What are brand values? Melbourne design agency Studio Alto share expert insights on the value of brand values.
What is the value of brand values?
Done wrong, they are nothing more than brand BS. Done right, they can be an essential plank of brand strategyâa beacon of clarity, unity and market differentiation. How do you get it right? Instead of thinking about ‘value’, think about the cost.
Many years ago we took a lesson in the what-not-to-doâs of brand strategy.
We were a young design agency, just starting out. At our client’s request, we were paired up with a more senior agency who would handle brand strategy, while we developed the brand visual identity.
We thought this would be a great opportunity to learn what we didnât know. And boy, did we learn a lot.
- How not to run a workshop.
- How not to do stakeholder engagement.
- How not to quote a job.
- How not to forge good relationships.
I still think of these how-not-to lessons often. One of the things that sticks with me the most is the usefulnessâor uselessnessâof brand values.
Words are cheap
Any brand strategist worth their Simon Sinek will espouse the value of values, and rightly so. Youâll hear something like âbrand values are your true northâ, and then examples of the brand values of Apple, Harley Davidson etc will be rolled out, before encouraging you to grab a sharpie, some sticky-notes and call out your brand values.
This exercise invariably surfaces things like:
âintegrityâ, âteamworkâ, âqualityâ, âcustomer satisfactionâ, ârespectâ, âexcellenceâ, âinnovationâ, âethicalâ, âfunâ, âcustomer-orientedâ, âcourageâ, âimpactâ, and my personal favourite âauthenticâ.
Yep. You and everyone else, buddy.
When done wrong, this process is just a box-ticking, feel-good list of stuff-we-like, to go in the brand manual, into the filing cabinet, never to be thought about again.
Quick test â if you or your team canât remember what your brand values are, then chances are they are not that important. They don’t actually guide the work that you do, or why you do it.
Why values matter
There are two key reasons for identifying or establishing brand values:
1. Market differentiation
One of the key reasons for identifying values is to differentiate who you are and what you do from the rest. If youâve got the same checklist as everyone else (and trust me, everyone does âvalueâ the same handful of things), you may as well skip this stage entirely. Youâre wasting your time and money.
2. Internal brand alignment
Identifying shared and even aspirational values are an essential part of the cultural glue that unites any group, defining a shared sense of purpose, and can indeed serve as a compass.
However, itâs just not that easy to hone in on what those things are, and get to the juicy ones that can be used as a means for brand clarity, unity and market differentiation.
So how do you identify what you do actually value? Think instead about the cost.
Values have a cost
In a world where consumers can smell bullsh*t at ten paces, the most valuable asset to any brand is authenticity. But âauthenticâ is not a value to add to your list, itâs just a word that describes your actions.
As your mother (probably) said – âactions speak louder than wordsâ.
What have you had to, or are willing to, sacrifice? What have you or will you pay for in money, time, blood, sweat and tears because it matters to you?
Claim and proof
How do you test whether itâs really a value? You prove it.
Your values are worthless unless you show the proof, or wear the scars. What does that look like?
- Outdoor clothing company Patagonia are well known for wearing their values on their sleeve, and recently donated their $10 million Trump tax cut savings to fight climate change.
- Bank Australiaâs âResponsible Bankingâ charter, which states that they wonât lend to the fossil fuels, intensive animal farming, live export industry, gambling, arms, or tobacco industries.
- Clothing company Everlaneâs âRadical Transparencyâ policy, where they publish their directory of worldwide factories to ensure âfair wages, reasonable hours, and an ethical environment for factory workersâ, and âreveal the true costs behind all of our productsâfrom materials to labour to transportationâ.
These commitments, actions and sacrifices are what differentiates a brand in an individual’s mind, making them relevant, respected and desirable.
Values: donât list them, live them
When you start to think about values in terms of the cost you are willing to pay, the list shortens dramatically. Whatâs more, because you have invested in these values, you will value them all the moreâyou wonât have to dig them out of the filing cabinet to remember them, because you’ve earned them. You live them.
For those reasons, you will have earned the much claimed but rarely proven value of âauthenticityâ.
