No matter what type of company you own, building a brand’s identity is one of the best ways to improve company awareness and gain new business. To optimize business growth, consider these tips below.
1. Work out your key values
No matter how long your company has been running for, if you have a weak brand identity, it could restrict your businesses’ potential. You’ll need to make some changes and the best way to do that is to start from the beginning. Bring your brand back to basics and clearly outline your company’s core values. What do you want your company to say? Is there a particular focus you want your audience to notice? Working out your company’s main philosophy will help you shape a prolific brand identity, as you’ll know what sort of company you want to be.
2. Know your audience
Again, at this stage, it’s a good idea to refocus your thinking and get to know your audience. Create customer personas of your target audience to help you better tailor your marketing strategy to your customer’s needs. By doing this, you’ll be able to tap into your audience’s emotions and get to know them better.
3. Identify your competitors
What is the market doing? How are your competitors performing? To truly be the best, you’re going to have to know what your competitor’s next move is. Attend networking events to seek out new opportunities. Keep on top of the latest industry trends and news and be an expert in your field.
4. What’s your motto?
Once you have focus, you’ll now need to use this to form a clear strap line, or motto, for your business. This is a short summary aimed at your audience that’ll clearly outline who you are and what you do. For example, Lego’s main philosophy is ‘Good quality play’ while Apple adopt, ‘Think Different’ as their slogan. Both help customers know exactly what they do, allowing them to create an identity that helps them stand ahead of the crowd.
5. Update your image
Once you’ve identified your audience, competitors and brand foundations, the next stage is to upgrade or replenish your existing branding. This would work particularly well if you’re a customer facing company, such as a trades person. If you use a vehicle, refresh a tired look by stripping the existing paint job and update with a fresh coat of color. This is the perfect opportunity to add your company’s name, brand’s motto, logo (if necessary) and contact details onto the van. This not only looks neat and professional, but it could potentially bring in new customers too.
6. Create a social media profile
Now your branding and image is on point, continue this onto your social media. All businesses can benefit from an online presence and social media is a great tool to use to do this. Social media gives you a direct link to new and existing customers. It’ll allow them to post feedback and gives you the opportunity to engage in conversation. Remember to post relevant and regular content to keep your brand up to date and active.
7. Create online content
Creating a blog gives you the space to let your audience know who you are as a business. As well as deciding on a motto, a blog will give you the opportunity to actively and honestly showcase your philosophies. It doesn’t have to be over complicated, either. For example, just updating the blog with relevant industry news is a stepping stone in becoming an expert in your field. Have fun with content and engage in the online world – you never know, it could bring in new customers on your brand’s personality alone.
Just remember, it’s your company and you have control over your brand’s identity. If you’re honest with yourself, your customers and the content you create online, you can’t go wrong.
