Arek Dvornechuck
Branding Expert
10 Best Books On Brand Strategy Development
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I specialize in the development of brands—from brand strategy & identity, to web design, motion and beyond.
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Having an effective brand strategy plays a huge role in growing your business since it sums up why your business exists.
However, it is not that easy to come up with a strategy that will guarantee you a great result, especially if you’re just starting in the business industry.
What are the best books to read about brand strategy?
Fortunately, there are a lot of great resources online in which can guide you on creating your brand strategy approach—and that includes books.
Books about brand strategy is an excellent way for every brand owner to learn everything from the experts.
That’s why in this article, I created a list of best brand strategy books to read in 2022.
I described each of them in a way that you can understand every book’s purpose and how important for them to be on your collection.
I guaranteed that you’ll learn everything that you need to know including the importance of brand strategy, its definition and examples.
You’ll also learn how to develop a brand strategy that is applicable to your needs and will generate amazing results for your business.
If you’re curious about the types of brand strategy, check out my other article where I featured the different types of brand strategy.
So without further ado, let’s jump in with my list of the 10 best brand strategy books every entrepreneur needs.
PS. If you’re interested, you can also check out my other article where I featured best branding books.
As the first thing on my list, I'm including a book by one of the most famous branding experts and authors, Marty Neumeier.
Bridge the gap between brand strategy and customer experience.
The Brand Gap by Neumeier is the first book to present a unified theory of brand-building among all the brand strategy books available online.
By reading his book, you’ll be able to learn a lot of things, including how branding is changing the dynamics of competition.
He also tackled the importance of managing brands from the inside and the five essential disciplines of brand-building.
The Brand Gap will answer most of your questions about brand strategy, including the reasons why collaboration is the key to brand-building.
Marty Neumeier is a professional author who has written books about branding, design, innovation, and creativity, so rest assured that you’ll learn from an expert.
In fact, I used to have an interview with Marty on one of my podcasts where we talked about how to become a branding master.
The Brand Gap is a must-have book for you if you want to know how to create a brand strategy that connects with your customers.
Buy The Brand Gap by Marty Neumeier on Amazon
This book about brand strategy is written by Don Miller, who is a well-known American author, public speaker, and business owner.
Craft your brand story in a way that makes customers listen.
By reading his book, you’ll be able to learn how to improve the way you connect with your customers by using the power of storytelling.
Don Miller is also the CEO of StoryBrand, which is one of the most successful marketing companies today.
Building a StoryBrand is a tried-and-true answer to the problem that business owners experience when talking about their companies.
Donald discusses seven universal, strong narrative aspects in this book to show you how to communicate your brand's story and captivate your potential consumers.
By creating a captivating story, you will let your consumers realize the key advantages of purchasing your goods, ideas, or services.
So if you want to know the importance of effective storytelling in brand strategy, then Building A StoryBrand is a great choice.
Buy Building A StoryBrand by Don Miller on Amazon
Another great brand strategy book on my list is by a British designer and an expert brand consultant, Michael Johnson.
A step-by-step visual guide for successful branding.
He is the owner of Johnson Banks, and in this book, he identified the five key steps in the process of creating an effective brand strategy.
According to the first chapter of this book, identifying the right question is the first step in the process of creating a brand.
Starting with the strapline, which gives the brand a narrative and a purpose, Johnson goes on to reveal the contributing factors required to build a successful brand.
This book analyzes every step of the development process required to build the simplest and most immediately attractive brands.
Branding In Five And A Half Steps comes with over 1,000 vibrant illustrations showing the world's most successful corporate identities.
If you are also interested in how to define and design brands, just check out my interview with Michael on one of my podcasts.
Buy Branding In Five And A Half Steps by Michael Johnson on Amazon
This next book on my list may not be the latest compared to others, but it is one of the most classic books about brand strategy.
Transform your business by creating a truly remarkable product.
The Purple Cow is one of the best brand strategy development books written by a successful entrepreneur named Seth Godin.
As outlined in this book, Seth Godin has devised a method for promoting your brand that will be as effective in 2022 as it was in 2009.
Seth teaches you key marketing ideas by telling you stories about brands like Starbucks, JetBlue, and Apple.
Seth's advice has never been more applicable to authors, marketers, advertisers, entrepreneurs, makers, product managers, and anybody else who has something to tell the world.
According to the book's principles, businesses should focus on creating standout products and then marketing them to those consumers.
The Purple Cow is one of the best books about business strategy today, so if you’re looking for one, then this book by Seth Godin must be in your collection.
Buy Purple Cow by Seth Godin on Amazon
Since we’re talking about the best brand strategy books available, I also include "Creative Strategy," written by Douglas Davis.
Learn how to gain new clients and grow relationship with existing ones.
Douglas Davis is an artist, critic, teacher, and writer, and in this book he explains the importance of understanding the business language.
He also talked about the best brand strategy approach that you can apply to your business to attract new customers and make the old ones stay.
By reading the Creative Strategy book, you’ll be able to learn necessary things about branding that you’ll never learn in school.
Additionally, this book aims to teach you the business objectives and marketing decisions that drive your creative work.
It revolves around the topics of understanding client requests from a business perspective, building a strategic framework to inspire visual concepts, and etc.
Since I personally interviewed David on my podcast, I am confident that this book will contribute a lot to your ability to have a one-of-a-kind brand strategy.
So if you’re looking for the best brand strategy book that will help you apply your creativity to your branding approach, then the Creative Strategy is for you.
Buy Creative Strategy by Douglas Davis on Amazon
Another must-have book about brand strategy is "Start With Why," written by British-American author and inspirational speaker Simon Sinek.
Understand why some brands are more successful than others.
This book demonstrates that the world's best leaders all think, behave, and communicate in the same manner—which is the total opposite of what everyone else does.
Simon calls this powerful idea the "Golden Circle," and it serves as a foundation for business development, movement leadership, and personal inspiration.
Start With Why is one of the best-selling brand strategy books, and it will help you understand how successful people get their position in the industry.
Simon believes that every famous brand and personality started with a question: why are other people and businesses better than others?
And if you also do the same, you’ll be able to observe the true secrets of successful businesses and you can also apply them to your brand as well.
Start With Why is an excellent choice if you're looking for a book about brand strategy development that will help you build a memorable brand.
Buy Start With Why by Simon Sinek on Amazon
This brand strategy book is written by Byron Sharp, a professor at one of the largest centers for research into marketing.
Have the opportunity to learn what most marketers don’t know.
How Brands Grow was his first published book, and it is considered one of the most influential marketing books of all time.
This book is built on decades of study that has progressively established scientific rules regarding buying and brand performance.
This is the first book about brand strategy to give these rules context, and investigate their significance and marketing applications.
Take note that the information included in this book has supporting evidence and a basis, so you’ll be sure that the tips included about brand strategy are reliable.
Byron Sharp reveals the process of establishing a strong brand as well as how to develop a brand strategy that will leave a great impression on the public.
So if you want to buy a book about brand strategy development that will cater to your needs as a business owner, then How Brands Grow is for you.
Buy How Brands Grow by Byron Sharp on Amazon
Of the eight books on my list, I won’t miss including "Fusion," which is written by the author of the successful book "What Great Brands Do."
Learn how brand and culture powers the world’s greatest companies.
Denise Lee Yohn is an in-demand keynote speaker and she has appeared on CNBC, Fox Business, and in the Wall Street Journal discussing business and branding issues.
Her book teaches you how to harness the power of brand-culture fusion in order to gain a long-term competitive advantage and spur new development.
This engaging book demonstrates how to connect the image you project to the outside world with the principles and standards that govern your workplace.
This is a must-read for entrepreneurs who are passionate about workplace culture, branding, strategy, leadership, integration, etc.
Denise also shows how connecting culture and brand will help you find the best brand strategy for your business.
If you want to know the importance of integrating brand and culture in the process of branding, you can check out my interview with Denise.
Buy Fusion by Denise Lee Yohn on Amazon
Positioning is the first book to address the challenges involved in communicating with a skeptical, media-saturated population.
Understand the importance of positioning in brand strategy.
By combining the company's strengths and limitations with those of its competitors, this book describes a new way to create a "position" in a customer's mind.
Through Positioning, advertising gurus Ries and Trout teach how to build your strategy around your competition's weaknesses.
Additionally, they present several excellent case studies and in-depth assessments of some of advertising's most phenomenal successes and failures.
Positioning is a must-have book for every brand owner that wants to create a strong position in the business industry.
This book established the concept that in order to be remembered, brands must clarify their position as to what they should be remembered for.
So if you’re looking for a must-buy brand strategy book that will help you to successfully position your brand, then the Positioning must be in your collection.
Buy Positioning by Al Ries & Jack Trout on Amazon
And for the last book on brand strategy development on my list, I want to highlight the Dim Sum Strategy by Peter Wilken.
Be familiar with tools that can build stronger brands.
Peter is a branding specialist with more than 30 years of experience working with some of the world's most prominent companies.
For almost three decades, Dim Sum Strategy has worked with some of the world's biggest brands at top agencies.
The book is organized to follow the author's proven Brand Centered Management (TM) method, with a variety of "tools" divided into four sections.
Each tool is provided in bite-sized, stand-alone portions; you may read the book in order or cherry-pick in whatever order you please—just like a dim sum dinner.
Dim Sum Strategy is a great choice if you’re looking for brand strategy tips and tools that can help you establish a strong brand.
You can also check out my interview with Peter, where we talked about the brand building process.
Buy Dim Sum Strategy by Peter Wilken on Amazon
Buying books about brand strategy is a great investment for every entrepreneur that wants to position their business in the industry.
They are great sources of knowledge since you’ll be guaranteed to learn from the experts.
All the books about brand strategy development on my list are must-reads and will definitely help you grow your business.
They all have different strengths and purposes, so you’ll be sure that you will learn everything that you must know about brand strategy.
Spending time reading these books will definitely be beneficial for your brand to stand out for the long run.
Also, I already interviewed most of the authors behind those great brand strategy books, including Marty Neumeier, Michael Johnson, Douglas Davis, Denise Lee Yohn, and Peter Wilken.
You can also check out my podcasts with them since we talked about their inspirations and purposes for writing those books about brand strategy.
Now that I’m done giving you my top picks, which do you think is the best book on brand strategy development?—Leave a comment below.
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I'm a branding expert and graphic designer based in NY. I specialize in the development of brands: brand strategy, identity & web design. Need help with your project?—Get in touch
