Defining Your Brand Image and Audience on Instagram

Hello and welcome back to the Instagram Bootcamp. In this section, we're going to be discussing how to identify your brand image and how to identify your target brand audience. So let's go through the steps of determining your brand image.

It starts with an understanding of your brand mission and the development of your brand. What problem is your brand trying to solve, right? Why does your brand exist? If your brand cannot effectively address a problem that a particular targeted market group might have, well, then there's no reason for your brand. Why should someone pay for your product or service unless it, in some ways, makes their life better, helps them overcome a challenge, right? So that's your brand mission.

Every brand should have a solid understanding of why it exists. What does it exist for? It's there to help these people do something, right? When you develop your brand mission, even though we do have this as a fourth step sequentially, in reality, developing your targeted audience should be done in conjunction with your brand mission because ultimately your brand mission is explaining not just what it is that you do, but who you do it for, right? We're going to see an example of a missing statement, right? Then, once you have your mission set, you at least have some initial understanding of who you are going to perform this mission for. Who do you need to communicate this mission to in terms of consumer audiences? Now you can develop your brand image.

How are you going to represent yourself to the people you're trying to communicate with? And your brand image should, of necessity, reflect your brand strengths, right? You want to emphasize the most positive aspect of your brand. You want to emphasize the advantages your brand has. And now that you have a brand image, you want to develop a brand voice, right? How are you going to sound to the world, right? Or when you communicate to the world, whether it's on social media or a particular social media platform like Instagram, or in your ads on your website, and so forth, right? So let us move forward and look at these one at a time.

Your brand mission. What are your brand missions? What are your short-term goals? What are your long-term goals? These are all questions that you need to consider, right? And where would you find a brand's mission, or where should a brand's mission be found, right? Well, certainly it should be on a website, right? It should be in the About Us. This is what we are looking for, this is what we do, right? And when in the context of Instagram, it should be on your brand profile page, right? We see our personal profiles.

We have an About Us section there. We're going to be a little bit later looking at brand profile pages, and certainly in the About Us of a brand, that mission should be there, right? And I'm going to give you some other submissions of some social media and brand sites and brands that you might be familiar with, right? If I were to say to give everyone, the mission is to give everyone the power to create and share ideas and information instantly without barriers, right? To give everyone the power to create and share ideas and information instantly without barriers. Out of all the social media platforms that you're familiar with, which one most accurately fits that description? Well, I would say X or X (formerly known as Twitter), right? Because what happens on X more than any other platform? The sharing of ideas and information, right? And done in real time.

What do people most often share on Instagram and Facebook? Most often, it's aspects of their lives, their vacation photos. They went out on a dinner date with their spouse, and what they ate and photos of their kids going off to school, first day of school, right? And what is mostly shared on TikTok? Well, little short videos to entertain people, to make people laugh, cute dances, and things. Most of the information, then, at all? So that is why that mission seems to be most appropriate to X, right? How about this? To give everyone a voice and show them the world, all right? Well, that could be any number of social media platforms to be completely objective about this.

But YouTube, when it was created, was the very first video-sharing app. So for the first time, wherever you are, wherever you travel, you're able to have a voice, express, you know, whatever you want to express, and then to show the world, you know, a piece of the world that you are at, right? To give everyone a voice and show them the world, right? And how about this one? Very straightforward. To connect the world's professionals to make them more productive and successful, right? So what's the one social media platform that has prioritized professional relationships, professional or career-related contact? Well, obviously LinkedIn, right? And the whole point of being on LinkedIn is to become more productive, more successful, to network, to get a better job.

And that's what LinkedIn's mission is, right? And here are a few from well-known brands, global brands, to create a better life for many people. This is their actual mission. Well, how about Ikea, right? IKEA is ostensibly a furniture and home goods company, and whatever product they have is ostensibly to create a better everyday life for people, no matter, you know, where you live, or your income level. It's a very affordable brand.

Young, old, the goal is whether it's a bed set or a kitchen set, towels, or wall hangings, is to make your everyday life better, right? So you see that connection. How about this? To offer Designer eyewear at a revolutionary price while leading the way for socially conscious businesses. How about Warby Parker, right? Warby Parker, if you're not familiar, is one of the first ecommerce eyewear sites, you know, in that category to be very successful on, you know, on the internet, right? And what was its main advantage? That it would present Designer eyewear, you know, Designer brands at very affordable prices, even to the extent that's what it did.

And that's why it became successful and popular. But it also says, while leading the way for socially conscious businesses, and it does that as well. If you go to their website, if you're familiar with some of their broadcast commercials and even content on social media, they talk about how, well, they have a program that if you purchase a sung eyeglass, you know, from them, a pair of eyeglasses, they will donate a pair of eyeglasses to someone in need anywhere in the world.

That was part of their initial value proposition to customers. And they do other types of socially conscious activity as well. And how about hair? This is a company I used to work for.

Become essential to our customers by providing differentiated products and services to help them achieve their aspirations, right? American Express, even though it might be seen as a credit card or financial product, has an array of services, with differentiated products and services that help everyone from small businesses to families to professionals achieve their aspirations through credit and other services. And that's how they view their mission, not just to provide credit cards or, you know, travel-related services, but all of that essentially to help people achieve their aspirations. And then PayPal, to build the web's most convenient, secure, cost-effective payment solution.

And that's what PayPal was. They were the first really to come out with a web-based payment solution, and it was convenient, and it was secure, so people could have confidence using it, and it created a whole category, right? Then we see Asana. Asana is a brand in the team productivity sector, like Monday.com and Microsoft Teams, and those type of Slack, those type of platforms that help teams, whether they're remote or in the same building or wherever they are in the world, in different time zones, et cetera, be able to collaborate and work together effectively with the tools that they offer.

So what is their mission? It is to help humanity thrive by enabling the world's teams to work together effortlessly. Now, one thing I want you to note, in addition to what it is that the brand is doing, is how in the mission it also explains who it's doing it for. Asana's mission is to help whom? Humanity.

So, well, no, it's helping humanity thrive by enabling who? The world's teams, right? So that's who it is focusing on. You know, I have this lofty terminology, humanity, but embedded in that mission statement is enabling the world's teams. That's the who, right? IKEA, to create a better everyday life for the many people.

So who are they doing it for? Everybody, the many people, you know, as I mentioned, various, no matter where you live, there tends to be an IKEA there, and, you know, across various incomes, ages, all of that, right? So that is the point. Embedded in your mission is the understanding of who you're doing it for, and what you're doing should be something that you can do, right? You can't say you're going to do something, you're going to help the world, the world's teams work together effortlessly, if you can't show how you can do that with the tools and features that you're offering, right?