One of the best ways for a small business to get ahead is by building a cohesive and stunning brand. Something that people will remember and immediately share with others. If you’re just starting or looking to revamp your small business, check out these five branding tips.
1. Figure Out Your Identity
One of the first steps to building a strong brand is to create your brand identity. Think of the things that are important to you and your business.
Are you trying to be a B-corp and want to show customers that your brand is sustainable? Do you want to work with influencers and value chic aesthetics and fashion? Or maybe you want to offer simple, no-frills services for your customers.
All of these are identities that you can build your brand off of. You can start creating your brand identity by brainstorming some keywords to work with. These keywords may come in handy when creating content for your brand down the line as well.
When creating your brand identity some other questions to keep in mind include:
- Who are your competitors?
- Who is your target audience?
- What is your brand’s story?
- What is your brand personality?
Having a firm answer to all of these questions will outline the exact brand that you are looking to have for your business. Once you have this sense of your identity, you can dive into building and curating your small business’s brand.
2. Come Up with Your Visual Identity
Once you have the brand identity down, you’re going to want to figure out how you want to present it to the world. This is the time to get creative and brainstorm ways to visualize your brand. Some of the visual assets you will need to create for your brand include
- Logo
- Graphics
- Business Cards
- Website Content
- Advertisements
- Newsletters
There are many more assets that you can create for your brand and should keep in mind when creating your visual identity. When going about visuals you should also create a style guide. This way your branding will stay cohesive no matter who needs to work on a project.
3. Create Your Content
Now that you have a solid identity for your brand, you can go on to the fun stuff. Making content! You will want to take the ideas from your brand and visual identities and build them into an aesthetic that is unique to your business.
When creating content you want people to be able to instantly associate your content with your brand. You can do this with photoshoots for products in a specific style. You might also do this by picking specific colors for your logo and subsequent content. Be sure to have fun with it and keep it consistent. If you create strong content for your brand, it will help customers identify you and set you out from the rest.
4. Revamp Your Marketing Strategies
When you’re creating your brand, you should keep in mind that you will be using these tools to help market your business. You aren’t just building a brand so your website looks great, you also want to grow your customer base with cohesive branding.
Revamping your marketing strategies is no easy task. You should be considering your digital strategy, and how your content is going to look when marketing through social media.
You will also want to make sure you are implementing a cohesive SEO strategy to ensure that your new branding reaches new customers online. Creating an SEO strategy takes expertise and trial and error. You may want to consider working with a B2B content marketing agency to ensure that your SEO strategy is tight and effective.
5. Integrate Your Brand
The final step to creating your brand as a small business is integrating the brand. Consistency is key when integrating. You want to make sure that your new branding is across every aspect of your business.
Whether it’s your online presence, retail outfitting, or messaging to customers, everything needs to stay consistent. You don’t want customers getting confused when they can’t identify your business because they keep seeing old branding. You should also make sure you train your employees on your branding initiatives. They’ll be the front line of getting your brand and messaging to your key customers.
Conclusion
Having a unique and identifiable brand will set your small business apart from the rest. As a small business, it’s always smart to put your best foot forward. And creating a cohesive brand is the perfect way to do that.
