There are so many start-ups that concentrate only on buying, making and selling their products and services putting aside their brand building.
This is as well one of the reasons why some businesses do not stand the test of time.
Business is not just solving a problem, by creating a service, or product and then, jumping into the market, asking people to buy what you are selling.
You need to know who, actually, needs what you have created and also, shaping it to one that can be easily identified through brand building.
The business might be making profits, without having a known brand, but believe me, jumping into the market, would not get you there.
I have seen numerous businesses, especially, start-ups, that commenced, but could not be kept running.
Strategies have to be in place for brand building and also, communicate your brand.
You need to understand that your business is a different entity from you, as a person.
You would not always be there to explain your brand, or business.
Everything surrounding your brand, therefore, from the logo, your colors, etc., should explain all about the brand and must be understandable to anyone who comes across it.
To build a strong brand, you should, first of all, understand the target audience of your products, or service.
You need to know who they are, the category they fall into and their needs.
Ensure that your audience is segregated into segments of psychographics and demographics.
Communicate your brand appropriately, with colours, surrounded around the brand essence and your brand purpose.
Make use of the art of storytelling and tell stories of your brand, products and services, appropriately.
Do this consistently, with every encounter, or experience.
Ensure that your brand passes the test of trust. Be an expert in your field and know the trend and latest in your brand category.
When telling stories, be sure to be authentic. Let the audience know the brand, for what it is.
Keep your goal in mind, when sharing stories. Ask yourself; “why exactly, am I telling this story?”
Have a catchy title for your story. A good headline must contain the 4U’s, i.e., Unique, Urgency, Ultra-specific and Useful.
Your introduction should be a punch line. Use vivid details that your audience can relate with and end with a call to action, not necessarily for purchase.
How can you tell these stories? You can tell them, through videos, graphics, pictures, text and audio, on various platforms.
Do not hide the stories of your brand. Expose them to the world.
Further on the essence of your brand, always know your brand story – know the story behind your brand and the build of your brand, (the journey/influence of your brand).
Always have and know your brand pitch – the summary of your brand idea, what it is about and of what importance.
Your audience should know your brand build story and brand pitch.
The internal audience, which consists of yourself and your employees, as well as the external audience, which consists of media, investors and so on.
Always state your unique selling point and make sure that your product is of a high standard.
It is better to have under expectation, than over-expectation and under delivery.
Always create the right content for your brand/business. Content creation is important for your business.
You need to get your content right, for your business to rise.
Content marketing is a strategic marketing approach, focused on; Value, Relevance, Consistence and Content.
How can you create a content marketing strategy?
Create a customer persona
This is imagining your customer/audience, to further understand them, you should note their daily routines, preferences, lingua, pinpoints, keywords and phrases often used.
Utilise social media channel strategy
You should know that, every social media platform have their different traffic and customer behaviour.
Make sure you are always in charge of whatever goes in and out of your social media account.
Make sure that you put up contents consistently, with a minimum of 3 contents per day, in various categories, such entertaining, inspiring, convincing/advisory and educating.
Understand the art and science of copywriting
The science of copywriting is making research and cooking a strategy, while the art of copywriting is putting creativity in your brand.
Always have an idea for everything. Be disruptive. Be different and reach out to your audience differently and learn the power of words.
Making use of simple graphic tools
Being a start-up business, you most likely do not have the funds for hiring lots of hands, like a graphic designer.
You should, therefore, have an idea of design and make use of simple graphic tools, to create your desired graphics to post on platforms.
Also read, 5 Branding Tools Every Startup Should Have
Some of the graphic tools you can make use of include:
- Canva, spark tool, vector – for graphics.
- Picular and coolors – for colour picking and codes.
- Font.google.com, dafont – for different fonts you can use in design
- Humaaans, freepik, undraw – for vector illustrations
- Pexels, resplash, pixabay – for stock images
With these, start-ups and SME’s, should go forth and dwell, shine and thrive, in the various industries of their choice, while prioritising product standard, target audience, brand building and brand communication.
Featured Image: marketingtutor.net
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