10 Best Brand Strategy Courses Online in 2023
This is the ultimate list of online brand strategy courses for creatives who want to become strategists or CEO’s who want to build a brand the strategic way.
If you’re a designer, go beyond making it look pretty — learn how to build brands from the ground up.
If you’re onboarding a new client and don’t take the time to understand the business behind it, the target audience, the appropriate tone of voice and messaging, then you’re just doing disservice to your client.
The goal of strategy is to focus all your visual, verbal and conceptual thinking on design solutions that will help your client achieve their business and marketing objectives.
So you need to get clarity on key aspects of branding in order to be able to make decisions that are “on brand”.
PS. Also check out my Ultimate List of Brand Strategy Resources.
What is brand strategy?
Brand strategy is basically bridging the gap between the business and design.
Your goal as a brand strategist is to go above and beyond just making your brand look pretty — you need to make it work.
Developing brand strategy will help you learn as much about the business as possible, so that you can propose the best possible creative solutions.
But if you don’t go into your project with some sort of a strategy, you will most likely get a lot of push back from your client.
And you and your clients will be very subjective, saying something like: “I don’t like blue” — then it becomes a very difficult conversation.
So when you don’t do the strategy it becomes very subjective and more of an art critique.
That’s why business solutions that have both rationale and creative parts at their core are essential to differentiating you and your work from the pack.
1. Brand Strategy Guide by Arek Dvornechuck
As the first item on my list I humbly put my own brand startegy course.
The most practical guide to learn how to run brand strategy workshops.
I’ve developed my course based on some of the best books and courses that exist out there, some of which I mentioned in this list.
Cost: $497 | Length: 12 Videos | By Arek Dvornechuck
In my course I divide brand strategy into 3 sections:
- Brand Core (Purpose, Vision, Values)
- Brand Positioning (Audience, Market, Goals)
- Brand Persona (Personality, Voice, Tagline)
In total, you’ll find 9 step-by-step branding exercises that you can use a whiteboard or fill in the worksheets provided.
In my brand strategy course you won’t find hours of boring videos with overwhelming amounts of content that you don’t really know how to apply.
Throughout my career I’ve gone through many courses on brand strategy, both in-person workshops and online.
This experience allowed me to try and test different approaches with my clients and pick what works best.
I strongly believe that whatever you want to learn, you should focus on applying it right away, because otherwise you’ll forget what you’ve just learned.
This type of self-education is the most valuable type of education I know of and that’s why I made my course extremely practical.
Check out this video tutorial on youtube, which is a preview of me running one of the branding exercises.
2. WHY Discovery Course by Simon Sinek
Simon Sinek is the author of the bestselling book Start With Why and the more practical version Find Your Why — a written version of his online course.
A pragmatic guide for discovering purpose for you and your team.
This course is designed to help you find words to express what truly inspires you.
Cost: $150 | Length: 17 Videos, 20 hours | By Simon Sinek
Simon’s course is based on the concept of Golden Circle which he explains is grounded in the biology of human decision making.
This easy-to-follow guide starts with discovering your personal WHY, and then expands to articulating your organization’s WHY.
So whether you’re a CEO or a team, these simple steps will lead you on a path to a more fulfilling life and long-term success for you and your brand.
Over 16,000 people have become students of this course.
This online course costs only $150 and contains 17 short and actionable videos together with worksheets to help you implement what you learn right away.
I strongly recommend this course for all CEO’s and teams who either start a new business/brand or go through a rebrand process.
PS. I based the Brand Purpose exercise of my Strategy Guide on the Simon’s concept of Golden Circle.
3. StoryBrand by Donald Miller
Donald Miller is a New York Times bestselling author and CEO of StoryBrand and he has helped over 10,000 businesses clarify their message.
A self-paced online course to help you create clear brand message.
In this course, he’ll help you clarify your company’s message so customers pay attention and respond.
Cost: $275 or $995 | Length: 28 Videos, 20 hours | By Donald Miller
Donald’s course is based on his proprietary storytelling framework described in more detail in his books StoryBrand and the most recent Marketing Made Simple.
His 7-step messaging framework goes like this:
“A character who wants something encounters a problem before they can get it. At the peak of their despair, a guide steps into their lives gives them a plan, and calls them to action. That action helps them avoid failure and ends in a success.”
Although this is not a typical brand strategy course but a messaging framework, it’s worth mentioning because messaging is a big part of developing a sound brand strategy.
You will learn how to use words to tell a compelling brand story and position your brand as a guide and solution to your customers problems and pain points.
In this course, you’ll get access to a free online tool (worksheets) that guides you through the implementation process step-by-step.
You have two options:
- Buy a yearly subscription for $275 and get access to this online course,
- Or pay $995 to book a livestream workshop and get instant feedback.
I highly recommend this course for anyone working on website copy, email sequences and sales letters.
PS. I based my Storytelling Guide on the Donald’s StoryBrand framework.
4. Designing Strategy by IDEO U
IDEO is an award-winning global design company that created IDEO U (University) to teach the methods and mindsets they have been practicing for decades.
A human-centered, design thinking approach to help organizations innovate and grow.
In this course, you’ll learn a process that will help you create and take action on a strategy for your business, team, or organization.
Cost: $799 | Length: 4 hours / week, 5 weeks | By IDEOU
The lessons in the IDEO’s course are designed to challenge assumptions and provoke new ways of working.
You’ll learn from esteemed practitioners who apply these methods every day in their own work.
By combining rigor and creativity, you can both analyze the world as it is and imagine how it could be better.
You’ll follow repeatable steps that are both human-centered and business-focused.
The course is mainly addressed to business owners to help them with choosing what to do and what not to do.
However, also as a creative you can benefit from this course — it will teach you the process IDEO goes through with their clients, so you can use it in your creative practice.
Clap if you liked it.
PS. Check out my new Brand Strategy Guide. 👇👇👇
