Brand building is all about generating awareness, establishing and promoting a company using a variety of strategies and tactics. In essence, brand building enhances a brand’s value using advertising campaigns and various promotional strategies. Brand building involves marketing a business and it’s no secret that social media plays a massive role.

For all intents and purposes, companies should take full advantage of social media as it is a powerful tool. The fact that most people have at least one social media account speaks volumes of its global reach. According to the Sprout Index, “58 percent of consumers prefer content that focuses on the visual, making social media the perfect place to advertise and build a brand”.

While the benefits of social media marketing are obvious, there are others ways to build a brand without focusing on social media marketing. In some cases, social media alone may not be the most effective brand building strategy for your business. You need to determine what works best based on your type of business, the industry and your target market.

Brand Building Strategies

When it comes to brand building, a diverse your strategy often results in a faster, better and more effective outcome. Fact is, combining these ‘complimentary strategies’ with social media can yield incredible returns if implemented correctly.  For best results, use one or all of these brand building strategies in addition to social media.

Gain A Deep Understanding Of Your Target Audience

While knowing your target audience well may not build your brand by itself, it remains extremely important for effective brand building. Regardless of your business model, really knowing who your target market is can make all the difference. Whether you’re selling cell phone accessories, handmade jewellery or clothing online, you have to know your target audience exceptionally well. The better you understand them, the more effective your ad campaigns and other strategies will be.

First consider exactly who your ideal customer is but it involves more than simply knowing the age group. To really gain an upper hand, you should build “personas” of your ideal customer. This includes where the person lives, what they do for fun and what they spend most of their time on. From there, you can start narrowing down your marketing effort and focus on building your brand with people who are most likely to buy from you.

Ensure Quality Visual Content For A Memorable Brand Identity

The first things many people think of when referring to branding are logos and slogans. Visuals are undoubtedly important so logos should really include your brand colours and fonts. Everything you choose to use will have an impact on how your people perceive your brand and how recognisable it truly is.

It often takes customers just 10 seconds to form a first impression of a brand and it usually starts with the logo. Do whatever you can to make your brand stand out and be more visually memorable. Another way to achieve this is to sell or give away branded merchandise from pens, caps, shirts, calendars, mouse pads to cell phone covers. The more you can get your name out there, the better for your business’ bottom line.

The primary goal of branding is to make customers recognise your company’s name at a glance. Creating a memorable logo and other quality, relevant visuals will help build your brand. Here’s a look at a very interesting article on ‘The Importance Of A Brand Style Guide’.

Create Compelling And Regular Blogs

It is true that quality online content can drastically improve your brand building effort and that includes blogs. Not only is it easy and free but when you do it right, it can be an incredibly powerful strategy. In fact, according to Hubspot, businesses with substantial blogging efforts are 13 times more likely to see a positive return on investment.

While blogging was initially intended as a unique platform to share your thoughts, feelings, opinions or experiences, it has changed considerable over the years. Today, companies use blogs for various reasons including:

• improving SEO
• establishing brand and persona with own unique voice and value
• educating customers on how to use their product
• notifying customers of any upcoming events or special promotions
• inform customers of where to eat, where to stay or what car to buy

Blogging is no longer just a journal of entries and has become increasingly important in brand building. If you aren’t blogging already, you really should get started as soon as possible.

Email Marketing And Brand Building

Email marketing is still one of the most effective strategies but it’s more than writing an email and sending it. People’s inboxes are constantly bombarded with marketing-type emails so it really needs to stand out. Offering potential customers an email subscription is great for brand building but it has to be done right.

The best advice is to ask your audience what information they would like to receive from you. It not only gives them the opportunity to voice their opinion but it also allows you to create the right type of content. Simply sending regular company updates on sales, promotions and giveaways may not be everyone’s cup of tea. Remember, GDPR now plays a huge role but we have you covered with these tips on managing email subscription rates.

When email marketing is done right and you have good quality email lists, you can easily interact and engage with customers in a more personalised manner. Email messages can contain relevant information aimed at the right people. This can help you establish a stronger connection with your customers on a more individual basis.

Offer Exceptional Customer Service

It’s easy to forget that success comes from satisfied customers and that without them, businesses won’t be around for very long. While offering quality products or services, impressive marketing efforts and a good overall brand presence with likable content all play important roles, customer service is absolutely vital.

Customers value positive brand experiences and subpar ones could easily lead them to never do business with a brand again. Not to mention spread negative word about your business and the poor customer service they received. When customers have a good experience, they tend to stay loyal and refer their colleagues, friends and family as well.

At the end of the day, it is more cost effective to retain customers than acquire new ones. The fact that return customers often spend more money with your brand means you spend less on operating costs for example. To summarise, the way you treat customers is a direct reflection on your brand image, mission and values. Don’t forget though, happy customer service staff always create more satisfied customers so remember to treat your employees well.

Related article: ‘The Importance Of Customer Service’

Brand Building With WSI eMarketing

The vast amount of data on the internet means that your business is likely part of an online conversation somewhere. You should aim to guide your customers and potential clients through their buying cycle with quality content. Your business should always be in a position to turn good or bad reviews into an advantage.

As we all should know by now, today’s brands should have a good social media presence as it forms part of so many people’s daily lives. However, going social is not the only brand building tactic as this article outlined. Which of these strategies have you implemented to help build your brand?

If you need help with building your brand, get in touch for a free consultation. We specialise in SEO, SEM, Social Media, Marketing Automation, Online Reputation Management and Video Marketing among others.