Brandcamp Recap
Written by Brandcamp Intern, Ben Vickers
We held a multi-session branding clinic at KEC early this August. With the guidance of our Chief Experience Officer Chris McAdoo, new business owners of the Knoxville area joined forces to create and refine their companies’ branding strategy. As Chris stated to the entrepreneurs several times throughout the day, the mission for Brandcamp was to “define and grow your brand using the same approach as professional brand and strategy agencies.” Similarly, when asked why they signed up for Brandcamp, the common theme within each response was clarity–for themselves and their brand. Through each of the three interactive activities, participants were able to define their businesses, audiences, competition, and goals, all with continual feedback from their peers. Then, to close off the day, experts in branding from across the country led small group discussions to go over each entrepreneur’s brand promise, tag line, and general branding strategy. Participants evaluated, generated, and revamped everything from the typeface they use to preparing for their future market.
The first session found each participant using powerfully branded companies such as Blackberry, Gridsmart, and Pepsi in order to brand themselves and their business. As Chris said during his presentation; “A brand is a promise made and a promise kept,” and it is meant to inspire action and make the customer feel important. He also taught that in each aspect of your brand, you need to choose one option and stick with it. Whether it is the color palette, shapes used tagline, tone of voice, font, imagery, or logo, it needs to be consistent throughout the entire brand. Next, each participant came up with six adjectives to describe what kind of person they are, and what kind of person they are not. Interestingly enough, the latter was found to be much more difficult than the former. Finally, everybody in the room shared their defining adjectives, then critiqued as a whole why they said that and how it differentiates them from their competitors, which leads to the next session.
Use the activity below to help define your brand personality by writing down traits that define you or traits you know do not define your business.
After a short intermission to stretch their legs, the participants got right back to work to clarify their primary and secondary audiences, as well as their direct and indirect competitors. Primary audiences are the people who will be using your product, while secondary audiences are the ones who manage the money, deciding what to purchase and what not to purchase. Direct competitors are those who have similar products and the same potential customers, while indirect competitors have a different product, but draw from the same money base.
During lunch, everyone set their goals, with instructions to make them quantitative, feasible, and relatively short-term. While the professional brand managers filed into the room, the goals of each company were debated and reconstructed according to the discussions.
Use the activity below to define quantitative, short-term goals for your business.
To conclude the day, experts in branding were split into small groups to go over everything that had been worked on throughout the day, giving advice and counsel. With a wide variety of business present, from meditation studios and life counselors to AI interfacers and publishers, Brandcamp made for a thought provoking and inspiring day!
Photos taken by Holly Rainey
If you have any questions about Brandcamp or how to get in touch with branding or marketing experts in our community reach out to Hello@knoxec.net.
You can find information about upcoming programming for entrepreneurs at our website and a full list of the Knoxville Entrepreneur Center’s monthly events HERE.
