Branding in small businesses
“A brand is the emotional connection that your business has with your audience. It’s that magical feeling somebody gets when they realise that your business is exactly what they need, and the art of branding is how those customers have come to that conclusion.”
Regardless of what stage your business is at, branding is incredibly important and incredibly powerful for all types of businesses, in particular small to medium sized businesses. Often when people think of brands they just think of the logo, but a logo is just one small part of a brand overall. Branding that speaks directly to your target audience can help drive revenue across the business and you can start achieving this in these ways.
Always Start with Consistency:
Branding ultimately seeks to build trust with your audience and to differentiate your business from the competition. When you build trust with your audience, they are more likely to want to engage with your business, share it with their friends, and better still – spend money with your business.
The idea of trust in branding goes across all facets of the business. In branding and creative terms, trust can be built through a number of ways, the most being through consistency. That could be shown through the type of fonts your businesses uses, colours, photography style, types of models you choose, copywriting, right down to the icons, graphics and patterns that make up your brand. Consistency helps to give your brand an level of expectation so no matter what day, month or year a customer interacts with your business, they know what to expect.
Actions: If you already have a brand but it’s maybe lost its way a little bit, One of the best ways to start with is a brand audit. Gather all of your marketing collateral together and sit down (over a wine is always nice) and review everything, making notes of what you like and dislike across your whole brand. This will really help you take a step back and analyse it from the outside and help you set steps and foundations of where to go from here.
Potion Creative can also assist with this process so feel free to contact us if this is something you are interested in.
“Building a sense of trust is the ultimate goal for any brand. Trust builds loyalty and loyalty creates revenue.”
Work From the Inside Out:
When you build a strong brand, your employees will have clarity on who you are, who you’re trying to be and who your target audience is (and employees are one of the biggest assets to any brand). When your messaging and overall brand persona is clear, your employees will have a better understanding of your brand and be able to communicate that to your customers. If your business is going through a rebranding process or you are thinking about making small changes to the look of your brand why not ask your employees
MONTI AND ME BRAND DESIGN BY POTION CREATIVE – VIEW PROJECT
Every Brand Starts Small:
Having a brand enables your business to stand out and become memorable. But, it’s not an easy feat to build a brand. Many of the powerhouse brands such as Apple, Google, Nike, and Adidas spend millions of dollars a year on branding, advertising and marketing to try and build connection and trust with their audiences. This is how they try to convince you to spend your hard earned money with them. For the likes of a company like Apple, they have built such an ingrained ‘almost cult-like culture’ that it’s incredibly hard to convince a die-hard Apple fan to ever make the switch to another product… and that type of loyalty is just priceless.
Whatever stage your business is at, start small with your branding and build a brand that seeks to change the lives of your customers regardless of how large or small that segment might be. Dream big and always remember that Apple started in a garage.
Not sure where to start with your branding?
Find out more about our brand design service and how we can help you build your brand.