Branding Your Business Effectively

Branding is one of the most effective marketing strategies there is. It basically occurs when something – color, graphics, taglines, personality – becomes universally associated with a person, a company, or a product.

What comes first to mind when I say: “Just Do It.” 

Yes, that right there is branding.

So, if you’re thinking about building a brand for your business, here are some points to keep in mind:

Know what to brand. When it comes to marketing your business – do you brand your company, your products? Or do you brand YOU?

The answer is simple: If your business relies on your personality and skills, say, a consulting business, your customers should see you and your business as one. You would therefore focus on branding you.

If, however, you’ve created a business that greatly depends on selling a product, then focus your branding efforts on that product. 

Be consistent with your branding.  This applies to your logo, your color scheme and even your company-speak. If you have a business blog and your posts have been always informative and friendly in tone, don’t adapt a sarcastic and critical tone on your next post. This will confuse your customers or audience; suddenly, they’re no longer sure who you are. 

If you really need to change your logo or any major branding element for your business, make sure you do it gradually. Check out how the logos of these famous companies evolved over time.  

There are many ways you can incorporate consistency into your branding campaign: 

• Always use the same slogan in all your marketing campaigns
• Always use your brand’s color or color combination in all your graphic and visual marketing materials
• Always use the same logo even across different media (print or digital)
• Always exhibit the same personality you’re known for

Build a community. A successful brand is one that’s trusted by customers, and building a strong community for your business can help you achieve this.

Social media sites like Facebook and Twitter are great platforms for community building, so is your blog. You can also extend the trust you’ve earned for your brand offline by participating in local live events like fundraisers, charities and workshops.

Don’t lose your branding identity even when making discounts. Value and price can help define your brand and differentiate you from others in the market. 

Don’t dilute your brand positioning by lowering your prices too much. Promotion is a way to reinforce your branding campaign, so make sure that you’re not hurting your brand identity with indiscriminate discounting. Try offering more instead of slashing too much off your price.

Over to you..

What are your branding strategies? Have you employed any of the points mentioned above? Do you have any more tips to add? Please share your thoughts and comments below, we would love to hear them.