldwide that the market expects a regular, non-luxury product when they see charm pricing. Consequently, avoid charm pricing for luxury products. Specifically, feel free to use whole numbers. In other words, rather than prices like $199, set the price to $200. Using charm pricing inappropriately like with luxury products could be detrimental to your brand.

Innumeracy refers to a pricing approach that takes advantage of the fact that many buyers are either unable or unwilling to understand some mathematical concepts involving numbers as they apply to daily life. This usually involves wording offers in ways that create a favorable illusion. Example(s)

• Consumers respond more favorably to offers to get the 2nd item free over pay 50% off when the 2 offers are essentially the same.
• When shopping for an item priced at $100, consumers easily feel special by the idea of getting not only 1 discount of 25% but an extra one of 20% 'just because the sales person ostensibly thought they were great'. However, the positive emotion deceives them, preventing them from realizing that, if the amount payable were calculated at once on a single summated discount of 45% (as b below), they would pay less ($55) than based on the discount being calculated in 2 parts. As illustrated below (in a), breaking apart the discount into 2 means that, when calculating the second second of the two discounts, that second discount will be calculated based on a price that is less than the original, ie less than the $100. Conversely, the summated total of the discount of 45% is calculated at once based on the higher original price of $100.
• a) $100  x 0.75 x 0.20        = $60      VERSUS
• b) $100  x 0.55                  = #55
• If your price can fall between $24 and $29, raise it to $29 without risk of consumers feeling ta significant difference.

Price Appearance refers to the physical way in which your price is displayed. The appearance of prices can be adjusted to support either abovementioned charm pricing or prestige pricing.

• Appearance of prestige pricing. High end retailers who have rounded up their prices (from $1xx to $200) recognize they are forcing upon their customers the pain of parting with more money than normal. For this reason, despite the fact they have clearly raised their prices, they try to make it appear as physically small and with as few characters as possible. In other words, they are trying to trick your mind into somehow thinking that the price is lower. For instance, a fancy clothing store may have prices written in small font and without the extra 0s at the end. Example(s):
• The price will be printed with a small font as '200' and not $200.00. The $ sign and extra digits reinforce the price. This is further reinforced by the fact that consumers read all the syllables of prices in their minds and would therefore take longer to recite the longer numbers. 
• Appearance of charm pricing. Non luxury prices that end in .99 like 1.99 for instance may make the 0.99 as small as possible. Needless to say, charm pricing is also typically presented with signage that is loud and large with words like 'sale'.
• 1.99 (versus $1.99)

Final note regarding ethics

Beware as some consumers will find these practices deceptive while others will find them entirely acceptable. You will therefore need to consider your market very carefully.

CONTENT RELATED TO PSYCHOLOGICAL PRICING

• Buying decision
• Product bundling pricing
• Exclusivity & urgency marketing
• Cottage industry pricing for wholesale customers
• MAP pricing

Brand Architecture

Brand architecture refers to the structure of the hierarchy and inter-relationships among various brands owned by your business. Advance planning your business' brand architecture is strategic in that it exploits the potential impacts of a parent brand's visibility, pre-existing brand awareness and reputation on other brands as you grow. This matter is ideal for businesses of any size, even ... or perhaps I should say, especially small businesses. Previously, I discussed the Ansoff matrix of growth strategies as they relate to different levels of risk (of failure). Brand architecture strategy can manage some of this risk. How you plan to group them into families and establish hierarchy is somewhat like family planning.  You can create support systems of brands that end up stronger than otherwise. This type of planning is even more critical today in a very noisy marketplace.

This post will discuss types of structure with 1) branded house and 2) house of brands structures existing on extremes of each other. Specifically, while the branded house structure presents support and safety, the house of brands presents complete freedom and independence. In-between these two extremes are 3) endorsed brands that have the best of both worlds to varying degrees and 4) hybrid brands.

1) Branded house  (brand support & safety net)

A branded house aka an umbrella of brands refers to a set of subordinate brands that are exposed to the public as being clearly derived from a visible master brand. The subordinate brands are derivatives of the master brand. Sub-brands may retain some aspect of the master's brand personality in that they often look and feel similar. Sometimes, the name of the master is integrated into the names of its sub-brands. However, they vary slightly to accommodate their own specific individual personality. I think of them like a close-knit family household with a shared culture but still every family member does his or her own thing. They all live under one roof with a placard hanging from it with their name. Each time a new member brand is 'born', the pre-existing brands give the new brand an unfair advantage into the market through familial association. The benefits include the following.

+ Each sub-brand can appeal better to its unique segment. It can therefore exist as a standalone brand. 

+ Each new sub-brand benefits from the brand awareness and strong reputation of the master brand. It does not need to start from scratch in building trust. This minimizes the greater risk asspcoated with risky growth strategies like diversification. As previously discussed with the Ansoff matrix, there is an elevated risk of failure with growth strategies. The benefit of this was evident in the new product development case of FedEx Office, whose offering is unlike all the other sub-brands. 

+ Consumers can easily make the connection among the sub-brands and remain likely to buy and use entire families. Examples include Google and Microsoft.

Master brand

• sub-brand 1
• sub-brand 2
• sub-brand 3

FedEx (master brand)

• FedEx Express
• FedEx Ground
• FedEx Freight
• FedEx Trade Networks
• FedEx Office

With only a small color variation, the affiliation with the FedEx parent brand is unmistable. 

Marriott (master brand)

• JW Marriott
• Courtyard
• Marriott Executive Apartments

Google (master brand)

• Google Docs
• Google Analytics
• Google Forms
• Google Adsense
• etc

Other examples

• Microsoft Office (Excel, Word, etc)
• Adobe Creative Suite (Photoshop, Illustrator, etc)

2) House of brands    (freedom & independence)

Unlike the branded house, a house of brands is like a  structure with different households of extended family members. Each household has its own entrance and living area but remain aware of each other. Specifically, the master brand is largely invisible from the public thereby allowing sub-brands to look and feel very different and unrelated to each other. In other words, the average consumer is unaware of the relationship between the various sub-brands. In many cases, consumers do not even know the name of the master brand,

> The business can use ostensibly unrelated brands  to reach far more different segments. Segmenting  the market with different brands avoids confusion in the minds of consumers, especially when some aspects of the unique value proposition (UVP) of one brand may be deemed unaligned with another. For instance, if a business' core value involves veganism or some other 'ism that is a deal breaker for its sensitive market regarding the related core values but it wants to compete in non-vegan markets, that business will be better off creating an apparently different non-vegan brand. As evident in the case of BMW and Mini Cooper, the segments are very distinct. These diametric segments allow the business to exploit other areas in the market. 

+ From a brand risk management perspective, this structure avoids the risk of a harmed reptutation if one brand encounters bad experiences in the market. This is ideal when some of your brands are in industries that carry greater risk levels of bad press, product liability, etc.

+ This structure allows brands to become more diversified. This is evident in cases like Unilever (below), whose sub-brands have even diversified in to entirely different industries.

+ To an extent far greater than branded house cases, unrelated brands can be even more individualized to target more precisely to segments or niches in ways that would have been impossible if they had remained connected with other brands. In other words, consumers can be clearer about each brand's offering. To extend this facility, BMW further created its numbered series which go even further in allowing consumers to figure which one is right for them and to have aspirations of upgrading, which many people do.

- Having multiple standalone brands requires a larger investment of time, human resources and finance (than the alternative option of piggy backing off of master and or sister brands).

UniLever (master brand)

• Dove
• Lynx
• Ben & Jerry's
• Flora
• Lipton

P&G (master brand)

• Duracell
• Pringles
• Gillette
• Febreze
• Ariel
• Pampers

BMW (master brand)

• BMW
• sub-brands
• Mini Cooper
• sub-brands

3) Endorsed brands    (in-between)

This 'endorsed' brands exist somewhere in between the 2 extremes, enjoying the best of both worlds. It is like the grown child who lives in an apartment in her parents' house. Sub-brands like this enjoy independence but still have the safety net of the parent brand. 

There is no one fixed extent to which endorsements occur. Some master brands are more visible than others. In such cases, the master brandname is used as a prefix for the new brand. On the other extreme within this gray area, the master brand's visibility is limited to a mention in barely legible print on the back panel of a sub-brand's product label.

Some of the cases listed above should arguably be placed in this section.

Apple (master brand)

• iPad
• iPhone
• iMac
• Aoole Watch
• Apple TV

4) Hybrid brand structure    (combination)

A hybrid structure combines the 2 extremes much like a household with some grown independent children in their own apartments and otherse still living in their parents' household.  

CONTENT RELATED TO BRAND ARCHITECTURE

• Ansoff Matrix, a tool of strategic growth that can result in the creation of different brands with different levels of risk.
• branding 101'
• Brand personality
• Brand Positioning, Strategy
• Brand style guidelines
• core values.
• mascot
• brand voice (tagline, campaign slogans)
• brand strategies (lifestyle branding)
• products (product mix)
• brand story
• Abovementioned case studies in other content

• Apple
• FedEx
• Google
• Marriott
• Mimi Cooper
• P&G
• Unilever

Packaging Design 101

Packaging design refers to the design of a product's container. Although this so-called 'container' serves a utilitarian purpose of protecting and prolonging its contents, its higher purpose as a retail salesman is the primary focus of this post. On that basis and for the purpose of this post, packaging design can therefore be understood as a promotional opportunity for consumer packaged goods (CPG) aka fast moving consumer goods (FMCG) products. In short, your package must say 'buy me' in the best possible way.

Package Design Objectives 

To sell effectively, package design must always meet the following 3 generic objectives.

1. Be sensorially appealing (this often refers to the visual)
2. Communicate
3. Persuade

These generic objectives should be developed and customized according to brand-specific and sales-related pain points and needs. For instance, a brand manager's common pain point is that consumers might miss the implortant cues related to brand differentiation, brand positioning and the unique selling proposition / USP in a packaging the pre-existing design.

• Example. There is a desire to portray a rich back 'story'. This typically involves details about a special way in which materials are sourced, manufacturing process, region and history (the USP).
• Example. The packaging needs to better establish consumer expectations. Perhaps the labeling information is not sufficiently descriptive for the consumer's level of product knowledge.
• Example. The brand already has legacy in the form of a pre-existing logo or logo idea that the business owners want to retain in the new package design.
• Example. The owners wants to elevate the perception so that the brand can be seen as premium so it can appeal to high end boutique retailers. Afterall, customers do not buy products, they buy feelings.

 

To be effective, packaging design also appropriately adapts to the product's stage in its life cycle and the stage within the decision making process of your target customer whose profile (avatar) you have already established. (The buying decision process has 5 stages: 1. Problem / need awareness, 2. Solution options research, 3. Consideration / evaluation of alternatives, 4. buy decision and 5. post purchase evaluation). The abovementioned 3 generic objectives have overlapping elements. Consequently, use them as a type of checklist to double check the adequacy of your approach of each objective. ...

Your package design process

Ground 0

In short, before tackling these 3 objectives, collect background brand (related) information that will motivate the design. This includes visual (and other sensorial) inspirations and conceptual research. Examples of 'conceptual research' include knowledge about the brand's sociocultural or geographic setting that will appeal to consumers. 

1. Be sensorial! (ie be appealing to the five senses which mostly involves the visual and tactile appeal)

Make it easy for consumers to notice or find your product on a shelf amidst noisy competition. To this end, use visual assets related to your brand personality like logo, mascots, color and even packaging materials. Considering what design trends already work for competitors, ie without copying the competition, collect samples of competitive brand packaging for analysis. Considering your target market's avatar psychographics, what visuals will resonate with a consumer with his or her specific problem x?

Among other things, visibility may respond to the degree of your market's 'awareness', ie of the brand awareness, the product and even the problem. Consider the product life cycle and your market's buying decision stage. For a new product, especially one for which there is little to no awareness of the product and even the problem, the 'visibility' objective deserves even more of your attention than otherwise. If your market is not already aware of their problem, your visuals will need to focus on highlighting the problem. Consider not only the obvious needs but subconscious ones that motivate the obvious motivator. For instance, consumers often seek after physical beauty products because they feel a need to comply with social beauty standards in order to be liked and belong. This is why advertisements may use abstract imagery like people attracting the opposite sex or connecting with friends even though the product is not directly related to these concepts. 

An option is to also use a disruptive style by exaggerating elements. 

Example: extreme colors, shapes, sizes, fonts. Sexy clothing for Valentines may come in red packaging because red is associated with amorous passion. Retailers sometimes stock competing brands next to each other on shelves if their colors are highly contrasting. Consider doing this with your market leader, especially if your product quality is already on point.  

Example: emotive images. 

Example: minimalism. Beware that minimalism carries brand risk in that it compromises your ability to meet the next objective of communicating your brand's message. 

Case: The Apple computers brand has such high levels of brand awareness, often 'unaided brand recall' that its packaging can afford to be highly minimalistic in ways that competing brands with less brand awareness can not afford to be. Its brand is so well known that it no longer needs to communicate its benefits to consumers.

Case: 

Example: Your market may be unaware of side effects of current products. In some cases, this is because the side effects occur insidiously, like plastic packaging that has nowhere to go after being dumped or even recycled. Although this problem is extrinsic to the product, for some target markets, it is noteworthy because it resonates strongly with their core values. Brand managers may use compostable packaging and or symbols to highlight the problem or suggest they offer the solution. Three leaves that resemble arrows and arranged in a circle are often used to replace the symbol of 3 arrows in a circle to suggest a product's packaging is recyclable. 

Having said all the above, when undertaking this process, save yourself time! Rather than attempt to complete the perfect visuals upfront, focus on completing a basic template called a 'design skeleton'. Function before form! The skeleton should use a single basic font and only grayscale tones. 

The skeleton applies basic brand information from insights research (like brand name, taglines, key claims and other key messages) to the basics of the form (like the package shape and dimensions). It is only after establishing the design skeleton should you consider the color, imagery, pretty fonts and so on. 

2. Communicate for the brand!

Communicate the following 4 messages. However, whenever possible, do so within the context of keywords that your target uses to research information related to solution options.

1. your brand. Example. When surveyed, consumers cite large legible brandnames as one element that makes brands recognizable.

2. functional benefits. Example: If you are selling an acne treatment, your target market is likely to use search keywords (online or in a store) like 'how to get rid of pimples?', 'how to control excess oil on my face?' and 'best exfoliants'. When the packaging plays a functional role in the consumption of the product, the experience of using it also influences product and brand perceptions. Examples include cosmetic product pumps, flip versus screw caps. BEWARE of restrictions imposed by regulatory bodies for labeling claims in your industry.

3. reason to trust the brand. This often involves using the influence principle of authority, ie highlighting associations and credentials like training and other accolades that are widely considered authorities in the industry. Case: One way in which CeraVe influences buyers is with their tagline 'made with dermatologists'. Example: FDA approved. Other ways in which trust is built is through social proof; cause-related core values for mission-driven brands. 

Example: Tagline! Your purchase helps us to employ mothers who are unable to go out to work.

4. emotional benefits & end result 

Communication should be consistent with your brand personality. Examples include premium cues like dark colors, shiny accents. 

3. Persuade!

This objective overlaps with communicating the brand in a trustworthy way. As previously mentioned, it is ideal to apply principles of influence.

Persuasion is typically achieved with key purchase motivation factors. These are often the UVP that differentiates and positions the brand in a favorable way relative to the competition based on a key attribute.

'voted #1 [key role]'; 'voted most [key attribute] by the [industry experts]';

Recap of steps for product package design

1. Conduct background strategic brand research. This research should include: brand personality especially as it relates to: visual inspirations (which may be external, as from Pinterest, movies, competition, etc) and conceptual research. Collect and analyze samples of successful direct competitors. Gather various ideas so that your graphic artist can create different design options from which you can select. Also know the life cycle. This step may require a lot of collaboration between the graphic designer and brand manager. Create a list of keywords, taglines, etc for submission to your graphic designer for inclusion in the label content.
2. Expressly agree with all involved in your process on the 3 design objectives within the context of the brand manager's pain point(s).
3. Create design skeleton or ask your graphic artist to do this for you. When handing over details, parties should reconfirm understanding along the way. One way of ensuring this is for the recipient of information to (re)assure the other that (s)he understands, often by repeating details just provided.
4. Using brand research, have your graphic artist propose several rough design concept options in the 'first round'. A 'first round' is a presentation of usually 3 - 4 options. It is a survey that seeks to to eliminate less desirable versions. Respondents are the business owner or brand manager. If you are doing the design on your own, your respondents may be your brand team and even beta testers (in new product development) from your target market members. The artist should have proposed the number of permissable edits beforehand and will advise whether your edit requests are possible. Whenever possible, avoid first rounds with only 1 concept option because that does not provide safety nets if the brand manager does not like a proposed concept. For creative motivation, perform an (in)formal demand matrix, a positioning tool for sales channels based on the price level and how many customers are likely. Complete this task with competing brands, including leaders. Look at the packaging designs of successful competing brands in your desired quadrant for packaging design ideas (which has been very strongly related to price elasticity of demand for certain types of locations).
5. The design should go into the refinement stage in which edits are done based on the graphic artist's proposed options.

CONTENT RELATED TO PACKAGING DESIGN

• The 6 Principles of influence
• Consider your target market avatar's 'buyer personality type' ('assertives', 'analyticals', 'amiables' and 'expressives').
• Brand voice and tone
• Social media management
• Brand positioning 
• Use a brand style manual to communicate your brand with graphic designers.
• Before proceeding, gather as much insight as possible about the branding. This includes establishing the brand personality, positioning in the competitive landscape, main communication objectives, etc.
• In-store / Point of purchase displays / POP displays
• Brand style guidelines 
• Color palettes 101 & setting the rules for the brand style guidelines
• Fun fact. The chocolate brand Cadbury;s, received many complaints that their dairy milk bar no longer tasted how it used to. However, the only thing that had changed at all was the shape of the chocolate bar. No changes had been made to the recipe.
• As pictured below, dielines are 2D pre-press (ie pre-printing preparation) representations of your 3D package design. A dieline looks like a disassembled box whose seams have been unglued so that the entire structure lays flat. It serves as a guideline for printers. For instance, it shows 'bleed lines' (often in green), 'cut lines' (often solid red or black lines) and the 'safe zone line' (usually in blue). Bleed lines extend just slightly beyond the edge of a panel. The edge of images or other visible media should be set up against these lines as a safeguard, ie just in case the printer shifts. This ensure that such slight printer errors will not result in panels with unprinted edges. The safe zone line is a guideline to ensure that anything that absolutely must be visible is placed within its boundaries, thereby preventing cuch content from being missed by minor printing errors.

Brand Personality - Color Palettes 101

Brand colors    

Brands use the psychology of color to convey their personality and to trigger emotional responses from the target market. For instance, if you want consumers to trust your brand and feel safe (possibly because of the potential sensitive nature of your industry and product), you may prefer blue. If you are unsure, seek inspiration from several logos and images that belong to direct competitors or are somehow associated with your brand. These can be used for selecting your main brand colors.

Color palettes, What are they?

A color palette is the full range of colors that your graphic designers will use for creating any user interface (UI) presentation (like a website, software and so on).  ^ 

Why color palettes (versus one color)?

Color palettes are useful for knowing how to combine colors effectively within a single presentation. Color combinations are noteworthy because they render an overall effect that is often very different to what is likely from presenting each single component color alone. This point is most evident when looking at a single logomark against different backgrounds with varying levels of contrast. In short, the higher the contrast, the greater the logomark will stand out and be effective because humans tend to look more readily at elements that have the greatest level of contrast.

This is therefore used strategically. A common example is when webpage users select an item that becomes more contrasty (like primary action buttons*) while the other options become less contrasty. This technique allows users to recognize the less contrasty elements as representing parts of the presentation but temporarily suspend their attention from those currently less important elements (like secondary action buttons).

Furthermore, color palettes are included in the brand style guidelines to establish the only colors to be used by UI graphic designers or other creators. This ensures that the brand's appearance remains consistent across all interfaces and other touchpoints.

*primary action buttons are usually calls to action to complete current tasks (or strong warning like to 'cancel' irreversible actions). Unlike 'secondary actions' that blend into the background, these buttons should be eye catching. ^ 

The composition of a color palette

Typically, palettes consist of the following components. 

• a very dark color that is either black or nearly black. In most cases, this color is used for text. Otherwise, it may also be used as a background color. 
• a very light color that is either white or nearly white. In most cases, this color is used for backgrounds and clearance (aka 'white space'). Otherwise, it may also be used as text colors on a highly contrasting dark background color. 
• a brand color that relates most to the emotional trigger you want your brand to have on the target market. Consequently, you will use this color in the most often as the focal point, not necessarily the color with the highest usage rate. This is evident in the case of McDonald's whose focal color is yellow, even though red is often used as a background for the arches.

• An accent color. This color originates from within the same color family, typically from the same side (warm or cool) of the color wheel as the other color. Sometimes, high contrast can be achieved by selecting colors that sit at 180 degrees, ie opposite to each other on the color wheel. 

• A 'contrasty' color. This is another, but more extreme accent color. However, it contrasts with the others. It should be very eye catching and is often used for call to actions (CTAs) buttons and hyperlinks.

Regardless of how many colors you have generated, all of them may be divided into the following 3 groups.

1. primary               aka dominant (the background)
2. secondary             aka complementary (often but not necessarily the brand color)
3. accents

Some brands have variations to these standards classifications. 

For instance, Atlassian's 3 palettes are as follows. 

1) a primary palette (with 2 neutrals and a brand color)

2) a secondary palette (with contrasts / accents of 5 colors) and 

3) multiple 'extended palettes' (with tint and shade variations of the other 2 palettes).   ^ 

 

How color palettes are used: the 60-30-10 rule

The primary, secondary and accent colors are assigned usage ratios that add up to 100%. The 60-30-10 rule has been well established in and borrowed from various fields that include interior design. As a sidenote, it is just a guide that can be used with some level of flexibility. However, since it has rendered reliable results in different fields, it is a good guideline, especially for beginners.

60% of a user interface (UI) usually comprises the background color. These colors are often neutral (like white, black or colors very close to them). (Neutral colors are subtle. Among the most common ones are black, white, brown, cream and gray. Although they are abundantly used in design, they often go unnoticed by layman users without experience in graphic design and brand management. They are so called because they often lack 'hue undertones' and are therefore thought of as being 'pure', and therefore rendering a very 'natural' feeling. The types of colors assigned to this dominant role can change between the neutrals and brand colors. For instance, bold designs like a special landing pages may assisgn a bold brand color as the 60% dominant color. See the illustration of this below.

30% is usually made of main elements like text. Brand colors are often used to this extent. However, that is not necessarily the case.

10% is made of accent colors that add contrast and interest to the page. These may be used to draw attention like calls to action (CTAs) buttons and hyperlinks. This percentage should be kept at its minimum because the contrast with the other colors tends to be very loud and, depending on your particular palette, may become intolerable beyond this point. For this reason, the common practice of swapping the assignment of the other colors between primary and secondary does not generally apply to these types of color.

Here is a palette. Before comparing it with the application of the 60-30-10 rule on the webpage below, note that black and white are interchangeable  because they are in the same 'primary' palette. One can easily be swapped out for the other if that alternative creates sufficient contrast. Like the black and white, the light and hot pink can also be used interchangeably or in combination as the accent colors because they belong to the 3rd 'accent' palette. On these basis, the large white letters are using the black assignment of space and the hot pink image below the button is part of the pink allocation.

On this bold landing page; the palette's blue is used at a rate of 60% (in the background), its white at 20% (in the large print) and its pink at 10% (in the tiny print and secondary color when the button is rolled over). (Notice how, although the white and black can usually be substituted within this palette, the black can not be used below because it does not contrast sufficiently with this background).

DOMINANT: blue
COMPLEMENTARY: white (or black)
ACCENT: light pink or hot pink

When users scroll down, the webpage presentation switches the space allocations for the same palette of colors. The 'white' is now used at a rate of 60%, the purple is now at 30% and the black is at 10%. 

DOMINANT: white (or black)

COMPLEMENTARY: blue or pinks

ACCENT: black

The poster immediately below follows the same 60-30-10 rule (for the most part). 

60%     neutral color: white 

25%    completementary: yellow

15%   3 contrasting colors

             10%     green

             2.5%    red

             2.5%    black

^  

 

How many palettes do you need?

Each brand varies of course. However, consider the examples above in which the neutral and contrasting colors comprised multiple color options. These colors will therefore be part of their respective palettes. On that basis, a single brand usually has multiple palettes as opposed to only 3 colors. As discussed above, Atlassian, a software company, offers 3 palettes, the 'extended' of which offer further numerous tint and shade variations for the earlier palettes. Keep in mind that color palettes are designed to provide all the possible colors creators can ever use. On that basis, provide sufficient options.     ^  

How to make a color palette ... or several palettes from one brand color

Color palette generators like a mycolor.space (a free online color palette generatspaceor) produce numerous palette options based on your given color. The given color always appears first in these palette options. In this case, the given color was #E31511. 

However, if you need to customize palettes, you can use the following steps. 

Within a color picker, select a color you are certain to use. You can use an image color picker to select a color from any image that you upload. Once you have the code for that image, enter the color into the color picker as pictured below.

Step 1.  Select a brand color. See how above. I will use the following to illustrate. This color will be the center of our palette. 

#E31511    Crimson

                                                                                                     ^  

Step 2. Create a color family 

From this point, create several colors that are lighter and darker than the brand color. For this illustration, I will create 4 lighter colors (the process of which can be replicated to create 4 darker ones). 

To create the 4 lighter colors, adjust the a) saturation and b) hue to arrive at different colors. As pictured below, imagine an arch that extends from the top left corner (that is closest to pure white), runs directly through the brand color and then ends in the bottom right color (that is closest to pure black). Select varations by plotting points along the curved path of this arch.

This process involves moving your mouse to those new plot points to find the additional colors that you like. You can also use the sliding tool to move away from the starting color. If you are going to select 4 different colors in the lighter range, it might be helpful to first establish the farthest selection plot point and then search for acceptable colors that are around equidistant points along the arch. In this example, if I want the lightest of my lighter colors to still feel related to red, I may stop at a sallow color as below before selecting the other points that are closer to the central point.

Continue this process until you like the new colors that are noticeably different from earlier ones. Here are the lighter colors is the emerging palette.

#E31511    Crimson

#E28751    terracotta

#F3b089    Tacao

#F7f1a8      Sandwisp

#F0f1cd  ≈ Tahuna Sands

Continue to arrive at the more saturated (ie darker) colors along the arch and moving the slider. (Not illustrated here).        ^ 

Step 3: Create 'tint' and 'shade' color variations

Variations of a single color are made by adding tints (ie more pure white) and shades (ie more pure black). Online variation generators typically generate variation options in 10% increments. On that basis, you can apply the same percentage of tint or shade to all the colors of your palette so far. This will create tints and or pastel variations. To find varitions for each color within the color family you created in the previous step. scroll down to the 'variations' section of the color picker (as pictured below using the brand color). 

Select variations with the level of tint you like. If I select 40%, I will apply 40% in the same way to all other of the colors in the color family from the previous step.

#E31511    Crimson  (original)

#Ee7370     ≈ Froly   (lighter variation)

#E28751    Terracotta (original)

#Eeb797     Tacao   (lighter variation)

#F3b089    Tacao (Original)

#F8d0b8     Danny Cream   (lighter variation)

.. and so on.

Repeat this process for lighter and darker variations. Of course, the darker variations require you to select 'shades' at 40%. Upon completion, you should have a range that looks like this. Ensure that there is sufficient variation among the 3 variations of any single color.

At this point, you can select parts of the palette that you like to be included into a 3-component palette (with 2 interchangeable neutrals, a brand color and a contrasting color). To make this final selection, consider the level of contrast you need. See below how 3 new palettes emerged in this example.

You can create even more palettes from these new ones. For instance, you can use this smaller color family as the basis for finding new variations (using the same process from above). See a new palette with variations highlighted below.

As a fun fact and as illustrated below, you can even overlay a color filter onto any palette to arrive at entirely new colors.

 ^ 

Step 4: Establish color rules for your brand style guidelines

Once you have established the 3 components of your palette (ie primary, secondary and accents), create the color-related rules that must be added to your brand style guidelines that are based on acceptable levels of contrast. 

Since primary and secondary colors can be used for backgrounds, test for acceptable contrast between them and elements like your logomark, wordmark, buttons of different contrasting colors, hyperlinks, font sizes, accent shapes and so on. Apply the same content to these different backgrounds, change the colors of each content as needed and then compare and contrast them until you can establish the rules for creators. See the demonstration (below) of this process and how to then apply the rules on a webpage.

 

Other rules are based on conditions. For instance. some brands allow greater use of contrast (in the form of illustrations) when brand awareness is already well established.  ^ 

CONTENT RELATED TO BRAND PERSONALITY - COLOR

Brand personality

Brand Positioning, Strategy

Brand style guidelines

Free tools for creating color palettes

Free online color picker. My favorite. Select colors from any image,  automatic suggested variations, suggested combinations, automatic conversioins among 8 code formats including hexadecimal and CMYK. 

Create color palette in Inkscape (YouTube video)

Free online color palette generator: Mycolor.space. This tool generates different palettes from the single dominant color you enter.

Free online color palette generator: coolors.co  .

^