Mission and Vision are two concepts often linked to brands such as Nike, Amazon, and Coca-Cola that for years had used them as a guide to convey their values and to achieve their goals. What are the goals of a brand, besides that of pure sales? An important goal is the creation of a community around the values of the brand so that the customer can identify with the values themselves. Another is that of offering a memorable shopping experience that the customer wants to repeat.
That’s where Mission and Vision come in. They guide the work of the whole company and show the way to achieve the objective described. How? Here’s how to use Mission and Vision for your company, small or large as it may be.
What are Mission and Vision
Vision is the brand’s goal, which is what the brand wants to achieve or what it wants to become in the long run. More simply, the Vision could also identify with the dream or the biggest aspiration of a company. For example, Microsoft would like to “Help people and organizations around the world realize their full potential”.
How to reach such an important aspiration? Through the Mission that identifies with the method adopted to reach the Vision. In the case of Microsoft: “Allow individuals and companies to realize their full potential.”
To sum up, Vision is the goal to achieve, while Mission is the way you reach the goal. Mission and Vision often get confused, in reality, they are two complementary concepts, working in synergy and at the same time, guiding the company’s business in the best possible way.
Why Mission and Vision mater
- The brand exists only if it has a goal to achieve. For example, for a textile machinery manufacturer, its vision could be to manufacture highly digitized and low-polluting machinery to lighten the work of workers and increase the speed of production. While its mission could be to use innovative technologies and recycled materials to create low-consumption machinery and pollution. As you can see, the Vision is achievable only if you define a Mission. While the latter is only realizable if you have the Vision to achieve.
- The brand exists only if it has a guideline to follow. Every activity, every choice, every communication, and every reason to be of the brand must be in line with its principles, values, vision, and mission. In this way, the brand becomes an expression of personality with which customers can as well identify.
- The brand exists only if it communicates. Telling the story of the company, its founding values, the production cycle, the Vision, and the Mission, makes the customer participate in a much broader process than a simple purchase. When you choose one brand over another, you share the brand’s principles, values, Mission, and Vision. As long as these are communicated.
How to communicate Mission and Vision
Website, social networks, media, and internal communication are the most at hand channels to communicate mission and vision.
Here are some of the most significant Missions and Visions that best convey the company’s objectives by focusing on the individual and his needs.
Vision
- Ikea: “To create a better everyday life for the many people”
In Ikea’s imagination, furniture is an element that helps to improve people’s daily lives. Ikea furniture ideas create a pleasant atmosphere in your home and your office, thus helping to improve people’s everyday life and the Vision reflects this concept.
- Samsung: “Inspiring the world, shaping the future”
Samsung offers everyday technological products such as mobile phones, tablets, and televisions. All tools through which you can enjoy various content such as text, video, and audio. Content created for entertainment can become a source of inspiration for new ideas. Here Samsung reflects this purpose through its Vision.
Mission
- Google: “Organize world information and make it universally accessible and useful”
Everyone knows Google as a brand for research and less for “the organization of information”, yet to present the information in the best possible way you have to organize it. The Google Mission correctly reflects its activity of organization and dissemination of information to allow everyone to use it.
- Tesla: “Accelerating the transition to sustainable energy in the world”
Tesla is one of the best-known companies for the production of electric cars and the use of solar energy. Electric cars that pollute less than normal ones help accelerate the transition to a more sustainable world that will embrace new energy sources, such as solar. The term “transition” clearly describes this concept. Moreover, it should be noted that a car brand uses the word “accelerate” and how this term contributes to making its Mission even
Interested in defining Vision and Mission for your company and all the strategies aimed at achieving your company goals? Leave us a message and one of our managers will contact you.