Branding has become one of those buzzwords that everyone uses but doesn’t really understand its true meaning and purpose. What is branding? How to create a brand? Why do companies need a strong brand strategy? These have been big questions so far.
And the reason for those failures is not having a clear brand strategy. Even if you succeed at creating a brand, maintaining its long-term success is another big challenge for you
Hartley & Soul
Only a few companies accept that creating a brand strategy is a long process that requires patience, time, and hard work — but pays off handsomely! In fact, the value of America's brand logos is worth more than 10X the combined price of the world's most famous buildings including the Eiffel Tower and the Vatican.
What is brand identity?
What is brand identity? It is the single most important part of creating a brand and building a business. Your brand identity is an extension of your core values. It manifests the values, goals and mission of your business. Your brand image is the catalyst that sparks the emotions you want your customers to experience each time they have an interaction with your brand – and it will be your north star when you’re building a brand, guiding every decision you make.
Everyone can think of companies with a strong brand image: Coca-Cola, Google, Nike, Apple and other corporations come to mind. They have immediately recognizable logos and direct, catchy slogans like “Just Do It” and “Think Different.” They have memorable commercials that bring their brand identity to life and create an emotional connection with their customers. Clothing companies such as Patagonia and Brooks Brothers exemplify this kind of branding. But how do you get to that point – where do you start and what are the guidelines to this process? How do you know you are creating a brand effectively?
You may think that making your business map and figuring out your financials are the biggest milestones when you’re starting a company – but building your brand identity is equally important. How can you develop marketing materials, establish a tone of voice for your content or even hire employees without your north star? If you don’t know what your company is and what it offers the customer, you cannot target the right audience or hire your business champions. To really get to the bottom of your brand image, take a holistic approach to refine your operations and company culture.
In this article, we will go through 8 steps of creating a brand strategy and will speak about common reasons why many companies fail. Also, we’ll discuss what channels to use for your brand strategy.
1, Define Your Target Audience
If you’re new to the industry, ask yourself who your ideal customers are and how they depend on your product/service. Or find and analyze your direct competitors. Analyze their product/services, their brand strategy, their customers or users, and how people interact with their business both online and offline.
If you’re an established business, you have a chance to analyze your existing customers and clients. While conducting your analysis and market research, divide your customers into segments according to their common patterns and motivations. This will help you understand which segment is more profitable to your business and try to attract more similar customers.
Source: Buffer
What does an ideal target audience look like? If your company sells grooming products for men, one of your ideal target groups will be women between ages 20 and 45 who usually buy similar products for their sons, husbands, or boyfriends.
This is just one example of good research. You can do the same for your product or service. The more thorough your research is, the better. These are the people who may become your brand ambassadors.
2. Use Co-Branding
An interesting example of co-branding is the partnership between Uber and Spotify. These two brands collaborated to make an exclusive experience for their customers. Check out the video below.
Co-branding is the partnership between two brands which is an effective way to reach new markets and increase brand awareness. Think about what companies you can collaborate with to make an unusual product or feature which is beneficial for the customers and is a win-win for everyone. This is not a mandatory step, but it can add some points to your brand credibility.
Like Jeff Bezos said:
“A brand for a company is like a reputation for a person. You earn reputation by trying to do hard things well.”
3. Make Your Employees Your Brand Ambassadors
Happy and satisfied employees are as valuable to the company as the customers. Most of the companies spend all their time and resources on their customers and forget how important their employees are.
What makes your employees happy? What do they want? Learn more about them and what kind of activities they like. Organize team-building events that will help to shape your company culture. According to studies, the employees who were actively engaged in different activities at work were 87% less likely to leave their company.
Why do you need all of this? Well, because your employees can become your brand ambassadors and help to increase your brand awareness, especially with the help of social platforms. When your employees share different photos and videos mentioning your company on social platforms, your customers can have an inside look at what happens there and how fun it is to be a part of your company.
In the same way, the employees who are not happy and content with your company, can give negative feedback and affect your brand image and marketing. So, if you don’t have company culture and employee engagement programs, it’s the right time to start developing them.
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