Table Of ContentThe Brand
Strategy Canvas
A One-Page Guide for Startups
―
Patrick Woods
THE BRAND STRATEGY
CANVAS
A ONE-PAGE GUIDE FOR STARTUPS
Patrick Woods
The Brand Strategy Canvas: A One-Page Guide for Startups
Patrick Woods
San Francisco, CA, USA
ISBN-13 (pbk): 978-1-4842-5158-4 ISBN-13 (electronic): 978-1-4842-5159-1
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4842-5159-1
Copyright © 2020 by Patrick Woods
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This book is dedicated to Founders.
Contents
About the Author vii
Acknowledgments ix
Introduction xi
Chapter 1: Getting Started with the Brand Strategy Canvas 1
Chapter 2: Overview of the Brand Strategy Canvas 13
Chapter 3: Market Opportunity 29
Chapter 4: Rational and Emotional Benefits 49
Chapter 5: B rand Positioning 67
Chapter 6: D efining Your Brand Values 87
Chapter 7: Creating a Brand Personality 95
Chapter 8: Drafting Key Messages 103
Chapter 9: C ompleting Your Canvas 113
A ppendix A: Brand Strategy Canvas Template 119
Index 121
About the Author
Patrick Woods is a writer and fencer living in
San Francisco, CA. He is the founder of the
developer relations consultancy DeveloperMode
and founder and CEO of Orbit, a platform for
building and managing developer relationships.
Prior to Orbit, he led Customer Success at
Figure Eight and Keen IO, and before that,
launched the startup-focused team at the ad
agency Archer Malmo, building brands and go-to
market plans for early-stage companies.
He has delivered presentations at SxSW,
Techstars, and various startup accelerators and
incubators around the United States. You can
follow him on Twitter @patrickjwoods.
Acknowledgments
First, I say Thank You to all the founders out there, whose tenacity and
innovation have inspired this work. I hope in some small way this book helps
you make the impact you’re driving toward.
The concepts behind the Brand Strategy Canvas were developed during my
time at the advertising powerhouse Archer Malmo, and without the support
and creativity and partners Gary Backaus and Russ Williams, the Canvas
wouldn’t exist. The Canvas itself was developed in close conjunction with my
two favorite writers Justin Dobbs and Dan Price, both of whom contributed
considerably to the structure and intention built into the framework.
Dan and I have given many presentations on the Brand Strategy Canvas over
the years, so a special thanks goes to him for the ongoing development of
refinement of the ideas you’ll find here.
Thanks to Dustin Larimer and Keith Casey for using and recommending the
Canvas to people in their network and encouraging me to refine and publish
the ideas found in this book.
I’d also like to thank the many friends who provided feedback on early drafts
of this manuscript, including Josh Dzielak, Eric Mathews, Ankur Patel, Chuck
Thomas, Scott Finney, Virag Reti, Fiona Co, and Mike Hoffmeyer.
Finally, I’m eternally grateful to my wife and partner in adventure, Kirby
Wallace, who has provided more than her fair share of copy edits, emotional
support, and inspiration along the way.
Introduction
Thanks to platforms like AWS, simplified billing tools, and powerful APIs, it’s
easier than ever to launch a startup. In fact, in 2018, more than 34,000 ven-
ture deals were completed worldwide, and of those, 20,250 were angel and
seed-stage transactions—the most active year on record, across the board.1
For consumers, this trend is great, since it means they have tons of alternatives
to choose from. But for founders, the ease of starting up simply means
more competition. How can founders compete, and survive?
Thanks to these new tools and technologies, almost anyone can build a product.
But building a brand? It’s just as hard as ever.
■ And yet, a strong brand is perhaps a company’s most defensible intellectual property.
The competition can’t copy it, and a clear strategy will ensure consistent and
powerful messaging to a high-value audience.
Every founder has to do it, but they don’t teach it in school, so how do founders
get started? Online guides are too high level to be helpful, and on top of that,
the vocabulary of the brand is enigmatic and inconsistent, making it difficult to
share ideas and best practices.
Compared to the more objective and data-driven aspects of building a startup,
it’s no wonder branding seems like a dark art to many founders.
To make matters worse, google “startup branding,” and you’ll find checklists
and ten-step plans that’ll tell you to “have a logo” and “be consistent.”
Thanks.
■ Founders don’t need the same old tips and tricks. They need useful tools for building a
meaningful brand.
1https://news.crunchbase.com/news/q4-2018-closes-out-a-record-year-
for-the-global-vc-market/
xii Introduction
In this book that takes the best from ad agency world and the startup trenches,
we’ll move past what to do about your brand and focus on how to actually do
it from day 1, equipping your team with actionable brand heuristics they can
apply every day.
We’ll explore quick-hit methods for jump-starting your strategy creation
process that you can start using today, and for those so inclined, we’ll dive
deep into the concepts of the brand development process.
We’ll chart your brand strategy on a single sheet of paper, and we’ll
look at lots of real-world examples along the way.
In Chapter 1, we’ll explore fundamental ideas about branding for startups.
What’s the difference between strategy and execution, and why does that
matter for you?
In Chapter 2, we’ll take a high-level look at the Brand Strategy Canvas, a tool
I created to help founders actually do branding on a single page. To get started,
we’ll look at the big picture to see how all the pieces of the canvas fit together,
before walking through each section in detail.
Chapter 3 will kick off our deep dive with the Market Opportunity. The first
three boxes on the canvas are foundational to the existence of your startup,
and key insights about your audience, competition, and product lead to a
strong strategy.
Chapter 4 is all about features and benefits. Sounds simple, but once you
understand the continuum from feature to rational benefit to emotional ben-
efit, you’ll be able to unlock key parts of your brand strategy that will lead to
great web site copy, killer campaigns, and, in general, strong messaging.
Chapter 5 gets to the heart of your brand. The positioning statement is a
tested tool for succinctly capturing your strategy. It’s the foundation and inspi-
ration for all brand execution. Getting it right is tough, but the struggle is
worth it.
Chapter 6 explores your startup’s values to help ensure you deliver your
messaging authentically.
Chapter 7 explores how personality will guide the tone and voice of your
brand and provide further opportunities for competitive differentiation.
Chapter 8 delves into your startup’s key messages, which is where your strategy
becomes actionable. While much of your strategy is internal to your team, your
key messages will inform everything from web site copy to press releases to
what you say in customer support emails.
Introduction xiii
Finally, Chapter 9 walks through how each tool from the prior chapters can
be applied in the real world and offers lots of best practices for nailing your
brand strategy the first time.
Whether you’re picking out the highlights from each chapter to spark
momentum for your current strategy or digging deep into strategy with your
team, you’ll walk away armed with ideas and insights that will bring clarity
and focus to your strategy and impact to your execution.
