Assessing Your Brand Story
This isn’t where I tell you it’s too hard to assess how what your brand story is and you need Happy Chance to do it for you. I’ll give it away, because it’s not a secret. It’s hard, that’s absolutely true, but it’s worthwhile in a way that justifies the effort almost immediately. It’s also just a small piece of cultivating your brand story. There are 8 steps to assessing your brand story as it currently stands. These steps will undoubtedly improve your business, but to fully realize brand story potential and avoid the potential pitfalls of this process read more here:
Observation. Make an observation or write down an issue your business is facing.
Example: My business website is seeing an abnormally high bounce rate.
Research. Seek existing information or talk with business owners facing a similar situation.
Example: Research bounce rates and dig deep into what they’re actually measuring. Identify areas of your site where the bounce rate is better than average and areas where it is poorer than average. What do those tell you? What is different about the content, the imagery, the design?
Hypothesis. Formulate a larger theory about what could be causing your issues. Write it down.
Example: My bounce rate is highest on product pages with fewer images. I predict adding images will improve my bounce rate.
Experiment. Test a single variable against a control.
Example: Add more product imagery to a poorly performing product page. Do not add imagery to a similarly performing item. Observe and record bounce rate over time.
Analyze. Draw a logical conclusion from the results. Log or Share the results.
Example: My bounce rate improved on the product page after adding additional imagery. Therefore, adding additional product imagery is a logical method to decrease bounce rates on poorly performing site pages. Or, in the inverse, my bounce rate remained constant despite increased imagery, therefore, imagery is not the primary reason my bounce rate is high on product pages.
Iterate. Keep testing variables. Over time, you learn specific strategies to achieve desirable results, and you also learn about your market and what is important to them. By extension, you’re also learning about what’s important to your brand.
Example: Images helped/didn’t help bounce rate. Testing long form product descriptions to measure whether they increase or decrease bounce rate independent of and in conjunction with product images can further clarify needed areas of improvement while giving action items for near term business objectives.
Apply findings to what your marketing says you are or do.
Example: If your marketing claims incredible customer service, but your existing product pages make it difficult to ascertain product features, then you have identified a problem with your business strategy that needs reconciliation. Addressing the expectation vs. the reality is an opportunity to change or live up to your brand story.
Codify.
Make the customer centricity, stakeholder centricity, employee centricity, value centricity inherent to this process a key feature of your business. It’s just listening.
So, it’s the scientific method. Surprise! It’s no secret at all. The hard part comes when the things the data points to as problematic are operationally difficult to change. In those instances, business pain points are palpable, and making the change required involves a real sacrifice. But, if the brand is strong enough, the decision is already made. If the data is there, the financial incentive is compelling. Let the story change you.
It may be difficult to see how bounce rate and brand story are tied. And, in some instances they may not be. However, testing many variables over time will absolutely reveal the places where brand and operations contradict themselves. When they do, it likely won’t be surprising because the issues are likely to manifest in other places as well: siloed departments, customer service inquiries, poor reviews. Listen, and let the story change you.
This is a way to grow intelligently, but it’s not the full picture when it comes to growing with your brand story in mind. It’s a way for the market to define you, but that’s not always a good thing. Read more about that here.
