The two hard facts about brand recognition are simple: it’s not a product of chance, and it’s not something you can create overnight. Brand recognition is a product of careful planning and implementation. It takes time to figure it out and start seeing results. And even then, brand recognition requires you to continually work on it. It never lets you rest on your laurels. Sounds difficult? It can be. But if you know how to segment your business assets into chunks you can change and manipulate, it gets easier. So let’s see which areas you need to tend to if you want to improve your business’ branding.
Start Creating a Visual Identity
Does your business have a visual identity? It should if you want people to notice your branding, and they have to notice it if you want them to be able to recognize it. And no, having a logo isn’t all it takes to say that your business has a visual identity. Although if you have a logo, you’re on a good way to having the whole visual identity thing figured out.
Colors, shapes, and images are the things that will define your business’s visual identity. You’ll want to work with a professional designer because developing a visual identity isn’t as easy as naming a couple of colors or shapes. It’s complicated work, and you need to take care of it early.
The key thing about branding is that it has to be consistent, and every other thing on this list will require you to have a fully developed visual identity. You cannot be inconsistent.
Move Onto Your Website
Once you have clear guidelines for a visual identity, you can start thinking about using them to make your business’ online presence consistent in reflecting it. And if your business is like most businesses who take e-commerce and digital business seriously, it probably has a website that serves as the main business presence and a central hub for marketing activities.
Implementation of a visual identity isn’t the only thing your website needs. It’s equally as important to provide users a great experience they will remember every time they see your brand logo. So think about the navigation, the copy, and the quality of the visuals. Those are some of the things that make a website great.
Proceed to Social Media
Social media is where you can find the people you want to be your customers. Before you start the search, however, it’s important to prepare all the visuals of your brand identity. Everything from the profile photos and backgrounds on your social media profiles, to the content displaying branded imaging, need to be consistent within the boundaries of your business’s visual identity.
Because social media is so widely used by all layers and demographics of a society, it’s really easy to find your target audience, or your customer base, on it. You might want to spend some time researching which networks are the most appealing to your audience, but once you figure that out, you can use everything from content to paid advertising to put your business’ branding in front of your target audience.
Consider Personal Branding and Thought Leadership
Finally, you should also address the biggest asset your business has — you. It’s true that you can’t plan your visual identity in accordance with your brand’s, as that simply doesn’t make sense, but you can do a lot to help your business’ branding stand out and become more visible. To be able to do it, however, you also have to become more visible.
You can use your personal branding to give your business a boost. So while you’re working on establishing your business’ brand, you should also do whatever you can establish your own. Guest posts usually help, as do visiting industry events, especially if you get to speak at them. And before you know it, everything associated with you professionally will get some of that limelight that’s shining on you.
