Embarking on a brand strategy project is an investment. We know it takes dedication, time, resources, planning, and a collaborative, open mindset. And in order to get true value from a strategy project, businesses have to be able to clearly explain the strategy, its meaning, and its value to people across their organization. This is where the power of creative design comes into play.

Powerful Strategy Isn’t Just a Deck

A strategy that simply sits in a presentation deck with a small group of people holds no real value for your business – no matter how smart the strategy is. It needs to come alive. It needs to live in people’s minds and hearts. Everyone across your entire business needs to understand the strategy in order to bring your organization closer to its vision for what’s to come.

Use Creative Design to Bring Strategy to Life

Tying creative design and strategy together is key. And bringing design thinking to how you approach and share your strategy with the people who matter to your business will help get everyone on board and rallied behind it.

Adding a creative design dimension will:

1. Build a solid strategy through an evaluative process:

Creating an impactful strategy requires noticing and deciphering patterns that yield impactful, insightful ideas and present innovative solutions. And creative design is a powerful tool for this.

When businesses bring design thinking into the process early on, strategic insights are more easily made, gaps are more easily filled, and patterns are more easily seen. The strategy evolves faster and becomes stronger throughout the process.

2. Help tell a complicated story:

Developing strategy is not only hard, but the output can be complex. Distilling it into an impactful, digestible, and simple story is important. Creative design is a way of visually and emotionally bringing that strategic story to life.

It helps people see a clear narrative, takes people along on the journey, and even makes the solution seem expected by the end. It’s a way of of simplifying and making the strategy more human and grounded.

3. Make the strategy digestible across your business:  

It’s easy for strategy to go over people’s heads. Especially if they haven’t been along on the journey. And organizations often run into road blocks because key audiences can’t grasp what the strategy really means for them.

This is a significant problem. In order for a strategy to truly come to life, all audiences need to be directed in the same direction, singing from the same hymn sheet. Design is one of the most powerful ways of making strategy digestible so that everyone can follow along and do their part.

Once people are aligned and prepared for what’s to come, getting them rallied behind shifts with an understanding of what they mean and where they will take the business becomes a lot easier.

4. Create an emotional impact for stakeholders:

In order to get stakeholders excited about a strategy, you have to make them feel something.

Design is inherently emotive. Visuals and imagery – when approached strategically – can help evoke the emotions needed for key people to get on board.

A stagnant, monochrome, unimaginative presentation of a strategy – no matter how smart or inspired – can’t speak alone. Design helps elevate strategy to the next level – adding emotional value – and boosting meaning and value to key audiences.

Why Design Produces Real Outcomes

Design has the power to bring strategy to life – telling a clear story and adding emotional impact.

At Emotive Brand, we believe that applying design thinking to strategy adds significant value. No matter how inspired, smart, or informed a strategy is, design helps make it truly impactful.

This means bringing designers into the process early, allocating resources, dedicating time, and working together to make more powerful outcomes. Use design to help bring your strategy to life, gain meaning in the hearts and minds of people, and position your business for impact and growth.

Emotive Brand is a San Francisco brand strategy and design company.