When you’re talking about your company, you’re talking about the products or services that can benefit your customers. But when you’re talking about your brand, it goes beyond what you do. It’s about who you are.
Your brand is essentially your identity. It’s how you want to be perceived both in your industry and by your customers. Your brand is the image, personality and values that should be incorporated into everything you do.
Your company is what piques people’s attention, but your brand is what holds that attention and converts a person into a customer. We’ll talk about the components of a strong brand before diving into how you can build brand awareness as well as the general timeline you can expect as you work on your brand awareness.
5 factors of building a strong brand
Brand building is all about how you market your brand. You have to ask yourself many questions: What message do you want to convey? What kind of experience do you want your customers to have with you? Are you trying to tell a story? By answering these types of questions, you can figure out the key components of your brand that will make you stand out from the rest and form long-standing relationships with your customers.
The traits of an effective brand will help you build a relationship of trust and loyalty with your customers. Here are a few key components of building a strong brand:
- Demographic-specific personality — Your brand’s personality refers to the characteristics your customers associate with your company. It should shape your company’s behavior and marketing tone to showcase the human side of what you do in a way that can be perceived by your target customers. For example, a brand for a beach product company has a cheerful and fun personality, while a brand for animal conservation may have an empathetic and intelligent personality.
- Authenticity — There are very few things that customers dislike more than feeling deceived. You should be as open as possible about who you are and what you do. By being transparent about your brand’s intentions, processes and culture, particularly on your website, you can build trust with your customers that will lead to retention and higher lifetime customer value.
- Clear messaging — Your brand’s purpose should be recognizable in everything from your tagline to your marketing, and that’s where your messaging comes in. The message should encompass the benefits that your product or service can bring to your target demographic and your overall mission as a company. An example of a clear message can be seen in Dollar Shave Club: “Shave Time. Shave Money.” It creatively combines what they do with how they can help their customers.
- Core value reinforcement — Your brand personality goes hand in hand with your core values. While personality showcases the characteristics that you want associated with your company, the core values are the principles that show how your company runs on a day-to-day basis. Common core values that contribute to a brand include accountability, community and compassion. Having strong core values that are consistently reinforced helps to reach customers who prioritize those values in the companies they support.
- Multi-channel strategies — A large part of brand building is diversifying your strategy to be seen by as many eyes as possible. Determine a variety of avenues that you can utilize to showcase your personality and messaging. This means bringing your brand to different marketing platforms as a way to hit your target demographic, such as social media and streaming ads.
How to build brand awareness
It’s one thing to build a strong brand with a personality and message that you’re proud of. But it’s another thing to make people actually become aware of your brand and what you do.
Brand awareness simply means that customers know about what your company does and what your brand represents. Increasing your brand awareness means that you’re piquing the interest of potential customers who lead to sales. It essentially starts the customer journey.
Building brand awareness comes down to marketing to the right demographic by adding value through advertisements and relevant content. It can include:
- Content marketing that can be shared across various channels.
- Being present and engaging on social media.
- Partnering with influencers and related brands.
- Adjusting social media campaigns based on tracking metrics.
- Participating in community events and promotions.
We all want to see results as soon as possible, but it’s important to remember that brand awareness is a gradual process that’s moved along by capitalizing on opportunities and addressing pain points. It can take up to a year for most companies to see results from their brand awareness strategies.
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