The 12 Advantages of Branding Your Business
Most small businesses have little to no brand identity. There’s no real consistency. This is why so many of them fail.
Do you own a business? If so, you’re probably familiar with the advantages of branding. We usually associate the brand building with consumer brands, but the term is used in a much broader sense in the business world. Branding is one of the most important aspects of running a successful business.
Many experts argue that there’s little point in having a business without a strong brand. It’s simply a waste of resources and time. After all, if you own a business, you are an expert. You can sell anything.
Branding is the most underused and often misunderstood marketing channel. Yet, it’s an excellent means of attracting customers who will stay with you long term. Here are some of the advantages of branding your business.
Table of Contents
Build Brand Awareness
Brand awareness is the ability of your company’s brand to stand out among a crowded marketplace of similar products and services.
When you build brand awareness, people will know who you are, what you do, and why they should care about you. Brand awareness is crucial for small businesses because they don’t have the luxury of enormous advertising budgets.
The first step towards building brand awareness is making sure you’re seen and heard by your prospective customers, and the second is making sure they remember who you are and what you do.
To build brand awareness, start with a big idea. Once you’ve got a big idea, it’s essential to keep your messaging simple, consistent, and memorable.
Start with an emotional connection—a feeling or impression that will stick with the reader and influence their decision to take action.
Make People Love Your Brand
You can’t love people’s brands if you don’t get their brand. Marketing is all about understanding who your customer is. So how do you know if you have the right customer?
Start by asking yourself what makes your customers feel good about their company or what makes them feel bad about theirs? The answers to those questions will give you insight into your target audience’s needs and desires.
You may already have a brand loved by your target market. But if you haven’t yet established a brand that your customers love, you need to create a solid emotional connection between your customers and your brand.
If you want your customers to love your brand, you need to ensure that every aspect of your brand experience reflects something your customers like and desire. This includes colours, fonts, logos, slogans, and copywriting.
Establish Yourself as an Authority
In other words, if you want to establish yourself as an authority in your field, you need to make sure that the reader perceives that you know what you’re talking about and that you can back up your claims with proof.
People are inherently sceptical and, as such, don’t readily believe things unless they’ve been convinced that there’s a reason for them to do so.
We form our initial impression based on their appearance and mannerisms when we first meet someone. But when it comes time to believe them, we check the veracity of their claims by looking for proof.
To establish yourself as an authority, you must provide an authoritative perspective on a topic. This means offering expertise, experience, and credibility—all of which come from providing value.
The key here is to show off your knowledge or credentials to prove that you know what you’re talking about. Think about how you can establish your expertise in the area you’re speaking about.
Build a Loyal Following
I can’t count the number of times I’ve sat down with a new client who tells me that their company is in a rut and that its social media presence needs some love.
They ask me to help them figure out how to get their company noticed. And then I ask, “What do you want to happen once you get noticed?” This usually leads to the following question: “Do you want to gain more followers?” If you answer no to this second question, you may just be missing out on something exciting and valuable.
Today’s consumer is more demanding than ever. They’ve learned that companies that cater to them best offer personalised services, exceptional quality products and services, and excellent customer service.
For example, if your business is a restaurant, consider using Twitter to provide customers with free food and drinks. The more you communicate with your followers, the more likely they will stay loyal to you.
Create a Visual Identity
There is some debate about whether or not a visual identity can create an emotional connection with a user and encourage them to keep coming back. The critical factor is whether or not it serves its purpose.
A good visual identity should always serve an underlying purpose in creating a connection between the brand and the user. It must also create a strong emotion in the viewer, such as excitement, intrigue, or fear.
If you’re going for something dramatic, there are many ways to convey those emotions visually. The easiest thing to do, however, is to use humour.
You can use humour to communicate the brand’s personality and provide a sense of authenticity and trust. It can also help build the connection between the brand and the consumer.
There’s no single definition of visual identity. There are several elements: brand guidelines, colour schemes, visuals, and logos. But another element plays a role in creating a sense of identity: a clear call to action.
The action should be clear and specific: Buy now. Learn now. Subscribe now. The visual identity will become even more effective if the call to action is a link to your site, product, or campaign.
Make Your Brand Memorable
It’s one thing to develop a logo your company will use on products and other marketing materials. It’s another thing to come up with a logo that makes people smile, makes them think, and gives them a reason to want to do business with your brand.
Brand memorability is a critical factor in selling. The more people associate a brand with something they like, trust, and appreciate, the more likely they will buy from it.
However, it’s not enough to simply sell a brand. The people you’re talking to have already researched the company they’re buying from, so your brand needs to provide value over and above the rest.
By understanding the psychology of your target audience, you can find out what makes them tick and come up with ideas and messaging that will resonate.
Make People Feel Good About Your Brand
For people who care about your brand and the people you serve, you are creating a positive experience. People feel good about brands that create positive experiences for them.
So, what’s the purpose of having a brand? Is it to make money? Or is it to create a positive experience for others? The brand is an extension of the brand personality.
To ensure that the brand you’re designing and developing feels genuine and authentic, ask yourself these three questions:
- What is our brand personality?
- Who is our target customer?
- How do we want them to feel about us once they’ve interacted with us?
Make people feel good about your brand by telling a story. According to marketing strategist Scott Galloway, this means sharing positive feelings and emotions that represent who you are and what you stand for, and you can do this through storytelling. He argues that you’re already halfway there if you tell a story.
Reinforce Your Brand
If you want to sell more than you already are, it is essential to brand yourself and your company. If you’re not branding, you’re putting all your eggs in one basket.
Once you have a brand, you can build off that, and it will only become stronger with time. When customers think of you, you should think of yourself.
There are three main reasons why companies reinforce their brands online:
- To establish a brand as the authority on a specific topic
- To build an audience that trusts them
- To establish a sense of familiarity in customers’ minds.
The way you reinforce your brand depends largely on the type of brand you’re working with and the purpose of your website.
For example, if your business sells books or magazines, you would want to emphasise that your products are highly reputable. Or, if your business sells insurance, you could show off your insurance company’s safety record.
Maintain a Consistent Brand Identity
Consistent branding means keeping all of the things that make up your brand consistent across your marketing, whether social media accounts, advertising, or even your website.
Marketing, branding, and marketing are related but distinct fields. You wouldn’t want to pay for a social media campaign in a perfect world, then later see it advertised on TV.
Brands can easily be ruined by a bad PR crisis, especially when it happens right after a company has released a new product.
Here’s why: When we become familiar with a brand, we don’t always think of it as a brand at all. Instead, we think of it as a set of features and benefits associated with that brand.
When something goes wrong with a brand, our brains instantly react, subconsciously pulling up memories of our experiences with that brand. We become angry at the brand, even though it’s the product we own that caused the problem.
Establish a Network of Followers
One of the best ways to establish yourself as an authority in any field is to form connections and make friends with those already influential. This is especially true in blogging.
If you have much experience with writing or marketing, start talking to people who have that experience. Offer to help them write or market their products. Don’t ask for anything in return. Just start conversations, and you’ll build a network of contacts.
This is another strategy often used by startups. To establish themselves as experts, many new companies start off building an email list of followers by doing one thing they enjoy: talking about the topic they are passionate about.
This is also the same strategy used by bloggers. They will usually share an article they read or write on their blog or website. This way, they get a chance to share the content they love and build a network of people who may be interested in what they’re writing about.
Gain Clout and Recognition
While social media is more about the relationships you build than about who has the most followers, having followers does help you gain clout and recognition, which is a good thing.
But the value of social media isn’t just about gaining followers; it’s about building genuine connections with real people. Social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter allow you to build authentic relationships with people. They allow you to share stories with friends and family about what you love and live for.
Generate Buzz
There’s no better way to generate buzz around a new product than to introduce it to influential people who can help to build interest and demand for it.
It doesn’t matter if you are selling an iPhone or a product or service. The key is to create a compelling story that resonates with the influencer’s audience.
How do you do this? Start by brainstorming the key influencers in your target market. Who are the influencers, and why are they influential?
Concluding the Advantages of Branding
A brand identity is the foundation of your business. It’s what defines you and distinguishes your business from others. In the same way, a company logo represents a company; a brand represents your business.
Your brand should reflect what you stand for, believe in, and who you are. It should be something that people connect with and recognise, not just from a distance but from close range.
It’s a vital element in promoting your business online. But, it’s something that you’ll want to do for the long haul.
There are many advantages to branding your company, including making your brand stand out from your competitors and giving people a reason to follow you.
