In today’s competitive business environment, it’s more important than ever to build a strong brand with company values. Your company’s values define who you are as an organization and what you stand for. They create a sense of identity and purpose that can set you apart from the competition.

In this article, we will explore the key steps to building a strong brand with company values and how it can benefit your business in the long run. Stay tuned for practical tips and strategies to strengthen your brand through your core values.

What Are Brand Values?

Brand values are the core beliefs that shape a company’s culture and customer experience. They build a strong brand identity and impact how customers perceive and connect with the brand.

Clearly defined brand values help create a unique identity and connect with the audience. For instance, a business that values eco-friendly practices and sustainability is likely to attract environmentally-conscious consumers.

To identify brand values, a company can gather feedback from internal and external sources, including leadership, employees, and customers. This feedback can help spot themes and patterns that reflect the company’s mission and identity.

After creating a list of brand values, it’s important to communicate these values to employees and stakeholders. Brand values should also evolve with the company’s operations and the changing attitudes and trends of its customers to stay relevant.

Examples of Core Beliefs in Famous Brands

Adidas and Their Passion for Sports

Adidas expresses their passion for sports through their brand values and core beliefs by actively promoting inclusivity and diversity in sports. They strive to create products that cater to all athletes, regardless of their background or abilities, aiming to inspire and enable people to take part in various sports.

Adidas also demonstrates their passion for sports by partnering with athletes, teams, and sports organizations, showing their commitment to the positive impact of sports on individuals and communities.

Adidas incorporates their passion for sports into their messaging and marketing strategies by creating compelling campaigns that emphasize the spirit of athleticism and the transformative power of sports. Their marketing materials often highlight real stories of athletes, emphasizing the values of perseverance, teamwork, and determination. This approach allows Adidas to connect with their audience on a deeper level, showcasing the impact of sports in people’s lives beyond mere competition.

To ensure that their employees and customers share and embody their passion for sports through their brand values, Adidas actively fosters a culture that encourages participation in sports and physical activities. They also offer various initiatives and programs that promote health and wellness in their workplace, reflecting their commitment to embodying the values they promote.

Additionally, Adidas engages with communities to create opportunities for people to experience the joy and benefits of sports, further extending their brand values beyond their internal and customer-facing operations.

Coca-Cola’s Message of Happiness

Coca-Cola’s brand values emphasize happiness. This helps the company connect emotionally with its audience, creating a positive association with the brand. The focus on happiness also guides the company’s operations, shaping its products and customer experiences.

Through marketing campaigns, Coca-Cola shares its message of happiness with customers. These campaigns incorporate themes of joy and togetherness, reinforcing the brand’s commitment to spreading happiness. The company also shares happiness with communities worldwide through social responsibility programs and sponsorships.

The emphasis on happiness significantly influences Coca-Cola’s business and marketing strategies. It leads to product development aligned with the brand’s ethos, focusing on partnerships and collaborations that resonate with people’s feelings of joy. Additionally, the company uses digital and content marketing to effectively communicate these values to a wider audience.

BigCommerce’s Commitment to Innovation

BigCommerce is committed to innovation. They prioritize and foster innovation in their company culture. They allocate resources to research and development, creating an environment that promotes creativity, forward-thinking, and continuous improvement.

BigCommerce encourages and supports its employees in contributing innovative ideas and solutions. They provide platforms for internal feedback collection, brainstorming sessions, and continuous learning opportunities.

BigCommerce has implemented several innovative strategies and technologies to enhance its products and services. For example, they have employed advanced machine learning algorithms to improve their product recommendation engine, personalizing the shopping experience for customers.

In addition, BigCommerce has developed seamless integrations with emerging social media platforms to facilitate direct shopping experiences, effectively leveraging new market trends. These innovative strategies and technologies have allowed BigCommerce to consistently deliver cutting-edge services and maintain its position as a leading provider in the e-commerce industry.

MeUndies’ Focus on Comfort and Expression

MeUndies makes sure their underwear is super comfy. They use top-notch, breathable, and soft fabrics for all-day comfort. They offer many styles for different body shapes and sizes so everyone can feel great in their undies.

They also love self-expression. Their undies come in fun, colorful patterns and unique designs from artists. In their ads, they celebrate being special and yourself, using models and real customers from all walks of life.

At MeUndies, comfort and expression are big deals. They weave these values into everything they do, from hiring to customer service, to keep their brand true to what they believe.

Learning from Successful Brands

Successful brands like Adidas and Coca-Cola convey their core beliefs and values using various strategies. These include integrating values into business operations, leading by example through leadership, and communicating them authentically to their audience.

For Adidas, core values of diversity, empowerment, and sustainability form the foundation of their brand purpose. Their product development and marketing efforts consistently reflect these values. Similarly, Coca-Cola promotes values of leadership, accountability, passion, diversity, and quality through marketing campaigns and community initiatives.

Businesses can identify their core beliefs and values by gathering feedback from internal and external stakeholders, hosting brainstorming sessions, spotting themes, and defining values with authentic language aligned with the brand’s tone.

Examples from successful brands like BigCommerce and MeUndies show how integrating core values into hiring, customer service, and product development reinforces the company’s brand image. Companies should establish, communicate, and adjust core beliefs and values when launching new products, targeting new markets, or experiencing shifts in consumer behavior. Regular assessment and adaptation of brand values in response to market changes ensure that core beliefs reflect the current state of operations and customer needs.

Picking the Right Core Beliefs for Your Brand

Listening to Customers and Employees

The organization gathers feedback from employees and customers through various channels, including surveys and analytical methods such as interviews and social listening. After gathering feedback, the team assembles a brainstorming session. It develops a list of brand values aligning with the organization’s mission and identity to demonstrate that it actively listens to customer and employee needs and concerns.

The organization then identifies themes and patterns from the list of brand values, reflects on their essence, defines each value with authentic language that aligns with the brand’s tone, communicates these values to employees, and integrates them into various areas of the business operations, including the hiring and onboarding process, product development, customer service, and marketing strategies.

Lastly, the organization evolves and adapts brand values aligned with customer attitudes and trends by continually assessing them and ensuring they grow with the business’s evolution.

Putting Ideas Together in a Fun Meeting

Creating a fun meeting environment can help create ideas for a company’s core beliefs. It’s important to have a relaxed, open space where employees can share their thoughts without worrying about judgment. This informal setting encourages collaboration and creativity, leading to a broader range of ideas contributing to meaningful brand values. Team members are more likely to participate in activities and discussions, offering fresh perspectives on what matters to the brand.

The energy and enthusiasm in this setting lead to the development of unique and impactful core beliefs, making brand values authentic and meaningful.

Noticing What Gets Mentioned a Lot

A brand can identify its core beliefs by gathering internal and external feedback. This includes leadership, stakeholders, employees, and customers. Feedback can be collected through surveys, interviews, or social listening.

This provides real insight into the values that resonate most with the audience.

To integrate these core beliefs into messaging and business practices, a brand can host a brainstorming session to identify the values that align best with the organization’s mission. They can then reflect these values in their communication plans and make them accessible to their audience.

Monitoring customer attitudes and trends is essential for a brand to adapt and change its core beliefs. They can revisit their brand guides to ensure that each value mirrors the company’s current state.

When Is the Best Time to Set Your Brand’s Core Beliefs?

When a brand sets its core beliefs, it should consider its business strategy, current market trends, and customer feedback. Gathering feedback from inside and outside the company helps ensure that the beliefs match the business strategy and goals. After these beliefs are set, they can be included in different parts of the business, like hiring, products, and customer service. This helps keep them in line with the company’s mission and identity.

Changing a brand’s core beliefs can affect customer loyalty and how the market sees the brand. However, these effects can be managed by regularly checking the beliefs and ensuring they keep up with customer attitudes and trends. By looking at these values again, the brand can make sure each one matches the company’s current state. This helps avoid any negative impact of changing core beliefs without good management.

How to Say What Your Brand Believes In

Knowing the Difference Between Beliefs and Goals

Beliefs shape a brand’s character. Goals direct its aspirations. Beliefs are linked to core values like honesty, trust, and sustainability. They form part of its identity and culture. They serve as guiding principles. Goals represent ambitions such as sales targets and market share. They serve as benchmarks of success.

The brand should create a comprehensive communication plan to effectively communicate beliefs and goals. This plan integrates values into product development, customer service, and marketing strategies. Leadership should embody the values daily. Goals should be emphasized in strategic business plans, partnerships, and financial reports.

Aligning core beliefs with overall goals and mission requires scaling down the list of top values to the strongest ones. This creates a list that reflects the brand’s essence and language that aligns with its tone. Integrating brand values into hiring, onboarding processes, and marketing strategies ensures that subsequent decisions and actions align with the mission and goals.

Sharing Your Brand’s Beliefs the Right Way

Brand values shape an organization’s identity and its relationship with its audience. Sharing these values is essential for building trust and connecting with customers. Communicating core beliefs that resonate with the audience requires understanding what defines the brand. Integrating values into the hiring process, product development, and marketing strategies ensures that beliefs are shared and implemented at every level.

It’s essential to communicate and reinforce these values as the business evolves. Assessing brand guides and customer feedback frequently helps ensure that core beliefs accurately reflect the company’s current state and continue to resonate with its audience.

Making Beliefs Part of Your Business

Identifying and establishing brand values and core beliefs starts with gathering internal and external feedback. This feedback should include the perspectives of leadership, stakeholders, employees, and customers. Once feedback is collected, a brainstorming session should be hosted to create a list of potential brand values that align with the organization’s mission.

Advisors can then identify themes and patterns and define the brand values using language that resonates with the company’s tone. To effectively communicate the brand’s beliefs to both customers and employees, it’s important to create a comprehensive communication plan. This plan should outline how these values will guide decision-making and ensure they are accessible on the company’s “About Us” page.

Businesses should integrate their brand values into various areas of operations, such as product development, customer service, and marketing strategies. They should also evolve and adapt their brand values as their business grows. Reassessing and potentially changing core beliefs should be done when they no longer align with customer attitudes and trends.

Picking People Who Share Your Brand’s Beliefs

Choosing people who represent a company’s values and beliefs is crucial. This helps maintain a good reputation and image. One way to do this is to include brand values in the hiring and onboarding.

Having a team that believes in the brand can make a big difference. They are more likely to connect with the brand’s target audience and understand their concerns.

These team members can play a key role in decision-making and keeping the brand’s values authentic. This helps build a stronger and more trustworthy connection with customers.

Changing Your Brand’s Core Beliefs When You Need To

Changing a brand’s core beliefs may be necessary due to shifting consumer attitudes, changes in the competitive landscape, or evolving societal trends. For instance, in a changing marketplace, a brand may need to revise its core beliefs to remain relevant to its target audience.

To effectively manage this change, a brand can take several steps. This includes gathering feedback from internal and external stakeholders, hosting brainstorming sessions, defining brand values, communicating these values to stakeholders, integrating them into various business operations, and evolving and adapting them over time.

However, altering core beliefs also carries risks. This includes potentially alienating existing customers who identify with the old values. On the other hand, the benefits may involve attracting new customers, staying competitive, and aligning with current societal values and expectations.

List of 100 Different Core Beliefs for Inspiration

Successful brands have core beliefs. These beliefs inspire and guide a brand’s values. They are crucial for a company’s success. Brand values show a company’s identity and set it apart in the market.

When choosing core beliefs, it’s important to consider alignment with the organization’s mission and identity. They should also be relevant to the target audience and consistent with the brand’s tone. The selected core beliefs should reflect authenticity and guide decision-making.

To integrate core beliefs effectively, a comprehensive communication plan is essential. The values should be easily accessible on company platforms. Also, leaders should embody the brand’s values.

Integrating core beliefs into different business areas, such as hiring and customer service, ensures that the values are consistently upheld and create a positive brand image.