In today’s competitive and overcrowded market, new businesses need to work harder than ever to stand out and attract the right customers. Marketing and networking will only get you so far. You will need to build customer loyalty, and the strongest way to do this is branding.How your business or product is branded, will play an integral role in its success or failure. A brand is not just a logo, nor is it an arm of your marketing strategy. It represents your business ethics, personality, values and tone of voice. It creates customer loyalty and market positioning. For example, what car do you drive? What supermarket do you shop at? Which clothing brands do you wear? Branding is perhaps the most important facet of any business large or small. If image is everything, then this image needs to be right.If you are a start-up or a growing business, it is common to be branded as such. The benefit of this is that you are young and enthusiastic. The downside is that customers are less likely to invest in something that does not carry much experience or credibility. You need to appear as a well established business, create customer loyalty through your brand values.How do you go about this?A good starting point is your target audience. If you can get inside their heads, you can appeal to them. If you don’t, you may find you offend them, upset them, or put them off. You may have a few target audiences, but try to consider your key audience. Next you need to think about what it is that you wish to communicate to them. What are your brand values? What is your brand positioning? What are your USPs? And how do you communicate them? A good way is graphically through your brand style, through your logo, your business or product name, your typography and your sales tone of voice. All these elements are a lot easier to make effective if they are proactive rather than reactive. Getting them clear in your mind from the start will give a greater understanding of how you wish to be perceived. With these sorts of things, it’s best to get it right first time and save yourself time and money in the long run.Communicating your brand message to your employees (and future employees) is crucial. Mixed messages can create confusion and a lack of direction. Remember, these people are representing your business or product. Make sure all of your staff are on board and understand your brand and key messages. Suppliers are also good advocates for your brand, they will spread the word about your service and style of approach.The design element of your brand is something you should consider and take very seriously, because once you have a solid style, it will need to be consistently implemented across all your marketing materials. Everything from your stationery suite, office signage, direct mail, brochures, email signatures, PowerPoint presentations and your website. Remember those brands you admire. It will cost you money, but not respectability. Too many businesses don’t respect this simple consistency rule. They end up with 5-6 variations on their logo, causing dilution of their brand, confusing their customer base and projecting an unorganised business ethic. You need to be able to reassure your customers and simplicity is the key. Your messages may be complex but the way you communicate them needs to be simple.When building your business, it’s important you build your brand recognition. Make your brand as visible as possible through the use of branded products and even create a favourable impression with fun freebies such as pens, mouse mats, mugs and stress balls. Your company logo will be the most recognisable feature of your business whether you’ve been in business for 2 days or 20 years. Take advantage of the benefits that promotional items can give you.As you can see, you don’t have to be a genius at branding to succeed. It’s simply well constructed communication, presented in a simple way to your target audience. It will take time, money and attention to detail to produce a successful brand. Your starting point needs to be the recognition that branding is worth while in the long run. Once you have established this, it’s up to you how far you want to go. It’s all in the brand.
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