Building a good product is tough. Ensuring people recognise, covet and remember it is even harder — that’s where branding comes in.
“At my previous company, we had a solid product but nobody actually cared because we didn’t have an identity,” says Sandro Okropiridze, cofounder and CEO at AI brand-building platform Stori AI.
But how do you build a strong brand that can compete against the big dogs when you’re a small team with an even smaller budget? According to Sandro, this is where AI comes into its own.
In our Startup Life newsletter, Sandro gave us his top tips for building a brand with AI.
Create brand guidelines early
To be a recognisable brand, you need to be consistent with how you present yourself to potential customers early. Create a brand book that includes:
- Mission, vision and values;
- Logo, colours and specific imagery;
- Tone of voice;
- Tagline and descriptions.
All-in-one AI platforms like Stori are developed to output branding-focused needs. You can also piece it together using tools like ChatGPT, and Stability AI for images, etc.
Use it to help you articulate your value
Founders are often so deep into the technical and functional aspects of the product that they find it hard to extrapolate the value of what they’re doing and to articulate it simply. Feed all of the information about your company into a conversational AI like ChatGPT and ask it to return your company’s purpose, mission and values. You may even want it to write up your elevator pitch.
Use it as a starting point
AI is perfect for ideation and brainstorming. You can ask it to come up with 20 different ideas for a logo, for example, and it will return it in seconds. Don’t expect perfection. Instead, treat it like a human’s rough draft. It’s then your job to refine it by either asking the AI new prompts or by manually adapting it.
Treat AI like an employee
You don’t expect an employee to guess what you want from telling them one line. You provide a proper brief — context, expected outcomes and what success looks like may be included. You then review, provide feedback and further information if necessary, so that the employee can iterate on their work. Do the same with AI. You want it to be a two-way conversation. Keep asking it questions. One of the queries can be, "What questions would you like me to answer that would help you have more context of what I’m looking for?"
Get good at asking follow up questions
Review what the AI outputs and figure out what needs to be improved. For example, does the tone need adjusting or does the message need refining? Then, write up some follow-up questions that are clear, direct and include context and the objectives you want the AI to achieve. Provide feedback and adjust your questions as you go on. Keep iterating until you get the results you need.
Don’t expect it to replace a branding team
AI can return lots of different ideas quicker than humans, which massively increases productivity. It’s important to note you can’t delegate to AI. View it as a personal assistant, not a manager. The team needs to keep refining AI’s results and asking questions internally like, "How similar is it to competitors?" or "What doesn’t work here for our market?". You may want a designer to polish it up or a copywriter to make the tone funnier, for example. You will also want to take it out and test it with existing and potential customers, to see what they think before you confirm your branding.
Find the right tools
AI tech is constantly evolving and there are an increasing number of tools being built for specific niches. Check out Product Hunt for the latest, or ask people in your industry what they’re using.
On the subject of ... How to build a brand with AI
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📰 How is AI transforming advertising?
💡 Want to get to grips with AI? Here’s a list of free courses.
