10 Effective Ways to Take Your Business Branding from Bad to Rad

 

If you are an entrepreneur, struggling to build a brand and hustling to grow your business then this article is for you.

How do you introduce your business to your audience? Does your business brand identity stick with the audience long enough to open doors to commence future interactions?

What does your customer say about your business branding? Good, Bad, Not sure?

Wait, What…? Business Branding, brand identity? What in the world is a brand?

Don’t worry, we can totally relate to these questions. We have experienced this first hand during our seeding year of business.

Building a remarkable brand can be daunting, especially when you don’t know what it truly means.

A BRAND is your business’s unique identity that differentiates your company from your competition. It promotes recognition that makes you stand out from the crowd and makes you become attractive to a specific group of people – your target audience.

Your brand is what other people say about you when you are not in the room. – Jeff Bezos, CEO  & Founder Amazon

And not to forget:

Branding is the most vital step of building a profitable business, both online and offline, and gain loyal followers.

A remarkable brand identity can be created with a well-thought brand strategy. An intentional brand strategy, implemented over long-term, can take your business branding from BAD to RAD!

Let’s dive deep into the 10 ways that have a proven track record of building the legendary brands like Nike, Apple, Harley Davidson, Barry-Wehmiller just to name a few.

 

The 10 most effective ways to help you find & build your Business Branding RIGHT NOW:

 

1. Define your Vision, Mission and Values to gain clarity:

We believe, every business exists to provide some sort of positive transformation in their customers lives.

Defining your vision, mission and values can help you gain clarity on your business’s brand existence and identity.

• Do you remember the primary reason to WHY you started your own business?
• What problem did you want to solve?
• What transformation did you want to see?
• What was your driving force?
• What do you stand for?

Related: A journey to finding your Why & What

As you start answering these question, you will begin to see a pattern that will define your Brand Identity.

For example:

Apple’s WHY: Everything we do, we believe in challenging the status quo. We believe in thinking differently.

Related: Check out our WHY: About Us

 

 2. Be succinct with your brand message

A brand message is an underlying value proposition of your company. A promise of a value delivered to the customers to improve their end result.

A brand message helps to promote a business with the means of easy-to-remember statement, which may be used as business’s tagline or a slogan.

For example:

UPXCEL: Simplifying Business; Amplifying Lives

Nike: Just do it

Apple: Think Different

Brendon Burchard: Live.Love.Matter

 

Here are three tips to create your memorable brand message:

1. Be clear and concise with your message
2. Avoid using too many complicated words or industry jargons
3. Focus on what your brand stands true to

 

3. Get clear on you offering and target audience

A thorough understanding of your product or service is not enough to establish a brand.  To build a brand it is vital to understand your target market – a customer base who will benefit the most from your products or services.

You can’t be all things to everyone. Therefore, decide your area of expertise and a set of people who you want to cater.  This will enable you to create highly relevant content to that specific community.

Create a brand that is relevant to the audience you want to cater. Click To Tweet

 

 4. Focus on adding enormous value

Think about:

• What qualities do you want your target audience to associate with your brand?
• What do your customer really want?

These questions will enable you to find several ways to add value to your customer’s journey.

A genuine care for your customers will encourage you to improve your products and services. One of the ways to express your care towards your audience is by creating, curating and sharing value-adding content, to help them on the journey to solving their problems.

Provide exceptional customer experience, and value to your customers.

 

5. Be refreshingly authentic

Authenticity builds trust and trust builds relationships.

Building a brand is all about developing strong relationships with your audience. Majority of the time people make faster decisions based on their emotional involvement with a brand.

Extend genuine care and respect to your customers and set yourself apart.

Be real and relatable. Express the real you and your brand will automatically begin to catch on to your personality.

For example:

Pat Flynn, Founder of Smart Passive Income, takes his audience through his real life experience of starting a business from scratch. He boldly call himself ‘crash test dummy of online business’

 

 

6. Develop brand identity and brand voice

Visual and verbal elements play an important role in presenting a polished look and feel of your brand to your core audience.

Visual Element – Brand Logo:

A brand logo is a visual recognition of your business. This logo will appear on your website, product packages, letter heads, business cards, banners, advertisements, social media; you name it and it will require your company’s logo.

So invest in a good graphic designer who can understand your branding needs and help you create:

• A spectacular logo
• Color palette for your brand
• A brand style guide
• Marketing collateral like business cards, brochures, banners etc.
• Product package design

And more

Verbal Element – Brand Voice:

Your brand’s voice is determined by your message, audience and your personal style.

Your brand voice and tone will evolve naturally over time. So try one or more voice styles to see which fits your company culture and values the most. For example:

• Friendly
• Positive
• Professional
• informative
• Humorous
• Expressive
• Inspirational
• Persuasive

 

7. Create content that is true to your brand

Identifying what you brand is all about and what problems it solves, will leave plenty of cues for you to create an authentic content.

So many brands get confused while deciding on what type of content to create. Trying to do everything that doesn’t fit your personality will do more harm than good.

Bad example:

A Business Consultant regularly posting photographs of their pets, food, blurred selfies and bunch of recipes on social media channels.

This strategy will not send a clear message to their audience.

Good example:

A Business Consultant may think, how best they can portray their brand through value-adding content.

Sharing tips, tools and examples of business best-practices, strategies, planning, management, coaching etc., through blog, vlog  and social media, will bring congruence to their brand.

 

8. Practice consistency

Consistency is one of the most important keys to success.

If you are just starting out your business, then consider sharing value-adding content with your audience through your website, videos, webinars, emails or workshops, on consistent bases.

And if you are a seasoned entrepreneur, then you may want to bank on the credibility that you have already gained in the marketplace. Share case studies, research reports, white paper, and data analysis with your readers.

Remember:

Your audience already sees you as an expert and expects to continue learning from your experience. And on the plus side, this strategy will trigger the brand retention.

 

9. Build a community

Great brands are always backed up by small to large communities.

Communities are formed by group of people who emotionally support a higher cause.

Missions that strive to make this world a better place, will attract the right kind of people to a brand. When people feel they are part of something bigger; they form a common voice and hence evolve into a community.

For example:

 

Nike is crystal clear about their mission and they have created a community of athletes; and as per Nike everyone with a body is an athlete.

These type of mission statements promotes sense of belonging and encourage loyal relationship with the brand.

So, invite your customers to become part of your brand and contribute to your mission.

 

10. Be a leader

Simply deliver the best of what you do and what you offer. Bring your best and forget the rest.

Your audience will start to see quality in your work and will not be able to resist themselves from becoming a loyal customer to your brand.

By bringing your best game forward, you are already demonstrating that you care and are dedicated to serve your customers with passion. That’s how leaders are born.

For example:

Bob Chapman, CEO Barry-Wehmiller built their multi-billion-dollar brand based on his most valuable asset: People

Everybody Matters.  – Bob Chapman

 

So go and be a leader in your field. Trust me, you will enjoy the journey as you see yourself transform into an authority.

Set yourself apart from your competition by building a meaningful and memorable brand. Click To Tweet

 

Share with us:

Which of these steps do you need to focus on most?

What’s the one action step you can take right now to move ahead?

 

Simplifying Business; Amplifying lives – UPXCEL

 By – Praneet Kaur