Category: Branding

Business branding is important. It doesn’t matter what the size of the business is, or what it actually does, it can be branded. The thing about brands is that we tend to associate them with the big companies, the ones that become household names we all know and recognize instantly, either because of their name or logo. That is thanks to their branding and their utilizing proper brand asset management to ensure they are delivering a consistent message. I’m certain we would all like that of our own businesses, but it feels considerably out of reach.

The important factor here is your marketing, because if your marketing strategy isn’t incorporating branding then you simply aren’t doing it properly.

If you want to have a successful, branded business then you’re going to have to be willing to push your brand forward at every opportunity. It isn’t something that just suddenly happens, it is something that people get used to and familiar with over time, the more they see your brand the more they remember it and associate it with your business – which is exactly what you’re aiming for here.

Step One – Logo

Essentially your logo is your brand, or at least it should be. This means that your logo should be something simple but unique. Think of all of the famous brands you know – some use their name as the logo, which is a clear and simple way of doing things, and those that do often have a very particular way of presenting that; Think of Coca-Cola, Sony, Google – their name is their logo, but presented in a clear, familiar way that we instantly recognise. Others use imagery that we become familiar with over time; Mustang, Apple, Nike, Starbucks, Toyota, Mitsubishi (pretty much any car manufacturer) – they’re all simple logos that we instantly recognise and associate with that company. You should aim to produce a logo that is easy to recognise and can become associated with your business easily.

Step Two – Use your brand

Once you have a logo that is suitable to become your brand you can start to push that forward by incorporating it into your business. You want it on display everywhere. Your office. Your website. Your letterheads. Basically if something comes out of your company it should be branded. This is actually very simple to do. Use your logo as the image on your social media platforms (if you don’t have a business page on at least Facebook and Twitter you should definitely make one). Steadily expand your way out, use your brand in more places and ensure it gets seen more. The more it is seen the more people will associate the brand with your company.

Step Three – Market with your brand

It’s one thing if people start to associate your brand with your name. It’s another if they start to associate it with your business, not just the name, but what your business does, what your business could provide. With the right marketing this could be a fantastic way for you to attract more customers to your business, allowing you to grow and increase your profits.

Branded Uniforms; if your employees interact with customers encourage them to wear company uniforms which feature your brand. This helps your employees to appear more professional and makes them easily recognised by your customers.

Branded Messages; when you’re blogging, or writing press releases, or providing infographics or just about anything else to market your business in the online world your primary concern might be getting a backlink. However, it might be much more beneficial to you to use your brand, rather than a link.

Remain Consistent; your logo isn’t the only part of your brand. Your colours, your values, and your purpose are all part of your brand. Using the logo colour scheme in your website, office space, leaflets and so on and so forth can all help to further your brand.

Step Four – Don’t Change without Explanation

Part of being consistent is that you don’t re-create your logo or brand on a regular basis, even changing the design of your website can have negative effects if you don’t explain yourself. Take Pepsi for example; first of all Pepsi used to be known as Pepsi-Cola, and when they first came about their logo was a lot more like the Coca-Cola logo; red and white, concentrating on the text. However; at the beginning of the war there came to be more focus on two primary things; bottle caps and supporting the troops. It was during this period that Pepsi started to use the red white and blue design, and first began incorporating the shape of the bottle cap behind the words.

Then, in order to distance themselves from Coca-Cola, their primary competitor, the company dropped the ‘cola’ from their name. Over the years the design has evolved, but kept that circular shape and the red, white and blue colouration, which certainly helps with their marketing. Their brand is well known, and of course because the reasons for the chances in the brand were explained it allowed them to market it as a very positive thing.

Regardless of what changes you make to your brand, so long as you explain the reasons for the changes to your customers they are more likely to agree with you, it also helps them to feel that they have some involvement in your brand, allowing the association between your company and your brand to develop stronger and more beneficial to you.

Step Five – Sell your Brand

One of the best things about having a brand is that people recognise it and want it, and they’re willing to pay a little extra to have something that people know. Regardless of whether you start selling t-shirts or giving away pens, your brand should be present on all of the products from your company. Not only to further develop the association between your business and your brand, but also to allow your products to have a greater value.

There are five currencies and money is the least important of the five.

The other four currencies are; time, knowledge, reputation and contacts.

Employees’ Priorities

Employees exchange their time for money. The employer pays the employee $20 per hour, and in that hour the employee earns $50 for the company. Everyone’s happy.

Entrepreneurs’ Priorities

Entrepreneurs don’t sell their time for cash. Time is much too valuable to be sold for a depreciating currency. Entrepreneurs spend their time learning and building their reputations.

Reputation is the precursor to acquiring contacts and earning money. A client earned through a good reputation could be worth millions over the next five years. You could never buy connections like that.

The 5 Currencies Explained

Time is limited. There are 24 hours in a day, and that’s it. You can’t put time into a savings account, but you can exchange it for knowledge.

Sometimes you can sell your knowledge directly, but it is more common to use what you know to grow your reputation.

As you share your knowledge and use it to help others, your reputation grows, and people start to take notice of you – Your contact list grows.

Some contacts will buy your products and increase your bank balance.

Reputation is the crucial step.

Growing Your Reputation

In 2018, you can’t make anyone buy your services. The days of push-marketing are over, and if you even try it, you come across as a snake-oil salesman.

Social Media Marketing

Social media alone will grow your rep as much as buying new socks.

You need to use your knowledge to help people in a visible format, and social media channels can be used to amplify what you are doing. However, people use Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook to be sociable and they are not tuned into business mode, and only a few will click to visit your website and learn more.

Website Marketing

Your website is your crucial marketing channel. It’s where people find out about you and what you can do for them. Only on your site can interested visitors sign up to receive email. You own your site, whereas you can never own a Facebook page. Your domain name and website are the basis of your online credibility and reputation.

You can share your knowledge in blog posts to establish your credentials. Share everything you know. You will be the person who is seen as the expert, and even if someone reads your blog from end to end, you will still know more than they do.

How to Set Up Your First Website

There are three steps to getting your site live:

1. Choose a URL/web address
2. Choose your web hosting company and package
3. Install and set up WordPress

When you have a few pages up is the time to think about social media and other promotional strategies.

1.       Choosing Your Web Address

Your web address must be easy to remember. Aim for two words run together or a unique word you can use in your branding like Lyft or Viber.

Many sites let you search for available names and then sell your search data on to domain speculators so they can buy the address you are interested in an attempt to sell it to you at an inflated price.

When you are buying a domain name, you should only search for available names on a site that guarantees they will not sell on your search details.

Screenshot source

The screenshot above is from LCN, a UK company that offers free privacy protection (You have to pay for your domain each year). If you pay for your web address for ten years, you get ten years privacy protection as well as a discount on the domain name itself.

2.       Choose Your Web Hosting

Basic shared hosting will suffice initially, but choose a reputable hosting company and avoid the big names because they have poor customer satisfaction ratings. Look at InMotion or Siteground shared hosting plans for a reliable hosting package. Check out these Suitcase Entrepreneur tips on web hosting.

3.       Install WordPress

Almost every host has a one-click install facility that lets you install WordPress on your domain name in a few seconds. Read this guide on setting up WordPress from Neil Patel.

The Short Version

You are no longer an employee, and you have new priorities. Your reputation in the years ahead is more important than cash in your pocket today.

You **need** a website to establish your entrepreneurial credibility and then to grow your reputation among your future clients.

You can use social channels to reach more people, but the value there is in having a website to direct those interested parties to.

Article Contributed by Hannah Whittenly

As a business owner, you’ve probably heard plenty of advice about targeting your marketing efforts locally. However, there’s a big world out there. If you’ve maxed out your exposure locally, or just want to grow at a faster rate, it’s time to look for new opportunities. If you want to grow your business base beyond your local area, here are a few tips to help you.

Market Yourself Online

Online marketing is one of the most important steps in getting your brand a broader business base. After all, they don’t call the internet the World Wide Web for nothing. By increasing your visibility online and specifically targeting people outside of your immediate community, you will start to get a wider customer base. Social media can be a great tool for increasing your online presence. Research has shown that people are up to 85% more likely to purchase a product after viewing a video for it. Try posting videos about your brand, products, and services to Facebook, YouTube, or Instagram, and watch your business grow.

Reach out to New Businesses and Clients

Another way to introduce your brand to new markets is by reaching out to established businesses in a new area. You could partner with another brand, go to community business meetings, or even attend networking events outside of your local area. These brands already have a lot of information about their area to share with you, and you can always return the favor with information about your community. Potential customers will see their local businesses’ trusted recommendations and be much more likely to engage with your brand. These established businesses will be a great resource for you as you continue to grow.

Open a New Office

What better way to increase your brand awareness in a new place than by moving there yourself? You could completely change the location of your offices, or, if your business has the means, try opening a second office or storefront somewhere new. Either way, the important part is that your business has a face in the new community. This way, you’ll be seen as an active member of wherever you move to, while still retaining the trust and confidence of your previous customers. Plus, if you’re strategic in picking a great new location, you could cut down on other business expenses, like rent and manufacturing.

Sell Products Across State Lines

At the end of the day, people will not engage with your company or purchase your products and services if they have nowhere to purchase them from. This is especially true of out-of-state consumers. Why not begin selling your products to retailers outside of your local area? You could gain a lot of customers by shipping your products across state lines with the help of a willing shipping company, like Rodbev Removals. A whole new group of consumers will be engaging with your brand face-to-face, and this new audience will help your business base continue to grow and flourish.

If you feel like you’re business is stuck and needs to grow, try looking outside of your local area. There are many opportunities for you to grow your brand and create an even larger business base for yourself in the process.

To think that you can build a brand without establishing an online presence is a recipe for disaster. No matter how hard you try, your efforts will only go in vain if you decide to overlook the power of digital media.

If you are ready to capitalize on the online platforms and tools, the following 5 tips can help you in building a powerful brand and expanding the reach of your business:

1. Social Media

Branding has a lot to with human behavior and society as a whole, which is why social media plays the biggest role in creating an online brand.

Your customers want to connect to your brand on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and other popular social media platforms. So, not only you should start sharing good quality content through your handles on these platforms, you should also try to deliver excellent customer support.

When a company listens to the feedback/complaint raised by a customer, they feel cared for, and it helps in deepening the connection they have with it.

2. Creating a Good Logo

If you are using different profile pictures and social media banners for different accounts, then you are doing more harm than good for your own brand.

Learning how to maintain a consistent message across a variety of platforms is an important part of the branding process that must never be underestimated.  So, what you need is a good but affordable branding and logo design suite that can help you create all things branding- company logo, business cards, watermark files, etc.

You need to create a simple yet unique logo that shows the world what your business, your brand is all about.  You also need to make sure that you use it wherever your company communicates with the public. Examples include emails, social media profiles, website, etc.

3. Start a Blog

One of the best ways to connect to the public, learn what they feel about your brand, and convert leads into customers, is by creating an informative or entertaining blog that the people will genuinely love to read. As you will publish new posts every few days or every week (ideally, the frequency shouldn’t exceed it), it will automatically jump positions on the search engine rankings and help attract more and more unique visitors to your blog.

4. Optimize Your Website

Did you ever conduct a thorough assessment of your company website? Is navigation on it easy or complicated? Are its search engine rankings satisfactory? These are some of the questions that you must ask yourself if you want to create a good company website.

SEO and UX (User Experience) are some of the most important things that you should learn about and update your website accordingly. You will be surprised to see how simple things within these can have the greatest impact on your online presence.

5. Check into Alternative Branding Platforms

It’s not easy to secure a sizeable portion of the market which is quickly becoming saturated with other strong brands. So, to create a name for yourself and to stand out, you need alternative marketing models.

Instead of simply booking digital advertisements, think of other ways you can generate the maximum ROI. Will your product sell well if you ask famous YouTube channels to promote your brand? Will popular influencers on Instagram be able to increase your customers in a rapid manner? Look into the options like these. They might do wonders for your brand.

New entrepreneurs can easily get bogged down in the specifics of creating their brand. overall, being an entrepreneur can be a double-edged sword. On one hand, the freedom that comes with creating a new business is empowering and thrilling.

On the other hand, being a self-made business man can be incredibly frustrating.  Seemingly endless streams of mistakes and missed opportunities can leave new entrepreneurs feeling doubtful, dissatisfied and disillusioned. It is therefore often beneficial to hear from a mentor who is already further along down the journey.

Entrepreneurs sometimes fall into the trap of “creating their own life”, and their own stubbornness can be blinding.  However, receiving advice from someone in the know is always beneficial, and can even be life-changing.  The advice of a mentor can provide a fresh view of perspective and clarity that can help you shape your branding, regardless of how specific or unique your endeavors may be.

Getting Advice in The Modern Era 

The advantages of a personal mentor seem obvious.  Someone following your journey and sharing their past mistakes or victories when relevant is incredibly useful.  For many young new entrepreneurs, however, getting that personal insight is easier said than done. If one is lacking professional connections and a larger network, it can often be difficult to find the right person willing to take the time to guide you.

Luckily, the current era brings communication and media from around the world, instantly. We are fortunate enough to have connections to a seemingly endless variety of seasoned entrepreneurs and gurus offering guidance and first-hand experience through online platforms like YouTube and other social media platforms. Successful professionals like Tai Lopez share entrepreneurial information, inspiration and ideas to those willing to listen.

Learning From Tai 

There is a seemingly endless number of gurus who offer their input and advice for those in need.  The mistake of falling down the rabbit hole of YouTube’s list of thought leaders and experts can be easy.  For those seeking advice from an online mentor, it can be more helpful to follow just a handful vets with a proven record and a philosophy than to mindlessly scroll through videos ripe with clickbait, produced by people who do not even know what they are talking about.

Tai Lopez is one of those vets. Growing up poor and raised by a single mother, Tai took his life into his own hands after dropping out of college. He worked ardently to create his own brand, and became a successful millionaire all by the age of 30. Through his efforts on YouTube and other social media outlets, Tai amassed a huge following and online presence, offering advice, inspiration, and useful ideas to up-and-coming entrepreneurs.  Tai is now considered a heavy hitter and thought leader in the world of online marketing and brand building.

Tai shares his life philosophy and principles with his viewership online for the pursuit of “The Good Life”, which he argues is a balancing act of health, wealth, love, and happiness.  He strives to become valuable, rare, inimitable, and non-substitutable, otherwise expressed as “VIRN”, an acronym he often promotes. Tai offers his advice and philosophy mainly on his popular YouTube channel, and through his online program called “The 67 Steps”.

One of the main concepts Tai promotes is the never-ending search for knowledge. He claims to read a new book at least every day, either by speed reading or through an audiobook, and swears by the effectiveness of this tactic for self-advancement. He has effectively created one of the largest book clubs in the world, and constantly analyzes and discusses the main ideas in the books he reads with his viewership.

Lopez believes and promotes the idea that the key to success is the endless pursuit of knowledge, and that a never ending influx of fresh ideas help synthesize new solutions to new problems in a constantly changing world.

Your Own Success 

The proof of Tai’s philosophy and lifestyle is evident in his own success.  For those needing guidance in their own quest in branding and entrepreneurship, it is extremely advantageous to listen to the experts from time to time.  Building off the lessons of some else’s past mistakes or virtues can help you on your way to create your own brand and business.