Branding that Works for You!
With the events of 2020, you can no longer ignore the importance your brand has on the success of your business. As a result, many believe that now is a good time to reflect on your brand, consider the elements that impact it, and evaluate if your company is in need of a brand refresh, revamp or rebrand.
Business owners typically believe they have something that differentiates them from the rest; something that is totally unique that they can do in a better way. Believing in your dream and building something that makes you a difference maker requires you to build a strong brand. Your brand is the perception that your clients, employees, partners, colleagues, competitors, and the overall industry believes about you and your business. Your brand includes your promise, your values, and the products and services you provide. It also includes the perceptions, characteristics, and emotions that come to mind when your audience considers what your company, your product, and your service means to them. Branding is the process that creates meaning. Whether you are just beginning your business journey and need some guidance or have a well-established business and want to build more growth, these tips can help you assess your brand and determine the next steps in your brand development.
Identify and Define Your Brand Strategy
In order to build a successful business and consider the functional elements of your brand (graphics, colors, and design), you have to establish where you are; what you uniquely offer; who you want to become; and where you want to go.
Where is your brand now? A complete brand inventory evaluation is necessary, first, to understand your current brand placement. Conducting a complete company profile, consisting of your brand image, mission, values, mottos, current graphics, language, and your digital presence, involving social media, website, keyword and SEO strategy, and various explored campaigns, helps you to learn how you are currently presenting your products and services to your audience.
What is your value proposition? What is unique about what you offer the market and how do you uniquely fulfill the needs of our clients?
What is the image of your client? Identify the people you want to connect with and clarify what they need that you can offer them at each step of the purchase funnel.
What are your long-term goals? Understand where you want to go and build a plan to get there.
Identifying your brand strategy helps you to build your action plan, gauge your progress, and adjust accordingly as you move toward your goals.
Build a Successful Brand Identity
Just because you have an outstanding product or service doesn’t guarantee that you will stand out in your industry. An appealing brand identity helps you connect your product or service in a meaningful way to your audience. Building an attractive brand requires strategic messaging and careful planning.
So many times, a company begins with a desire to create a catchy name or a cool logo. Instead, successful branding begins with establishing strong brand values. They are part of your company’s DNA and act as the moral compass for every decision made within the business. They link your purpose, personality, and service together, forming how your brand "sounds" and looks. They are at the core of what differentiates you in the minds of your key stakeholders.
Next, careful research involves an inventory audit that reveals the image of your ideal client, your value proposition, your relationship to competitors, and your visual aesthetic. A careful evaluation of these elements will inform your brand, so that you can create your brand identity that communicates who you are most effectively.
Now that your brand is informed, you are ready to design a look and feel that matches what you bring to your industry. A thorough graphics package and brand guidelines can be created that matches how you want to present yourself in the marketplace.
Strategic messaging is important to ensure that your client understands what separates you from your competition. If your brand is all about reliability, confidence, and competent service, you want your branding to reflect those characteristics by being professional and sophisticated. If your brand is playful and creative, those elements should create a carefree and energetic impression.
Understanding the elements associated with your success is critical to building your brand and connecting with your audience as you intend. Once you create your brand and build a strategic plan, you can make meaningful connections, motivate your audience, and build brand loyalty.
Consistency is Key
Branding helps create your identity, connects you to an audience, and helps them understand why they need you. If you don't stay consistent with your branding, you have not only wasted your investment in time, money, and hard work, but you have also moved further away from your goals than when you first began. Here's why:
You no longer have a meaningful or trustworthy brand identity.
You have created brand confusion with your intended audience. Your risk is in potentially having them tune you out and moving on. We know that in business, you rarely get a second chance.
Being consistent in your branding protects you from errant interpretations that confuse your audience, diminish trust, and challenge loyalty. Consistency creates a more professional and competent impression and ensures your ability to stand out in the way you want.
Build Trust and Loyalty
At this point, you have assessed your goals, created a strong brand identity, created strategic messaging that highlights your uniqueness and your value proposition to clients, remaining consistent in your approach. The next step is to sustain client relationships that are built on trust and loyalty:
Deliver on your brand promise for value and quality.
Focus on the customer experience and their needs rather than being promotional and sales oriented. You can't control all the variables that lead to sales, but you can manage how your customers experience their interaction with you. Nurture and optimize that experience and the sales are likely to follow.
Listen to your audience and engage with them in a way that you create a deeper, more personalized connection. This allows clients to become your brand ambassadors that will help you widen your audience.
Remember, how you respond when problems happen will resonate the most with your clients and could have a negative impact on your brand. Respond positively to client concerns, seeing them as opportunities to improve your product or service and build a stronger client relationship. Evaluate whether you need to make adjustments and communicate your solutions to your clients.
A strong, effective brand occurs when a business presents the same visual aesthetic, values, personality, and brand messaging across every client touchpoint. This can be challenging to accomplish if you don’t fully understand your own brand and the elements that impact it. Your company’s logo design, your business website, your signage, your marketing, and your strategic messaging must all be instantly recognizable as your brand. If you haven’t given any deep thought to your brand: your values, your inherent and projected brand personality, your unique value proposition, and how those elements will manifest visually, you simply can’t expect to achieve a successful brand. Considering all that has occurred in 2020, there is no time better than now to evaluate where your business is today and your company goals. By doing so, you will improve your chances of reaching success.