How to Become a Brand Strategist: A Step-by-Step Guide

A brand strategist plays a pivotal role in shaping and elevating a company’s brand. As a brand strategist, you develop long-term visions and strategies to build brand awareness, loyalty, and equity

Brand strategists have highly sought-after expertise But how do you get into this exciting career field? This comprehensive guide examines how to become a brand strategist,

What Does a Brand Strategist Do?

Before diving into how to become a brand strategist, let’s look at what they actually do on a day-to-day basis:

• Research the target audience and market landscape
• Uncover consumer insights through surveys, interviews, focus groups, and data analysis
• Identify the brand’s core strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats
• Pinpoint the brand’s values, personality, positioning, and promise to consumers
• Craft the brand’s identity and messaging strategy
• Develop meaningful brand experiences across touchpoints
• Design creative campaigns to increase brand visibility and engagement
• Track performance metrics and refine strategies as needed
• Lead collaboration across departments to align efforts
• Present recommendations and educate stakeholders on brand strategy

In short, brand strategists fuse art and science to shape how consumers perceive and interact with a brand.

Brand Strategist Job Requirements

Breaking into any field requires meeting certain prerequisites. Here is what you typically need to become a brand strategist:

Educational Background

Most brand strategist positions require at least a bachelor’s degree. Relevant majors include marketing, communications, advertising, business, graphic design, consumer research, or psychology. Coursework in brand strategy, market research, consumer behavior, and communications give you pertinent hard skills.

Some employers prefer a master’s degree in a related discipline. Majoring in brand management or brand leadership provides highly specialized training at the graduate level.

Branding Experience

Hands-on experience in branding or marketing roles provides crucial real-world preparation for brand strategy work. Look for opportunities like:

• Marketing intern
• Brand ambassador
• Content creator
• Graphic designer
• Copywriter
• Marketing assistant
• Social media manager

Key Skills

A strategic mindset is vital for analyzing brands and developing positioning. You also need creativity to design compelling brand experiences. Other key skills include:

• Research expertise
• Data analysis
• Project management
• Storytelling and messaging
• Influencing and presenting
• Leadership and collaboration

Personality Traits

Certain natural talents lend themselves well to the brand strategist role. Top traits include:

• Curiosity to dig deeper into target consumers
• Creativity and imagination
• Initiative to identify growth opportunities
• Analytical ability to interpret data
• Flexibility to shift strategies as needed
• Vision to see the big picture

4 Steps to Becoming a Brand Strategist

If you have the foundational qualifications, what’s next? Follow these steps to launch your brand strategy career:

1. Earn a Relevant Degree

Your educational background signals to employers whether you have the knowledge base for brand strategy work.

An undergraduate degree in business, marketing, communications, or design provides fundamental training. Supplement with coursework covering areas like consumer research, analytics, and interpersonal communications.

For additional credibility, pursue a master’s degree in a specialty like brand management or brand leadership. Programs exist at schools like Emerson College, School of Visual Arts, and New York University.

2. Gain Hands-On Experience

Classroom learning provides the foundation. But real-world experience cements the capabilities to excel as a brand strategist.

Seek out internships and entry-level roles that expose you to branding and marketing activities:

• Marketing intern at an advertising or PR agency
• Brand ambassador activating experiences at brand events
• Content creator developing branded content and social campaigns
• Graphic designer crafting brand visual assets and packaging
• Copywriter bringing a brand’s voice and tone to life

Use each role to build up your skills in research, messaging, creativity, and analytics.

3. Develop a Strategic Mindset

The ability to think strategically is what sets brand strategists apart. Immerse yourself in resources to develop this critical skillset:

• Read branding books and blogs covering brand positioning, consumer psychology, and industry trends. Authors like Marty Neumeier are respected experts.

• Study case studies on how top companies created disruptive branding strategies. Analyze what worked and how you can apply their approaches.

• Take online courses to strengthen key capabilities like presenting, research, and critical thinking. Try resources like Coursera, LinkedIn Learning, and General Assembly.

• Attend branding conferences to learn from today’s top strategists. Events like Brandweek, Adobe Summit, and HOW Design Live offer inspiration.

• Follow industry leaders on social media to gain insights on their approaches and mindsets when building brands.

4. Showcase Your Abilities

At this stage, you have the credentials and experience needed to start applying for brand strategist roles. Make sure your portfolio and resume convey your value effectively:

• Compile a portfolio demonstrating your strategic perspective and branding skills. Include sample brand vision statements, messaging frameworks, designs, campaigns, presentations, and data analysis.

• Reflect your capabilities on your resume. Beyond listing branding roles and education, incorporate keywords from the job description to emphasize your fit.

• Explain your personal brand. In interviews, be ready to articulate your vision, values, positioning, and the unique perspective you bring to branding.

• Highlight results like brand lift, increased engagement, and growth attributed to your efforts. Use data and anecdotes to quantify your impact.

• Convey your potential through your career objectives, passion for branding, and desire to take on greater responsibility in brand strategy.

3 Alternative Paths to Become a Brand Strategist

If you don’t have a marketing degree or branding experience, don’t lose hope. Here are some alternative routes to break into brand strategy work:

Transition from a Related Field

Skills from fields like market research, advertising, public relations, and management consulting readily transfer to brand strategist roles. Highlight how your expertise solves brand challenges to make the pivot.

For example, if you’re a market researcher, emphasize how your ability to uncover consumer motivations and segment audiences informs branding strategy.

Start as an Associate Brand Strategist

Some agencies hire associate strategists who have potential, but need further training. This allows you to gain experience and work towards promotion to brand strategist.

Pursue entry-level marketing and consulting roles to build capabilities and work ethic. Then convey your passion for branding during interviews.

Build Your Own Brand First

Prove you can strategically build a brand by creating one yourself. Establish an influencer persona or launch your own company, product, or service.

Use storytelling and content marketing to craft your positioning. Analyze your target audience and brand traction. This showcases hands-on strategic thinking.

Develop These Skills to Advance Your Career

Once you secure that initial brand strategist role, continuing to build up these skills will strengthen your expertise and accelerate your career growth:

• Business acumen – Take finance, product management, and strategy training to speak the language of executives and understand what drives the business.

• Data analysis – Become fluent in analytics tools and methodologies to glean consumer insights and measure branding impact.

• Leadership – Spearhead collaborative initiatives and mentor junior team members to enhance your influence.

• Creativity – Expand your ability to develop breakthrough branding concepts and experiential activations. Attend workshops or courses.

• Specialized experience – Gain expertise around specific branding contexts like B2B, digital-direct, or rebranding.

• Consulting skills – Develop strategies for conveying recommendations, influencing stakeholders, and driving consensus on branding vision and strategy.

• Storytelling – Enhance your skills at crafting compelling narratives across mediums like presentations, videos, and written content to build an emotional brand connection.

Brand Strategist Career Paths

As you grow your expertise, you can progress into more senior-level and specialized brand strategist roles:

• Senior Brand Strategist
• Brand Director
• Global Brand Strategist
• Brand Engagement Strategist
• Branded Content Strategist
• Strategic Brand Manager
• Brand Experience Designer
• Brand Architect

Some brand strategists leverage their skills to move into related leadership positions like:

• Chief Brand Officer
• VP of Brand Strategy
• VP of Marketing
• Head of Consumer Insights

The world’s top brands need strategic visionaries to steer them. By following this guide, you can join the ranks of elite brand strategists driving meaningful brands forward.