How To Conduct A Brand Audit

Brand is what differentiates your company from your competitors. Taking an outside-in view of your company will drive initiatives that create greater market share and build customer loyalty. So how do you conduct a brand audit?

Brand is not just your company's name and logo.

Brand is:

The unique impression you leave on your customers
About how your customers feel about you
How your company looks
The special way you deliver your service and products
Your attitude and the way you advertise yourself

Brand is important because a consistent brand means you can spend less money attracting new customers. It means that your customers keep returning, you're able to charge a higher price for your services, and you get more word-of-mouth referral.

Big companies the world over have huge folders devoted to their brand guidelines, with detailed instructions about how and where logos can be used, the colour palette allowed and what their promise to customers is. They have these folders and these rules, because they know the value of a strong, consistent brand. The good news is that it's easy for any business to get on board the "brandwagon"!

The brand audit process helps determine:

The strength of your brand
What's good about it
Where it works
How well your customers can recall it
Uncover weaknesses and inconsistencies
Show you where there are opportunities for improvement

The outcome of the audit is to ensure consistency in the way your business is promoted and perceived. This leads to a stronger brand and therefore, a stronger company.

To successfully conduct a brand audit your research needs to include:

Marketing brand audit - A complete review of the physical representation of the brand (stationery/advertising etc.)
Internal brand audit - Conducting employee workshops and management interviews
External brand audit - Conducting external market research ie customers, target market and stakeholders from whom you want to find out how the company is spoken of, its current positioning and perceived culture

You need to go over a wide range of areas including:

Typefaces and colours: Are these consistent across your stationery, emails, website, marketing materials, uniforms and signage?
Imagery: Do the photos/illustrations you use all have the same hue, framing and characteristics?
Email tagline: Does everyone in the company use the same email tagline, or do some not use one at all?
Tone of voice: Do your sales material, website, emails and letters all use the same tone of voice and same language style?
Reception area: Is it in keeping with your brand?
Name tags: Are these consistent in typeface, colour and quality?
Packaging: Is your product's packaging distinctive and in keeping with your brand?
Communication: Is your phone answered in the same manner every time. Is this first introduction to your company in keeping with your brand?
Advertisements: Do you chop and change your style regularly or is your advertising instantly recognisable based on its theming?
Employees: Do they feel the same way about the company's values or is there a wide disparity in views? Do they treat customers in much the same way, or are there huge discrepancies? A mystery shopper program can be useful to determine this.

During an audit you might realise your company is promising one thing to your customers but delivering something else. This destroys customer loyalty, and reduces sales. Or you might discover your brand has lost its sense of direction and what it stands for. If this is your discovery, revitalising your brand would be the next step.

The most valuable brands in the world have achieved their position not just through implementing an initially strong branding strategy, but more so, by monitoring changes in customer perceptions over time, and being strategically flexible to these changes. Many businesses overlook the need to monitor their customer base in any great depth, as the focus is often all about acquiring new customers, not keeping current ones. A brand audit helps you do both.

Many unexpected positives can come out of an audit. You might need to make just a few tweaks to get back on track, or you might have to go through a thorough spring clean. Wherever you are on the scale, an audit helps give you an important perspective on your business.

Jane Toohey, Marketing Angels. Marketing Angels understand small business and deliver marketing solutions that work. For more information visit the website: www.marketingangels.com.au
First published: 18 March 2008.
Last updated: 18 March 2008.