Owning a small business may seem easy, especially if you are passionate about what you do and offer. However, sometimes what you have in mind doesn’t always translate as easily into the real world, especially when it comes to how people perceive your brand.
Here are some branding tips you should consider if you are a small business owner.
1. Treat your brand as a person
Thinking of your brand as a person will help you better understand the branding process. Your brand should have an identity, personality, and experience, just like a person. When you treat your brand as such, you will create relationships with your clients since they are inclined to treat it as a person too.
You can start making these questions about your brand:
- If you had to describe its appearance, how would you do it?
- How would your brand talk about its products or services?
- What would someone say about your brand after meeting it for the first time?
2. Prioritize consistency
When a brand is inconsistent, customers are confused, and it weakens the brand. It is important to prioritize coherence and consistency throughout all media and platforms to ensure that your customers become familiar with your brand, leading them to recognize it and prefer it over other brands over time.
This applies not only to your brand colors and logo but also to your brand voice and tone, the personality it has, and the way you communicate in all your messages.
3. Build and follow a brand strategy
Creating a brand strategy goes far beyond brand guidelines; it is a long-term plan with specific goals that can be achieved as the brand evolves. These goals generally revolve around an emotion, a purpose, a competitive conscience, and the employee’s participation. (tallahasseetimes.com) Make sure your goals are specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, and timely. Track the Key Performance Indicators (KPI: a quantifiable measure that will help you evaluate the success of your marketing efforts).
4. Do not copy your competition
Analyzing your competition is a very important step when working on your own brand. It helps you know what the competition is like and how it stands out, and it can also give you ideas on how to improve or differentiate your brand.
However, you need to be extra aware of not imitating your competitors. When looking at your competitors, focus on what your company brings to the table. Just because something worked for others doesn’t mean you need to do the exact same thing when it comes to branding.
Memorable brands are unique and provoking, and they stand out even in little things like social media posts or other visual media.
5. Create a great customer shopping experience
Whether it is an online business or if you have direct contact with the final customer, you must scrupulously take care of the experience they get when they visit you. Take care of all the messages your client receives, even the most insignificant. Stay away from automatic responses and try to personalize everything with your personal seal. From phone calls to emails to the purchasing process, everything must be taken care of.
If you are a small business owner, Miss Ink can help you with your social media and digital marketing needs. From planning content to managing comments and reviews to social media ads to SEO and beyond, we have you covered. Contact us today to learn about our digital marketing services.
Sources:
Clear Review (2020) Which SMART Objectives definition should I use?
Brond Studio. The 7 essential keys to Branding for SMEs and entrepreneurs
HubSpot (2022) What is branding? Types, objectives and importance
