Lean Branding: Creating Dynamic Brands to Generate Conversion

by Laura Busche

Every day, thousands of passionate developers come up with new startup ideas but lack the branding know-how to make them thrive. If you count yourself among them, Lean Branding is here to help. This practical toolkit helps you build your own robust, dynamic brands that generate conversion. You’ll find over 100 DIY branding tactics and inspiring case studies, and step-by-step instructions for building and measuring 25 essential brand strategy ingredients, from logo design to demo-day pitches, using The Lean Startup methodology’s Build-Measure-Learn loop.

Genres: Business, Nonfiction, Design

290 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2014

About the author

Laura Busche is the author of Lean Branding and Powering Content. Busche is an experienced brand strategist with a track record of helping companies in the public and private sector bring their message to life with a compelling brand story, memorable visual symbols, and a bold communication strategy. Her approach to brand design is holistic: she combines insights from her undergraduate degree in business, master's degree in design management, and Ph.D. in consumer psychology. Laura has implemented Lean Branding tactics with more than 150 entrepreneurs and their 50+ startups and regularly shares branding tips at laurabusche.com/blog and instagram.com/laurabusche.

Reviews

[Edythe · Rating 4 out of 5]

“Positioning is finding the right parking space inside the consumer’s mind and going for it before someone else takes it.”

Lean Branding covers what branding does for your business and you in the world of consumers. Laura Busche shares her expertise on brand building strategies to develop a plan that will render a successful venture in the field of consumer attraction. Having consideration for your target audience, main competitor, and the differences between you and your competitor are key factors in building your company or organization’s brand.

To begin building your brand Ms. Busche encourages using a ‘positioning map’ that shows competitors and why your brand stands above the rest. This is a useful tool for business after brand building to continue strategizing efforts in comparing competitor strategy. The positioning map used in addition with the ‘Measuring Traction and Identity’ section of the book could detect valuable information for any company’s ‘Brand Redesigning’ if needed. In addition, ‘Rechanneling’ is covered with information on branding and media use of Websites, Online Catalogs, Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, and Instagram to name a few.

I find Lean Branding would be a great addition and enhance any company library of business and strategy bookshelf. This would be a great starting point for new business owners to begin a business plan to give direction before approaching their venture. The book contains valuable information and written in easy to understand language that will not have you reaching for a dictionary.

I received this book free from O’Reilly Media in exchange for an honest opinion in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission Guidelines.

[Ben · Rating 2 out of 5]

I learned very little reading this. It felt like there was about 30 pages of content - but the book unfortunately is close to 300 pages. Far too many recaps of what was very little information in the first place and diagrams/checklists conveying very little value (e.g. calling out individually that the subject line of an email is important, that the title of a blog post is important, that the title of a YouTube video is important, etc.).