Worksheet

Brand Core

What do we intend to be understood as — and can we keep that promise?

How to use it

Each area of the Brand Core gets its own page. Its working parts are set out as prompts — not a form to complete, but the things worth having a view on. The last part of each page lists what the area touches in the other cores, because a position taken here usually commits something there.

Read about the Brand Core

The Omnigoal · Brand Core · What do we intend to be understood as — and can we keep that promise?

Brand promise

The commitment the organisation makes to the people it serves — what they can expect every time, stated plainly enough that failing to deliver it would be noticed.

ForDate

  1. The promise

    The commitment itself, in a form that could be failed.

  2. Deliverability

    Whether the organisation can actually keep it — every time, not on a good day.

  3. Communication

    How the promise is stated to the outside, and how carefully.

  4. Keeping it

    Measuring whether the promise actually holds, and what happens when it does not.

What this touches elsewhere

  • Goal Core — The promise should be recognisable as purpose turned outward and made specific enough to fail.

  • Business Core — Deliverability is settled here in operations and cost, not in the wording.

  • Omni Core — The promise is kept or broken at the touchpoints, which is where the experience is actually designed.

  • Data Core — Whether it was kept is a measurement, and it needs collecting like any other.

The Omnigoal · theomnigoal.com · CC BY 4.0 · Andreas Baggesen

The Omnigoal · Brand Core · What do we intend to be understood as — and can we keep that promise?

Brand Identity

What the brand is made of on the outside: what it stands for, how it behaves, how it looks, how it sounds, and the discipline that keeps those recognisably the same thing.

ForDate

  1. Brand values

    The outward expression of the core values: the few an outsider can recognise, worded for them, each traced to the core value it derives from and to what already proves it.

  2. Brand personality

    The traits the brand behaves as if it had, chosen deliberately and with things it is explicitly not.

  3. Visual system

    Logo, colour, typography, imagery and layout — specified precisely enough to be reproduced by someone who has never spoken to anyone about it.

  4. Verbal system

    Name, tone of voice, vocabulary and how things are named beneath the brand.

  5. Consistency

    How the system is actually held: where the assets live, who can approve a departure, and how often the real output is checked against the intent.

What this touches elsewhere

  • Brand Perception (Brand Core) — Identity is what is sent; perception is what arrives, and they are measured separately.

  • Market Core — The identity is executed through channels, and each channel constrains what can be expressed.

  • Business Core — Brand assets are assets, and belong in the register with an owner like anything else.

  • Omni Core — Consistency is tested where customers actually meet the brand, not in the guidelines.

The Omnigoal · theomnigoal.com · CC BY 4.0 · Andreas Baggesen

The Omnigoal · Brand Core · What do we intend to be understood as — and can we keep that promise?

Brand Positioning

The place the brand occupies in someone else’s mind: which category they file it under, what they think it is better at, and what they would accept it being ordinary at.

ForDate

  1. Frame of reference

    What the customer compares the brand with — the category they file it under, which is frequently not the one the organisation would choose.

  2. Points of difference

    What the brand is meant to be believed better at, held alongside the parity points it has to be credibly adequate on to be considered at all.

  3. The positioning statement

    The internal sentence that fixes the position: for whom, in what frame, what difference, on what basis.

  4. Brand architecture

    How brands relate to one another where there is more than one — what carries the master brand, what stands alone, and what the customer is expected to connect.

What this touches elsewhere

  • Business Core — The value proposition settles what the offer does better; this object settles what the market believes.

  • Market Core — Frame and competitor set come from the market analysis, and positioning is what is done with them.

  • Brand Perception (Brand Core) — Whether the intended position was actually taken up is a perception measurement.

  • Goal Core — A position takes years to hold, which makes it a long term goal rather than a campaign.

The Omnigoal · theomnigoal.com · CC BY 4.0 · Andreas Baggesen

The Omnigoal · Brand Core · What do we intend to be understood as — and can we keep that promise?

Brand Value

What the brand is actually worth: whether people know it, what they associate with it, whether they come back, and what that is worth in money.

ForDate

  1. Awareness

    Whether the brand is known, and whether it comes to mind at the moment a choice is being made — which is a different and more demanding question than recognition.

  2. Associations

    What comes to mind with the brand, how strongly, how favourably, and how uniquely.

  3. Loyalty

    Whether people come back, and whether they would defend the choice if a cheaper option appeared.

  4. Valuation

    What the brand is worth financially, on a stated method — price premium, royalty relief or earnings attribution — with the assumptions visible.

What this touches elsewhere

  • Business Core — The brand is an intangible asset and belongs on the schedule with a replacement cost.

  • Data Core — Awareness and association tracking is a measurement programme and needs designing as one.

  • Market Core — Brand measures are only interpretable against the same measures for competitors.

  • Time Core — Brand value moves over years, which makes the measurement rhythm a deliberate choice.

The Omnigoal · theomnigoal.com · CC BY 4.0 · Andreas Baggesen

The Omnigoal · Brand Core · What do we intend to be understood as — and can we keep that promise?

Brand Perception

What people actually think, as opposed to what the organisation intended them to think — measured rather than assumed, and taken seriously when the two differ.

ForDate

  1. Measuring perception

    How what people think is actually established — tracking, unprompted association, sentiment, interviews — with the method’s limits recorded alongside the result.

  2. The identity–image gap

    The distance between what the organisation intended and what arrived, and which of the two is wrong.

  3. Segment differences

    How perception varies between customers, non-customers, employees and candidates — and which of those differences matters for what the organisation is trying to do.

  4. Shifting perception

    What it takes to change a belief that is wrong or outdated: how long, on what evidence, and why saying it differently is rarely enough.

What this touches elsewhere

  • Brand Identity (Brand Core) — Identity is the input to this object; the gap between the two is the finding.

  • Omni Core — Perception is formed at the touchpoints, which is where the experience is designed.

  • Data Core — Perception tracking is a longitudinal measurement and only means anything if the instrument holds still.

  • Market Core — A perception reading is only interpretable against how the category and its competitors are perceived.

The Omnigoal · theomnigoal.com · CC BY 4.0 · Andreas Baggesen

The Omnigoal · Brand Core · What do we intend to be understood as — and can we keep that promise?

Brand Narrative

The story the organisation tells about itself — where it came from, what it is trying to do, and why that is worth anyone’s attention — told by people who can actually tell it.

ForDate

  1. The story

    The narrative itself: where it starts, what the difficulty was, and what it is actually about — short enough to be retold and honest enough to be believed.

  2. Message architecture

    What is said beneath the story: the one thing that must land, the supporting messages, and what changes by audience without contradicting anything.

  3. The tellers

    Who actually carries the narrative — employees, customers, partners, media — and whether they have been given a version they can use.

  4. Evolution

    How the narrative changes as the organisation does, without breaking continuity.

What this touches elsewhere

  • Brand Positioning (Brand Core) — The narrative carries the position; it should not be arguing for a different one.

  • Vision Core — Mission and values are the source material the story is built from, and it should not contradict them.

  • Business Core — Employees are the primary tellers, which makes this partly a matter of what people are told internally.

  • Market Core — Where the story is told, and in what form, is a channel decision made there.

The Omnigoal · theomnigoal.com · CC BY 4.0 · Andreas Baggesen