From Strategy to Equity: How ASEES Creates the Backbone for the Journey

Jaafar Hamza

The complexity of business involves juggling multiple aspects simultaneously: products or services, internal personnel (employees), external stakeholders (customers), business structure, and various other considerations.

All these elements need to be tightened up and become one cohesive unit so you can manage, measure, and sustain them. Therefore, we need a unifying factor to hold everything together.

In this article, we will discuss tools that will serve as your roadmap to transform your brand strategy into brand equity, covering the intermediate steps.

Brand Strategy Becomes Essential

Brand strategy has become essential for businesses and organizations due to the rise of two factors:

• Competitiveness
• Expectations

Before we delve into the details, the first question is:

What is Brand Strategy?

A brand strategy is a complete guide, a comprehensive roadmap that outlines the details of your business. It includes your brand's mission, values, vision, target market, and needs. A brand strategy is communicated to your team members to help tailor and direct their efforts toward a united goal.

Source: FORBES

An effective brand strategy aims to build brand awareness, loyalty, and long-term success. In other words, the brand strategy is your decision on what you want to stand for—the associations you want to build in people’s minds.

Why Do We Need a Brand Strategy?

It’s the roadmap and blueprint for any business or organization to create their own positioning in the market and achieve the perception they want to hold in their customers’ minds. Here are some benefits of having a brand strategy:

1. Differentiation: A strong brand strategy helps a company stand out by clearly defining its unique value proposition (UVP) through the 3 Ps (Product, People, and Presentation).
2. Customer Recognition and Loyalty: Consistent branding builds recognition and trust, fostering customer loyalty and repeat business. This happens both internally within the organization among employees and stakeholders and externally for customers and end users.
3. Emotional Connection: A well-defined brand strategy creates an emotional bond with the audience, influencing their purchasing decisions and creating the perception that leads to action.
4. Guides Marketing Efforts: A clear brand strategy ensures all marketing and communication efforts are consistent and aligned with the brand’s values by choosing the right brand archetype and creating an effective persona for the business. This reflects on all communication and touchpoints with customers.
5. Value Perception: A strong brand shapes the customer's perception of its value, influencing attributes such as quality, convenience, and reliability, which can enhance the overall customer experience regardless of price point.
6. Business Direction and Focus: A brand strategy provides direction and focus, aligning the organization’s activities with its mission and vision for long-term success.

A well-executed brand strategy leads to the creation of brand equity, which is the ultimate goal for any business as it signifies the brand's value and impact in the market.

What is Brand Equity?

“Brand equity is a set of assets or liabilities in the form of brand visibility, brand associations, and customer loyalty that add or subtract from the value of a current or potential product or service driven by the brand.” (Aaker, 1991, Managing Brand Equity)

Simply put, brand equity represents the value of a brand.

How Can We Move from Brand Strategy to Brand Equity?

This can be achieved through the ASEES Methodology, which stands for:

1. A: Audit and Assessment: Conduct a thorough audit of all brand touchpoints, both internal and external, to evaluate their effectiveness in achieving the brand's objectives. This includes examining communication channels, brand messaging, and overall brand presence.
2. S: Strategy: Based on the audit and assessment, develop a comprehensive brand strategy that aligns with the organization's vision, mission, and values. This strategy should address the identified gaps and leverage strengths to enhance brand positioning.
3. E: Execution: Implement the strategy across all relevant areas. This includes internal execution with employees to ensure they embody the brand values, as well as external execution to effectively reach end users and customers.
4. E: Evaluation: Continuously monitor and evaluate the execution of the strategy to ensure it aligns with the intended objectives. Adjustments should be made as necessary to stay on track and respond to any emerging challenges or opportunities.
5. S: Sustainability: Focus on sustaining brand equity through horizontal and vertical growth. Horizontally, expand product and service offerings and explore new markets geographically or virtually. Vertically, drive innovation in products and services to continuously meet and exceed customer expectations.

By following the ASEES methodology, businesses can systematically build and maintain strong brand equity, ensuring long-term success and market impact.

What’s the Difference Between Brand Strategy and the Strategy from the ASEES Methodology?

Brand Strategy:

• Definition: Encompasses all aspects of how a brand is perceived in the market, including its positioning, messaging, target audience, competitive differentiation, and long-term goals.
• Components: Includes defining the brand's identity, value proposition, and strategic direction to achieve its business objectives.
• Purpose: Aims to establish a clear roadmap for how the brand will achieve its desired market position and build a sustainable competitive advantage over time.

ASEES Methodology (Strategy Component):

• Definition: Focuses specifically on developing a comprehensive plan based on audit and assessment findings.
• Purpose: Aims to align the brand's activities with its vision, mission, and values, addressing identified gaps and leveraging strengths.
• Scope: While brand strategy is broader and encompasses all elements of brand management, the strategy component within ASEES methodology is more tactical, focusing on immediate actions derived from assessment outcomes to enhance brand positioning.

Relationship:

In essence, brand strategy provides the overarching framework and direction for how a brand will achieve its market objectives, while the strategy component within ASEES methodology translates this into actionable steps based on current assessments and strategic goals.

How ASEES Leads to Brand Equity?

ASEES influences the perception of the brand when both internal and external aspects of brand strategy are implemented effectively. There is an interlinked relationship between brand perception and brand positioning: perception shapes positioning, while positioning empowers perception.

We can say that brand positioning builds brand equity because positioning follows a comprehensive process and presence in the market, which leads to the creation of value for the brand, thereby enhancing brand equity.

In summary, every business needs to create its equity in the market to sustain, expand, and leave a positive impact on the target audience’s life. To reach that equity, you need a roadmap and tools for your journey. The roadmap is your brand strategy, and your tool is the ASEES methodology.

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