"Build your brand substance" is workshop product from Given London designed to help brands use sustainability principles to build their brand. It involves exploring the role they can play in creating positive impacts for people, their communities and the world at large. There are two parts to the workshop. 1 - Writing sustainability principles into their brand story 2 -Telling this story through the things that they do both inside and outside their company.

1. A strategy workshop for brands to create value in peoples lives...

2. Story telling is one of our most powerful inventions.
It’s the way we absorb and understand the world
around us. We use story telling to capture and
remember past experiences, and to project and
plan the things we will do in the future.
Stories are everywhere in culture from music,
through to sport and computer games
Brands are STORIES
Brands are stories told through every
interaction people have with a
company. Some are rich and
meaningful, while others are shallow,
one dimensional or inauthentic.

3. Brand stories come to life through the
behaviour of companies in everything
that they do.
But lots of disconnects have opened up between
what brands say and what they actually do. The
image presented to customers is often very different
to what happens behind the scenes.
It has led to lots of phony brand stories that present
one idea to the customer i.e. fresh or farm
produced, when the actual production techniques Not so Innocent?
tell a different story.
But now people are starting to see past the image ...every market is under threat from
and are looking for something more. more authentic, more sustainable
They do not just want to like a brand’s personality; brands that have more substance; a
they want to love the whole company and problem that traditional marketing
everything that it does alone cannot solve.

4. The outcome of the workshop are ways for
your brand to create positive impacts in the
lives of people, their communities and the
environment.
To become more recognised as a ‘good’ company,
behaving in a way that benefits people and the world
at large has to be hard wired into your brand story.
...is one day workshop designed This brand story will guide future actions while making
to help you add substance to current customer interaction more compelling.
your brand story In other words, it will give your brand story more
substance.

5. This workshop will benefit the following people in
companies that are at risk of becoming less popular or
being seen as less authentic than their competition, or
forward thinking companies that are seeking to stay
ahead of competitors…
• Brand Managers who are looking for more credible
and authentic ways to engage people.
• Corporate Responsibility Executives who want to help
their company embed sustainability principles into their
Who should attend brand.
this workshop? • Marketing Heads who want to take a more holistic
perspective on the role of their brand in people’s lives.
• Corporate Management who see the value of a more
meaningful role for their brand in society.

6. 2 A simple two-part structure
part 1 - writing your story (Morning session)
The workshop is based on the idea
that a brand story is no more part 2 – expressing your story (Afternoon session)
complicated than the things you could
express in a face to face encounter

7. Part 1 - writing your story A story that delivers on all of these levels
makes for brands that outshine expectations
Any compelling story needs to think about who it is
being written for. Our starting point for this workshop is Example brand story for In-N-Out Burger,
creating a well defined customer portrait. a Californian fast food restaurant
ME
The morning session will focus on writing a brand story
To bring the convenience that people expect from fast
against the customer portrait.
food with personal service, quality and healthiness, that
they would not.
The story begins with how you meet people’s everyday
needs but then reaches beyond this into creating
MY WORLD
broader, more meaningful impacts in peoples lives.
In N out Burger never wants to stop being a
neighbourhood restaurant. We seek to make a positive
contribution to the communities where we do business
THE WORLD and have a special place in the hearts of local people.
THE WORLD
MY WORLD Our personal approach means that we favour natural,
local and hand-made produce whereever we can.
We think keeping it simple can contribute to a better
ME world.

8. Part 2 – expressing your story
The afternoon session is about exploring ways that this
story can be told through projects, programs and
initiatives that touch upon all of the key parts of your
business ecosystem.
Inside your business Outside your business
A story with substance will come to life
in a meaningful authentic way when it is
told creatively and imaginatively in all
areas of your business.

9. You will get a digital story book, just like this, containing
the outputs of the workshop. Your very own brand
substance handbook.
This will include further thinking and implications of the
key ideas that emerge during the session, especially
where they touch on technical sustainability issues and
may need further research or thinking to ensure
What will you get to credibility.
take away? It will also include the working up of creative ideas
developed on the day or subsequent to the workshop.

10. Benefits
BRAND BUILDING & CONSUMER ENGAGEMENT
✓ Makes brand stories more holistic and credible
✓ Makes sustainability principles brand building and
relevant to customers
✓ Gives a strategic platform for substance based
initiatives in the future both internally and externally
✓ Creates new opportunities to engage customers in
meaningful ways - i.e. a more compelling brand story
SAFEGUARDING YOUR BRAND
✓ Protects against the threat that more authentic or
ethical alternatives present
✓ Moves you from relying on intangible brand image
A strong strategy framework with tactics to tangible brand substance
executable ideas for building the ✓ Helps companies challenge negative perceptions
of them with positive behaviour.
substance in your brand
INTERNAL COHESION
✓ Helps to bring together CRS and Brand initiatives
✓ Provides a basis for engaging employees across the
organisation in more meaningful ways

11. Three steps from brand image to brand substance
STRATEGY & CREATIVE
EVALUATION
IDEAS PROGRAMS

12. To get in touch.
Email: David@givenlondon.com or Becky@givenlondon.com
Call: +44 207 7017 3990
Visit: 34-35 Great Sutton Street, London, EC1V 0DX