Developing Brand Values That Actually Mean Something

Quality. Innovation. Client focus. Sustainability. Trust.

If those are your brand values, you do not have brand values. You have a collection of words that could apply to every business in Switzerland — from the dentist to the SaaS startup. And that is exactly why they accomplish nothing. They do not differentiate. They do not guide decisions. They do not move anyone.

Brand values that actually mean something are specific, sometimes uncomfortable, and always costly — because real values require you to give something up. This article shows you how to develop values with substance. Values that help you make decisions. Values your clients can feel without ever having read them. And values that do not make your team roll their eyes at the next meeting.

Why Most Brand Values Are Useless

The problem usually starts in the workshop. Someone writes a list of positive adjectives on the wall. Everyone nods. “Yes, quality matters to us.” “Of course, innovation too.” By the end, there are five to seven words that nobody objects to — and that are therefore worthless.

Brand values that nobody would disagree with are not values. They are platitudes. The test is simple: if the opposite of your value sounds absurd, the value is not worth having. “We stand for quality” — who stands for non-quality? “We are client-focused” — who is deliberately client-distant? These statements say nothing because they exclude nothing.

A study by the Havas Group shows that 77 percent of all brands could disappear tomorrow and most people would not care. The primary reason: lack of relevance and missing differentiation. Interchangeable values produce interchangeable brands. And interchangeable brands produce indifferent clients.

Real brand values polarise. Not all of them — but some. They say not only what you do, but also what you do not do. They are not a wish but a stance. And having a stance means there are situations where your value costs you something.

What Brand Values Should Actually Do

Before you start formulating values, you need to understand what they are for. Brand values are not decoration for the About page. They have three concrete functions:

1. Decision Filter

Your values should give you direction in every business situation. Do you take on this client or not? Do you lower the price or not? Do you communicate on TikTok or not? If your values do not help with these questions, they are too vague.

Example: if one of your values is “depth over breadth,” you know not to take on ten projects simultaneously, even when the money is tempting. You know your website should have fewer pages that truly land rather than fifteen that are half-filled. The value guides.

2. Cultural Foundation

If you have a team — or are building one — values are what holds people together when rules do not exist. In situations no handbook covers, people act according to values. But only if the values are clear, honestly formulated, and actually lived.

According to research by Gallup, employees who identify with their company’s values are 67 percent more engaged with their employer. That sounds like HR statistics. In practice, it means less turnover, better collaboration, less friction.

3. Attraction and Repulsion

Good values attract the right clients and repel the wrong ones. And yes, repulsion is a feature, not a bug. If a potential client reads your values and thinks “this isn’t for me,” you have just saved both sides time.

In Switzerland, where business relationships often run for years and depend on trust, this is especially relevant. You do not want clients where the cultural fit is off. The project brief may be right — but the collaboration drags, the results are mediocre, and the referral never comes.

The Method: Developing Brand Values in 4 Steps

Step 1: What You Actually Do (Not What You Say)

Forget for a moment what your website says. Look at what you actually do. How do you work? How do you react when something goes wrong? What do your clients notice about you?

Gather feedback. Ask three to five clients, colleagues, or partners: “If you had to explain in one sentence what it is like to work with me — what would you say?” Not “What do you like about me?” — that produces niceties. But: what is it like? What is typical?

The answers almost always surprise you. Maybe you hear: “You also tell me when I should drop an idea.” Or: “You make things simpler than I expected.” Or: “You are sometimes uncomfortable, but in the end it is always right.” These are not marketing phrases. They are lived values — you just have not named them yet.

Step 2: What Matters to You (Even When It Costs Money)

Now it gets personal. Think of situations where you made a decision that was not the easiest or most profitable, but was the right one.

• Have you ever turned down a client even though the budget was right?
• Have you ever done rework at no charge because you were not satisfied with the result — even though the client would have accepted it?
• Have you skipped a trend because it did not fit you?

Behind each of these decisions is a value. If you turned down a client because the chemistry was wrong, even though the revenue was attractive, then “fit over revenue” is a value. If you rework things nobody asked you to rework, “standards” is a value.

Write down these situations. Not the values first — the situations. The values emerge from them.

Step 3: What Sets You Apart (Not Better, Different)

Now look at your industry. What are the unwritten rules? And where do you break them — deliberately or not?

In the finance industry, the unwritten rule is: complicated language signals competence. If you opt for clarity instead, “clarity” is your differentiating value. In the design industry, the unwritten rule is: aesthetics matter more than functionality. If you put function before form, that is a value that sets you apart.

Differentiating values are the ones where others in your industry would make a different choice. Not wrong, not worse — different. That is exactly what makes them real values rather than industry standards.

Step 4: Formulate and Sharpen

You now have raw material: external feedback, internal decisions, differentiation from the industry. Now you formulate three to five brand values.

The rules:

No single words. “Quality” is too vague. “We deliver work that still works in five years” says something. Formulate each value as a short sentence or at least as a pair — “depth over breadth,” “clarity over cleverness,” “honesty over harmony.”

Every value must have a counterexample. If nobody would claim the opposite, your value is too generic. “Honesty over harmony” has a counterexample: many service providers tell clients what they want to hear instead of what they need to hear. The value has bite.

Three to five, no more. If you have ten values, you have none. Three that you truly live are stronger than seven on a wall. When in doubt: cut, do not add.

Explainable in one sentence. Every value needs a brief explanation of what it concretely means. Not as marketing prose but as an instruction for action. “Clarity over cleverness” means: we write so that everyone understands. Even if it sounds less impressive.

The best brand values do not sound like a motivational poster. They sound like the honest answer to the question: what matters more to you? And above all: what are you willing to give up for it? — Miriam Beck

Examples: Values That Actually Work

So this does not stay abstract, here are three examples from practice. Not from large corporations, but from the kind of business you find all over Switzerland.

An architecture firm in Zurich had as its values: quality, innovation, sustainability. Interchangeable. In the workshop, we uncovered what actually defined them: “honesty in materials” (they only use materials that last, even when cheaper options exist), “dialogue, not dictation” (they develop with their clients, not for them), and “less, but right” (they take on a maximum of three projects at a time). Suddenly it was clear why clients come to this firm specifically — and not to the twenty others in the city.

A nutritionist in Bern had no formulated values but lived them every day: “no bullshit” (she tells clients directly when a diet is nonsense), “enjoyment is not the opposite of health” (she bans nothing from the menu), and “self-reliance” (she empowers rather than creating dependency). Once these values were written down, her entire communication became clearer — from the website to the first consultation.

An IT service provider in Basel replaced “client focus, reliability, innovation” with “no tech jargon” (they explain everything so a non-technical person understands), “warn early rather than fix late” (proactive maintenance instead of reactive firefighting), and “your problem, not our hours” (fixed pricing instead of hourly billing). The client response was immediate.

Brand Values and Corporate Identity

Brand values are not an isolated element. They are the foundation of your entire corporate identity. Everything that comes after the values — your visual presence, your language, your name, your logo — must reflect these values.

If one of your values is “clarity,” your website must not be overloaded with marketing speak. If your value is “courage,” your visual identity should not look like an insurance company. The values define the frame within which all visual and verbal decisions happen.

This is also why values come before design. In our approach, we build the foundation deliberately in this order: first the question of what a brand actually is. Then positioning. Then the target audience. Then values. Only afterwards come name, logo, colours, and typography. Because every visual decision without values is a guessing game.

The Anti-Bullshit Test for Your Values

Once you have formulated your values, put them through these five questions. If a value does not pass the test, rework it or cut it.

1. Would anyone claim the opposite? If not: too generic. “We stand for quality” — nobody says the opposite. Drop it.

2. Can a new team member make a decision based on this value? If they would not know what the value means in a concrete situation — too vague. A value like “honesty over harmony” gives a clear direction: if the client has a bad idea, we tell them.

3. Does the value sometimes cost you something? Values without a price are wishes. “Less, but right” costs revenue when you turn down the fourth project. “No tech jargon” costs time because you write every email so a layperson understands. If a value never costs you anything, it is not a stance.

4. Would your best client recognise the value? Without having read it. If yes: the value is real. If no: you have formulated a wish, not a reality.

5. Does it set you apart from your competitors? Not from all of them. But from most. If three out of five competitors have the same value on their website, it is an industry standard — not a differentiator.

I always do the proof-by-contradiction test with my clients: once we have formulated a value, I ask: can you name a situation where this value cost you money? When the answer comes, we both know: the value is real. — Miriam Beck

Communicating Values Without Being Cringeworthy

One last point that is particularly relevant in Switzerland: Swiss businesses find it hard to talk about values. Because it quickly sounds like self-congratulation. Because the Swiss culture tends to show rather than tell. Because “do good and talk about it” here is more like “do good and let others talk about it.”

The solution: show your values instead of proclaiming them. You do not need to write “Our value is honesty” on your website. Instead, write honest copy. Give honest prices. Run honest first conversations. Your clients will feel the value without ever reading the word.

On the About page, you can name your values — but always with concrete context. Not: “Our value: quality.” But: “We take on a maximum of three projects at a time. Because we would rather do a few things properly than many things halfway.” Same value. But one is a platitude and the other is a statement.

Mean What You Say

You now have a tool to develop brand values that are more than wall decoration. Values that guide decisions, attract clients, and set you apart from the competition.

If you are working through our series, the next piece is Naming — finding a business name that sticks. Because your name is the first visible translation of your values. It communicates in a word or two what would otherwise take three sentences.

If your values disappeared from your website tomorrow, would anyone notice? If the answer is no, you know where to start.