Having a strong brand is a fundamental part of your marketing strategy. Whilst your logos and straplines play a role, they are only a fraction of your brand identity. The real aim should be to develop a brand that resonates with your target audience, to ensure that they wouldn’t rather look elsewhere.
Building Trust and Credibility
A well-developed brand creates trust. This isn’t something that happens overnight, it’s an ongoing process built from positive customer experiences, reliable products or services, ethical business practices, and effective communication. Being consistent and authentic with your messaging, showcasing your genuine values, mission, and brand ethos, will resonate with customers on a personal level. Actively and consistently engaging with your customers through your marketing channels will help to build relationships and gain loyalty – don’t be someone they buy from once and forget about. Building rapport is essential for long-term relationships and securing repeat business.
Introduce review features such as Trustpilot, Facebook reviews, and Google reviews. Encouraging customers to share their experiences not only provides valuable feedback but also serves as social proof, allowing them to hear about it from other people and not just you. Positive reviews can significantly influence potential customers: just remember that you won’t get these reviews if you’re not creating positive experiences.
Differentiate from your Competitors
Standing out from the crowd is vital when developing your brand. Being unique will set you apart from the competition, so highlight what makes your brand different – are your products 100% sustainable? Are you a small family-run business? Do a percentage of proceeds go to a charity? It’s important to demonstrate these details as these are your differentiating factors – it’s how you’ll attract customers who see value in what you offer.
Demonstrating your expertise and experience within your industry can position your brand as the ‘go-to’ or thought leader for the specific product or service you’re offering. Clearly showcasing your expert knowledge can encourage audience engagement, providing a further opportunity for communication with your potential customer – if you’re easy to get hold of and happy to share information or advice, you stand a much higher chance of converting a prospect than the competitor who doesn’t provide the same level of service or support.
Whilst price may also play a part in the purchasing process, ultimately it comes down to how your customers feel about your brand and whether what you offer aligns with their values – in many cases, it’s the only unique differentiator between you and other companies.
Emotional Connection
Having an emotional connection can significantly influence customer perceptions and behaviours throughout the customer journey. The brands that forge an emotional connection with their target audience will enjoy a higher level of engagement, which can in turn drive sales and generate long-term loyalty. Begin by understanding your audience’s needs and any pain points they currently experience. You can then demonstrate how your product or service addresses or solves these - are they looking for sustainability, something that’s easy to use or access, or a brand that makes them feel heard? Acknowledging your customers’ needs and clearly showing how you will cater to them will entice your audience to look deeper into what you’re offering.
Openly share your core values to enable your target audience to identify if your values resonate with theirs. Think about the emotions you want your audience to feel that connect with your brand – do you want them to feel inspired? Do you want them to feel happy and relaxed? In generating your emotional connection, don’t be afraid to share any challenges you’ve overcome or where your brand story started – showing the ‘human’ side of your business with authentic communication will also support you to build the connection.
80% of the sales decision is based on emotion – your marketing efforts must reinforce the emotional connection with your target audience to drive sales and generate customer loyalty.
Consistency
Brand consistency is imperative across all marketing channels – it’s the basis on which your customers will recognise, understand, and trust your brand. Brand consistency includes your visual identity, design elements, messaging, tone of voice, and overall customer experience. Presenting a unified image and message across all these areas boosts brand recognition and builds trust – inconsistency suggests low quality or a laissez-faire attitude, which is not something that your customers or potential customers will be looking for from your product or service.
There are many touch points within the purchasing process and every point must have the same, consistent representation – be it on a website, social media channels, or an in-person experience. It’s no good extolling the virtues of your customer service levels in your marketing materials if, when someone contacts your team, they’re met with an unenthusiastic, unhelpful call centre operative. One bad customer experience with one employee can undo all the good work that marketing campaigns have delivered.
Regular Review
As with all marketing, it’s important to regularly review your strategy. Whilst it’s unlikely your core values will drastically change, there may be new competition making a noise in your industry, or a new trend that means you have to adapt your messaging. Taking time to review your marketing efforts and making sure that your brand is still relevant to your target audience, without compromising your brand values, will keep you at the forefront of your customers' minds, removing the opportunity for a competitor to enter into your space!
