Developing a Brand Strategy – Brand Building 101

If you want to develop a good brand, you will need to have an effective brand strategy. This will help define who you are as a business and allow you to focus on your goals. If you don’t have a good brand strategy in place, you will have no way of knowing whether you are moving in the right direction. Here are a few helpful tips to help you develop a successful brand strategy: 

Tip #1: Know Your Audience

Before you can implement a successful brand marketing strategy, you must know your audience inside and out. Start by creating a buyer persona that represents your ideal client. You can go into detail with this fictional representation, adding notes such as income level, career and pain points. The best part about buyer personas is that you can always add more characteristics after you’ve run a few campaigns and collected valuable customer insights.

Tip #2: Take a Stand 

Now that you know your target market, you can begin the process of building a brand strategy by taking a stand for something that is important to you, your business and your target audience. A mission statement with a purpose sets you apart from your competitors – and gives your intended audience a reason to choose your company.

Tip #3: Design Stellar Brand Packaging

Your brand’s name, logo and tagline are critical to making a great first impression. Be sure to put a lot of thought into the aesthetics of your website. Try thinking of it as a presentation: When a new visitor comes to your website, what kind of impression do you want them to have? Taking the time to develop your branding package will ensure that your company is resonating with the right audience.

Tip #4: Build a Dynamic Website

The next part of brand development is the website. Now that you understand your audience, have a killer mission statement and have chosen your brand package, you can begin building a dynamic website based on all of these aspects. If your company is new, small or has a tight budget, you can find great website-building sites that offer affordable, professional results. Remember to organize your site thoughtfully — build personalized landing pages based on your buyer personas, add dynamic web forms and include CTAs where appropriate

Tip #5: Don’t Slack on Content Marketing

A solid content marketing strategy will go a long way in helping you build your brand strategy. The first way to initiate content marketing is to create a blog on your website and publish thoughtful, relevant articles that your audience will find useful. You can also generate a content calendar to help you keep track of what you post, when you post it and how well the content is received.

Tip #6: Build Up Your Social Media Following

Good brand building also involves a strong social media presence. If you haven’t created social business accounts yet, it’s time to get started. This ties back into knowing your audience and where they congregate online. It lets you expand your online presence, share your blog posts and fully establish your company as a thought leader in your industry or niche. Keep in mind that a strong social media following doesn’t necessarily mean that you need a million followers – it means that you have an active and engaged online community.

Tip #7: Track Your Efforts

?Once you’ve initiated and implemented your brand strategy, you need to track the progress of your efforts, analyze your findings and generate easy-to-read reports for better understanding. You can track website visits, social shares and everything in between.