Brand Strategy: Building a System that Brings Your Story to Life

Think about your brand for a moment. No, not just your logo, not your colours, or your fonts or the surface things people can see.

Think about the experiences your brand sparks. The emotional reactions it provokes. Think about the value you create in the world. 

Your brand is beautiful and powerful and in so many ways, intangible.

We always start our brand strategy presentations with this quote from Maya Angelou: “People don’t always remember what you say or even what you do, but they always remember how you made them feel.”

“Great,” thinks every marketing and communications professional reading this, “can’t wait to create a feeling.”

And that’s what makes branding hard: how do you capture something so nebulous? How do you take this living, breathing organism and give it structure so anybody at your organization can consistently bring it to life? How do you take something so complex and make it easy to talk about? 

Hello, brand strategy.

Brand strategy is a system that defines who you are, what you do and what sets you apart from everybody else. Because it’s a system, it can scale a grow with you and it can be used consistently by different teams across the organization in a consistent way. 

I want to recommend this book by Alex M H Smith, No Bullsh*t Strategy. It’s an easy read, but in it, he describes the value of brand strategy using Dolly Parton’s words.

“Find out who you are, then do it on purpose.”

That’s what the brand strategy process is. It’s both sides: learning about yourself and then being intentional.

In this article, I’ll guide you through the brand strategy process that we at Briteweb use time and time again with our clients to help them articulate and define who they are, what makes them special, and why it matters, so they can show up in authentic ways across channels again and again.

I’ll also provide some questions for you to consider so you can take our process and apply it to your organization and start refining your brand strategy today. 

Because ultimately we want is for you to have the tools you need so you can better tell your story and amplify your impact.

At the centre of every purpose-driven organization beats a powerful truth: why do you do what you do? What’s the transformation in the world you’re fighting for? What is it in its simplest form? 

It’s why you show up every day. It drives you to push through the hard days and it makes the good days unforgettable.

But here’s what often happens: this truth gets fuzzy.

Even for nonprofits. It gets buried under mission statements and vision documents. Expressed in words that might sound smart but they’re hard to understand.

Employees start losing sight of it. We create a new program that does something completely different.

Teams get caught up in tactical problems and that bold, world-changing idea starts to fade.

“Very few people or companies can clearly articulate WHY they do WHAT they do. By WHY I mean your purpose, cause or belief—WHY does your company exist? WHY do you get out of bed every morning? And WHY should anyone care?”

Simon Sinek

When we worked with TransLash, that core truth was immediately powerful and clear: they believe that the stories we tell shape our world.

And therefore telling trans stories isn’t just important: it’s life saving. In a time when anti-trans violence and legislation threaten their community—our community, they recognize that sharing authentic stories of trans lives from trans people’s perspectives is vital to building a different world, a world where trans people no longer have to fight to be seen, much less exist. 

When your purpose is clear, it becomes the beating heart for your organization. And that idea drives through everything you do through the highs and the lows.

This is where a lot of nonprofits stumble. It’s not because they don’t know what they do, but because they haven’t articulated what makes them different.

Your “why” is universal. It pulls on the threads of human truth, on shared hopes and dreams. But your “how”? That’s where your organization becomes unique.

It’s the path you see that others don’t. It’s the gap you’re uniquely positioned to fill. It’s also important because it charts the path towards the vision that you’re setting: how are you going about achieving that big bold vision of the world you have? 

There are a lot of organizations out there fighting climate change. But each of them are doing it in their own way.

And the more clearly you can articulate your way, the more people will believe: you might actually be onto something. You might actually have a shot at changing the world, because you’ve got a plan of how you’re doing it.

When you recognize that what sets you apart is not being better than everyone else, but reconnecting to the unique way your organization is working to solve the problem, you will be better positioned to articulate it clearly.

And that clarity will help you stand out like a shining beacon.

What is it that you do? In the plainest, simplest terms. What are your programs? Your services, your initiatives? What is the actual work that your organization does? 

The biggest mistakes that nonprofits make is they cloak what it is they do in mumbo-jumbo highfalutin language.

“We cocreate sustainable development outcomes through capacity-building initiatives and multistakeholder partnerships.” No! You train entrepreneurs and fund small business accelerators in East Africa. Say it simply! You’ll have lots of opportunities to unpack the complexities of that work (it’s called a content marketing strategy).

Now you might be thinking, “Hey, we’re pretty in tune with what we offer. Can we skip this step?”

Respectfully, no.

Look, if you and your team really are on the same page and you get through all the questions in five minutes and everybody agrees, then congratulations! You’ve won at meetings.

But it’s always what seems obvious and straightforward that sparks the most complex discussions. 

It is through the work that you do as an organization that you are advancing your how, bringing us closer to your why.

Further reading: The Key to Getting Clarity and Alignment

“Brands that position themselves as heroes unknowingly compete with their potential customers.”

– Donald Miller

So far, we’ve covered the transformation in the world you’re working to achieve, how you are working to achieve it and what you actually do to achieve it. 

Now it’s time to look at a different side, one that affects everything you do.

Your audience. 

Let’s start with a concept that’s quite old but popularized in Donald Miller’s Building a StoryBrand: you are not the hero of your brand story. Your audience is not the supporting character. This is not your story.

This is the story of how your audience woke up one day and went on a journey to change the world. And along the way, they encountered obstacles that were difficult to overcome, until they came across a guide that helped them overcome those obstacles and restore balance to the world. 

You see, you’re not alone in wanting the specific transformation in the world you’re working to achieve.

There are a lot of people who believe in a world where trans people can thrive. There aren’t a lot of people who have a clear idea of how to make that vision a reality. Until they come across an organization that tells them: “Hey, to make that world come true, we have to change the stories we tell. But not just the stories we tell, but the people who are telling those stories.” The organization becomes the guide that tells you that in order to change the status quo, you have to make space for trans people to tell their story.

You can’t change the world on your own. You change it by building a movement. 

When you shift the focus from your organization to the people you’re trying to reach, everything starts to click.

You stop speaking into the void and start speaking to real needs, real struggles, real hopes. That’s when your message begins to matter.

And when your work starts to resonate.

While many brand elements focus on what you’re going to look like and what you’re going to say, brand personality is about how you say it. If your organization were a person, what kind of person would they be? The life of the party or the strong, silent type? Warm and nurturing or bold and direct?

These questions might seem playful, but their answers shape every interaction with your audience. They guide everything from word choice and sentence structure to visual elements like colour palette and typography. A warm, nurturing organization might use gentle colours and flowing fonts, while a bold, direct one might opt for strong contrasts and clean lines.

To make this concrete, we often create a brand archetype – an imaginary but vivid person who embodies the traits your organization wants to express in its communications. This isn’t just about making up a character. It’s about creating a consistent, relatable reference point that helps everyone in your organization understand how to show up in the world.

Brand personality is where voice and visuals come together and create something that comes to life. It sounds a little bit like Frankenstein’s monster (and the process isn’t that far off) but the brands that make lasting impressions are the ones that have clearly defined who, why, how, what and that can express that in a unique, consistent and cohesive way.

And that feels like magic.

These insights form the foundation for your core brand elements:

The essence of your organization captured in a single, powerful phrase. It’s both a north star for your team and, potentially, a compelling message for your audience. A strong brand idea feels inevitable – like finally finding the words for something you’ve always known to be true.

Your organization’s story – a rallying cry that builds from your brand idea. It helps your team understand not just what you do, but why it matters and how you’re going to get there. A good narrative acknowledges current reality while painting a picture of the future you’re working to create.

Your purpose statement is why you exist, expressed in a way that’s both strategic and inspiring. It can serve as an internal compass or an external declaration – or both. This isn’t about listing activities; it’s about capturing the transformation you seek to create.

Statement that helps your team understand exactly who you serve, what you do for them and what makes your approach unique. 

Core truths that make your organization special, the fundamental beliefs and approaches that set you apart. Together, they create a framework for consistent decision-making and communication.

These elements form the foundation for everything that follows, from your visual identity (logo, colours, typography) to your messaging.

When they work together, they create clarity that empowers everyone in your organization to tell your story consistently while adapting to different moments and audiences.

A great brand strategy is a gift. It provides clarity and more than that, energy and momentum.

It gives you and everyone on your team the tools to express what you’ve always known to be true but could never quite say and to do it over and over again.

When every element aligns while maintaining its own purpose, you create a framework that lets everyone in your organization bring your story to life consistently and authentically.

Because ultimately, that’s what brand strategy is about: taking something beautifully intangible and making it real.

Join us for a free workshop where we’ll walk through how to develop these essential elements of your brand. In this session, you’ll learn: 

Save your seat below and we’ll email you when we announce the date.