The Importance of Branding
Branding – a brand does more than just identify your company and products. It establish the values of your company and communicates your unique selling points. While large companies sometimes spend millions on branding, many small business panic at the very thought of branding because they simply do not have the budget.
This article is written to help you get started in building a successful brand without the large budget.
We often receive questions related to the most important things to consider when building a brand, and though it sounds like a simple question it could lead to complex answers. However, there are some basic steps important to consider.
1. Know Your Target Audience and Market
Knowing your target audience and market as early as possible in the process is very important when building a brand. You need to have a clear idea of who will buy your products and who will use your services. You need to know their age group, economic status, social background, likes and dislikes. There are many ways you can get to know your target audience. Perhaps you can carry out a survey or use google analytics and social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Or better still if you have the budget, hire experts on data analytics to do the research for you. You need to know who you talk, it is crucial when building your brand and corporate identity.
2. Set a Brand Mission Statement
When you know your target audience and where to market your business, your next step should be to decide on your brand mission statement. A brand mission statement simply reflects what the company stands for, what you provide and what makes you unique. It communicates how you want your customers to perceive your company, your core values, vision and objectives. Everything about your business, from your logo to your personality, should be reflected in your brand mission statement. For instance, Nike’s mission statement “To bring inspiration and innovation to every athlete in the world” is reflected in almost all their activities. To build a successful brand, you need to do the same for your company.
3. Create a Great Logo & Tagline
Your business logo plays an important role in your corporate identity and is key to establish brand recognition. It is an important piece of the puzzle when building trust and striving for customer loyalty. Your tagline is equally important and a good tagline should be short and precise so that it is easy to remember. We could elaborate on the importance of this topic for hours but will leave it at this for now. Since we are planning to publish a full article covering only this topic, to ensure you are fully equipped with necessary knowledge when designing your brand logo.
4. Research Other Brands Within Your Niche
Study your competitors, you need to know your rival’s strengths, weakness, threats, and opportunities. You need to know what makes your target customers use their products and services. However, don’t imitate them if you want your brand to be successful. Instead, make sure your products and services speaks the words on their own by being far better, more efficient, and more affordable than those of your competitors.
5. Promote Your Brand
There are many ways you can market your brand. You can promote it on traditional media like TV and radio stations if you have the budget. You can also organize seminars, conferences, or meetings where you can educate people about the benefits of your brand. Another option is to market your product online. In fact, regardless of what other means of marketing you use, online marketing is essential to successfully build your brand. With internet marketing, you can advertise your brand on social networking sites, blogs, and websites. Always make sure you point out the main qualities and benefits of your brand to your audience without compromising or exaggerating your brand values.
6. Stay True To Your Brand
You need to stay true to your brand no matter the circumstances. A recipe for failure is to promise your customers Product A and deliver Product B. You also need to be your brand’s biggest advocate and ensure that everyone working in your organization believes in and reflects the core values of your brand, always.
That’s it!
As mentioned in the early introduction of the article, these are the very basic steps. We guarantee that all successful brands once took these steps to ensure their success. Take your time and make sure you get your branding strategy right. Successful brand building does not happen overnight. Stay true to your brand and be persistent, ultimately it will give the results you are looking for.
If you need help building a successful branding strategy and take the next steps, our branding experts are here to help and we’d love to hear from you!