Learning how to present your brand and leverage your brand identity with your customers are two of the keys to growing your business.
Ensuring a truly unique and memorable experience for everyone who walks through the doors is paramount. Although looking at the bigger picture is important when you are running a business, when it comes to branding, a lot of the skill is in the details.
To maintain a consistent image, you need to make sure that your brand is presented effectively each and every time your business comes into contact with your customers. This includes your physical stores, website, employees and product packaging. When your business comes into contact with customers it is known as a ‘touch point’, and understanding these is one of the key factors to creating a unique and positive brand image.
Many businesses focus on one area of their business, for example, the products they sell, and ignore other areas, such as the quality of service, or the overall customer experience. To really dazzle your customers, you need to focus on the entire package – from products to service – and make sure your brand identity is upheld throughout the customer experience.
If you haven’t given your brand identity much thought, the first step is to spend some time thinking about what makes you unique, and how you would like to portray that. If you pride yourself on being environmentally conscious, how can you uphold these values in your packaging and your store layout?
Once you have an idea how you would like your brand to be presented, the next step is to think about where you come into contact with your customers, and how you can reinforce your brand identity each time.
Not everything will be under your control, and there is no point trying to change things that are out of your control. Focus on what you can change and work on making those aspects of your customer experience unique, rather than wasting time and energy trying to change things that you can’t.
The aspects that most businesses can control include their communication style, and materials including their website, their products and service, and their employees. Concentrating on these things can make a big difference to the success of your business branding.
If you aren’t sure how to start reviewing your customer touch points, an easy way to begin is by becoming a customer yourself. By purchasing the products, subscribing to your newsletter and visiting your stores, you can get a customer view of your business and where the areas for improvement might be.
It is a good idea to become a customer for your competitors too, so that you can keep up to date with what they are doing, and what their customers’ experiences are.
Creating and upholding a unique brand identity can set you apart from other businesses, and make sure your customers have a memorable experience of your products and services.
