Elevate Your Brand's Visibility with These Proven Strategies

Don't be afraid to shine!

Building a brand is not an easy feat and having spent years in the film industry where I was 'my brand' and technically still am, all things considering ... I discovered the best way to improve brand awareness is to learn and try everything! As much as you can whenever you can. I can confidently guestimate that 99.9% of businesses, brands and solo-preneurs rely on digital marketing for the majority of their earnings. This means when it comes to brand awareness there's a high probability that the channels to promote your brand (social media, content marketing) are also heavily saturated and seemingly impossible to get a leg up ..... not sure if it's foot or leg but hopefully you get the point.

Brand awareness involves not just the visual identity of your business, such as logos and colour palettes and schemes, but also how you communicate your values, connect with your audience, and differentiate yourself in the market. Here are some top tips to guide you in building a strong and memorable brand:

Understand Your Audience

• Who Is Your Target Market? Know who your brand is speaking to. Understanding your audience's needs, preferences, and pain points is crucial. Also have an understanding of what your audience is interested in is key to understanding them.

• Create Personas: You can create a detailed customer persona to better tailor your messaging and products, so basically your ideal customer and compare it to real customers. See about asking for feedback from your existing customers or if you're just starting out ask a friend or family member. Make sure it's someone who is honest.
  

Define our Brand Identity

• Mission and Vision: What is the purpose of your brand? What is it you're hoping to solve or achieve? Your mission (what you do) and vision (why you do it).

• Values and Personality: What are your personal values and do they reflect in your brand? Most brands fall into a generic category because there is a stigma that in setting up a business you need to be all about the business but in most cases the business is an extension of you. So your personality should also shine through. It doesn't make sense for a cold and stoic person to set up a warm and friendly brand or a person who dislikes children to sell toys and games. Understand your traits then implement those into your brand and your audience will easily identify you with your brand and vice versa.
  

Develop a Strong Visual Identity

• Logo and Colour Palette / Schemes: Your logo doesn't need to be flashy and a lot of the time the simpler the better when it comes to logos. Your logo should reflect your brand’s personality and you should choose colours that evoke the desired emotional response from your audience. If you're not sure which colours suit your industry research into colour theory and colour psychology.

• Consistent Aesthetics: Be consistent across the board with your brand's visual elements including your online platforms and in-person materials (signs, business cards, leaflets)
  

Craft Your Brand Message

• Unique Value Proposition (UVP): You want to clearly communicate what makes your brand different and why customers should choose you over competitors. I can't emphasise enough to make sure you know what you do in the simplest terms as possible especially when it comes to telling people about your brand.

• Tone of Voice: Develop a consistent tone of voice that resonates with your target audience and reflects your brand personality. How do you speak? There is no point Googling flowery words just because it might sound better. Just speak how you would in a professional and polite manner whether that be in-person or online. Think like this: 'Hi' works better than 'hello'!
  

Build an Online Presence

• Website: This should be a standard if you are serious about taking your brand to the next level. A website should be the central hub for your brand online.

• Social Media: There used to be a thing of picking social media platforms based on your target audience specifically but today that no longer applies as most people are on multiple platforms and to throw a wider net it's best to try as many platforms regardless of your business model (B2B or B2C). Try everything until it sticks especially as social media is free to set up on.
  

Deliver Quality and Value

• Product/Service Excellence: Quality and value again comes back to what you deem as quality and value. Don't be afraid to look at brands you admire or your competitors to see what resonates with you then see about infusing your own insights and voice into that. Hopefully that makes sense.

• Customer Experience: Customer experience is not just the end service or product it's the entire journey from the initial email, social media follow, try to make that journey as welcoming and as fun as possible. Yes fun! Remember that word. Business should be fun too.
  

Foster Community and Engagement

• Engage with Your Audience: Community fosters longevity and loyalty when it comes to your customers so maybe consider ways in which you can build a community just as much as building a brand.

• Build Relationships: Whether it's thank you emails or social media shoutouts acknowledge your customers and audience especially the ones that show active support and interest. It takes all of a minute to reply to someone's comment online or drop a like to show that you've read it.
  

Be Consistent

• Brand Consistency: Maintain consistency in your messaging, visual identity, and customer experience to reinforce brand recognition and loyalty.

• Stay True to Your Brand: As your business grows and evolves, ensure that every decision aligns with your brand's core values and identity and more importantly your own personal values too.
  

Adapt and Innovate

• Market Trends: Stay informed about industry trends and be willing to adapt your strategies accordingly. It can get overwhelming trying to stay on top of every trend going but pick 1 or 2 that you can easily implement.

• Innovation: I think in terms of everything in life we should always be looking of ways to be better and do better. This also applies to your brand and business.
  

Measure and Adjust

• Feedback and Analytics: If something isn't getting the results try something else or even better try and get feedback from your customers or audience. Ask them what works and what doesn't. Ask them how something makes them feel whether it's your branding, your content, your products, your services ... the list goes on.

• Implementation: Use insights gained from feedback and data to make informed adjustments to your brand strategy.
  

I know first hand and second hand that building a strong brand is an ongoing process that requires patience, consistency, and a deep understanding of your market and customers. Hopefully by following these tips and remaining authentic to your own vision, you can develop a brand that resonates deeply with you, your audience and stands the test of time.

If you need a hand with your brand, that's why I set up Solmaz Marketing so check out the packages to see which one suits you best. Not sure which one? Then drop me an email: info@leahsolmaz.com or I'd be happy to jump on a call. Marketing and branding isn't as scary as most people think. It just takes patience, willingness to learn and putting your money in the right resources. Most small businesses can spend thousands when it comes to marketing and some don't spend enough.

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