Branding Exercise: Determining Your Company Mission and Values
- 3
- Add a Comment
Your company brand is an extension of your company’s mission and values. Your company exists for a specific purpose — whether it’s to provide environmentally friendly cleaning products or a healthy meal for families. Your brand is the visual concept and reinforcement of your mission and values. Now is the time to evaluate what your company mission and values are.
Company mission
Disney’s is to “make people happy.” Boeing’s is “to push the leading edge of aviation, taking huge challenges doing what others cannot do.” 3M’s is “to solve unsolved problems innovatively.” What is your company’s mission? First, it’s important to understand what a mission is and what it represents for your company. Then you’ll be able to better determine what your company mission is, or what it should be. Since the mission can act as a strong marketing and branding tool for clients, establishing an effective mission is imperative to your company’s success.
A mission statement is a written representation of a company’s goals and purpose. It’s undisputable that Disney succeeds in making people happy or that 3M uses innovative products to solve problems. A mission statement helps to give your company direction because it helps employees, vendors, and customers to remain focused on what your company offers.
4 steps to creating a mission statement
In four easy steps, you can create a meaningful mission statement for your company and solidify your brand position.
1. Pick a focus. The first thing you need to decide when creating a mission is its focus or theme. It has to be easy to understand and simply stated. Disney wants to make people happy and they carry through on this mission with whimsical character names, and an entire kingdom built on fantasy. Your focus may be more down to earth, like saving the environment one cleaning product at a time.
2. Communicate your mission and act on it. Creating a mission is not just about putting it down on paper. It’s about carrying through on your actions — internally and externally. If your mission says you are going to provide environmentally safe cleaning products to help save the environment and then a harmful chemical is found in the mixture of a product, then you are not acting out and fulfilling your mission.
3. Focus on key attributes you can fulfill. Don’t get too lofty with the goals of your mission. You can’t save the entire world, but you can certainly help to save it by offering eco-chic cleaners. Focus on a few unique things your product or service offers your clients and include these in your mission. 3M does introduce innovative products to the market that helps to solve problems. It invented the post-it note and if that didn’t resolve a lot of problems, then I don’t know what did. We no longer have to tape or staple notes to paperwork. We can just stick a post-it note and remove it just as easily — all without damaging the paperwork.
4. Take it slow. You should really concentrate on your mission before jotting just anything down on paper. Don’t rush the process. Take it slow. Create a well thought out and educated mission statement that truly represents your company and what if stands for.
Your company mission and values go hand in hand.
Your mission statement also supports your company values. Values are what drives the company to do what it does. A “green” company that values the environment offers green living cleaners. A cosmetic company that protects animal rights sells products free from animal testing. A food company that values a healthy lifestyle sells organic and healthy alternatives to unhealthy foods. Values and missions are directly related. The values your company has it what drives it to meet its mission — its goals.
Liked this article? Have more of the same emailed to your inbox each month. Sign up for the Copywriting and Marketing Ezine from Wordfeeder.com today.
- SQL Server Web - license & software assurance
- SQL Server 2008 Web - license
- Business Week Magazine Subscription - 12 Months 12 Issues
- The Economist Magazine - 12 Months 8 Issues -
- Small Business Opportunities Magazine - 12 Months 6 Issues -
- The Wall Street Journal - 12 MONTHS 77 issues
- SMART MONEY–1 Year–12 issues
- Consumer Reports Money Adviser Magazine - 12 Months 12 Issues -
- Paper Money Values - 12 months - 6 issues
- Wall Street & Technology Magazine - 12 MONTHS 12 ISSUES monthly
- Swap Meet–1 Year–12 issues
- Home Business Magazine–1 Year–6 issues
- Barron’s Magazine - 12 Months 13 Issues -
- Entrepreneur–4 Year–48 issues
- Hispanic Business Magazine - 12 Months 10 Issues -
- Hispanic Business Magazine - 2 years - 20 issues
- The Economist - 12 months 51 Issues Weekly
- Forbes–1 Year–26 issues
- Outsourcing Web Projects: 6 Steps to a Smarter Business - Free Preview!
- Web Wholesaler
- Website Magazine
- Employee Web Use and Misuse: Companies, Their Employees and the Internet
- Not Just Words: Enforce Your Email and Web Acceptable Usage Policies
- Protecting Your Network Against the Growing Danger of Web Attacks
- Small Business Messaging and Web Threat Solutions
3 Comments
Brian Phelps
November 12th, 2008
at 9:48am
Disney’s actual mission statement is longer: “The mission of The Walt Disney Company is to be one of the world’s leading producers and providers of entertainment and information. Using our portfolio of brands to differentiate our content, services and consumer products, we seek to develop the most creative, innovative and profitable entertainment experiences and related products in the world.”
But more importantly is that you’ve made a common mistake is confusing vision and mission. Some people think they are interchangeable, but they are very distinct.
A mission is a positive declaration of the general objectives and principles of operation of an organization. It is written in the present tense and focuses on how the organization will accomplish its vision.
A vision has a number of distinguishing characteristics, including:
An effective vision:
- Is an energetic, telegraphic, and engaging statement describing what the organization aspires to become.
- Is a short, simple, compelling description of a worthy long-term achievement, expressing an idealized state in the future. … (and more)
A vision motivates individuals when it:
- Clearly sets a long-term direction and articulates a valued purpose.
- Excludes limitations and constraints.
- Describes achievements that benefit entire groups of individuals.
- Are people-centric rather than materially-centric. (and more)
You can read all of these characteristics on my blog:
http://blog.phelpsinc.com/2008/10/characteristics-of-quality-vision.html
Regards,
Brian Phelps
Dina
November 17th, 2008
at 6:45am
Hi Brian,
Thanks for your input. It looks like your new blog and business is getting off to a nice start.
I think that if you look at the big picture of whether you want success and profit for your company, it doesn’t really matter whether you call it “vision,” “mission,” whether you have one, the other, or both, or whether the actual statement is 2 paragraphs or 2 sentences.
The important thing to remember here is that you want to differentiate your brand - and a vision, mission, unique selling proposition, or whatever one chooses to call it, is an important step in clarifying that.
I do NOT think that a new business owner will “fail” if they don’t understand the difference between the two.
Part of being a strong marketer and attracting a following involves intelligent communication. That involves finding ways to enhance conversation without discounting others in the process. Best of luck with yours in the future! :)
matteo recanatini
February 23rd, 2009
at 2:23pm
Dina;
Thank you for the thought-provoking post.
You’re right, when you say that a company not understanding the difference between vision and mission will not spell the failure of the company. I agree with Brian, however, that there is a substantial difference between vision and mission, and brands should know both.
After all, the dollar store that I drive by each day has no idea what a mission even is, let alone how to incorporate it in its brands, and yet he’s been doing business for decades at the same location.
The difference is not between success and failure, but between doing business and thriving, and between selling a product for a dollar or selling a promise through the brand, to which a product or service happens to be attached: that’s when success happens. For a company to be truly successful, it is important that it understands how a brand is sold and positioned, and - without a vision - you can’t really allow a brand to reach its full potential.