Branding is what gives your business its reputation and enables you to build a deeper connection with your customers. With strategy, creativity, and skill you can establish an identity that sets you apart from the competition.
While it is important to differentiate your brand, it is equally important to ensure that your brand is attracting the right audience.
How Your Audience Defines the Standing of Your Brand
No matter what logo you choose, which marketing strategies you implement, or how your product performs, the perception of your brand will largely be determined by the audience it attracts and the way in which they perceive it.
While you may think that your product or content sends a certain message, it is actually your audience who decides the actual value of your offering and the message that it sends.
Your Audience Leaves Its Own First Impression
Today, brands invest considerable time and money into social media to help spread awareness about their businesses. They’ll make detailed changes to their profiles and come up with ideas for posts that effectively showcase their clever brand voice. However, they often overlook what it is that actually creates a brand’s first impression, its audience.
When someone first encounters your brand on social media, they will judge you based on your audience just as much as your own content.
They will look to see who follows you, who actively talks about you, comments on your profiles, tags you, and who identifies the most with what you do. Newcomers will try to determine whether the audience that supports your brand is made up of the type of people they want to be associated with. Your community says much more about your brand than you think, and understanding how to leverage that is crucial to your PR and your long-term success.
Your Audience Drives Your Brand’s Word of Mouth
The words your audience uses to describe your brand matter just as much as the ones you use. No matter how well you craft your brand message, your audience will define it for itself when spreading the word about your company to others.
By matching your branding to your audience’s taste and values, you can help ensure that your brand means what you want it to mean.
Aligning Your Brand Values With Your Audience
On the surface, a brand consists of two primary external aspects:
- Your visual identity: This includes your logo, colors, and typography.
- Your voice identity: This includes your tagline, tone, and communication styles.
However, for a brand to be complete and really resonate with its desired audience, there is a third “internal” aspect that must be established, your brand values.
Brand values help you define your brand’s personality and position. Without them, your brand will seem like just any other business instead of a distinct and recognisable company. This will lower your appeal to your target audience.
Establishing Your Brand Positioning
Actively planning your brand positioning can help shape the perception of your brand and ensure that your brand meets your audience’s expectations.
Here are the key factors you should consider when defining your brand positioning.
1. Relevancy
How can you make your brand relevant to your target audience?
Put yourself in the position of your customers and ask the following questions:
- What is the primary reason to use your product or service?
- Why would you choose your product or service over other solutions?
- What is the most significant difference your product or service is making for you today?
- What is the single greatest benefit your product or service provides?
- What prompted you to look for a solution like this?
Understanding the true value of your offering can help you ensure you are targeting an audience actually interested in your brand.
2. Uniqueness
Uniqueness determines how your brand will stand out from the competition.
You can start defining how you will make your brand unique by monitoring your competition. Take a look at their websites and other marketing assets and review their logo, taglines, headlines, keywords, and common verbiage.
Then brainstorm how to differentiate your brand’s positioning. Ask yourself:
- How do you envision your product or service is different from your competition?
- How would you define your product or service to someone outside of your industry?
- How would you define your product or service to someone in your industry but is unfamiliar with your offering?
When you have a better understanding of what makes your offering unique, you can begin to create brand messaging and marketing assets that will effectively convey the unique value of your brand to your target audience.
3. Credibility
Credibility defines the reasons why your target audience should trust your brand. Ask yourself, why should they believe your brand will deliver better benefits than your competitors?
Does your brand have an established reputation for reliability?
Do you use higher quality materials for your products?
Being able to convey the credibility of your brand can help you establish your business as an authority and leader in your industry.
Contact TDW DS for Brand Design Service
Crafting your brand takes time, effort, and experience. Branding experts spend years learning the market, analysing trends, and testing options to determine the right strategies.
TDW DS has the expertise needed to get your business noticed. Whether it’s brand development, website design, or print management, we know exactly what it takes to create a unique identity that increases the perceived value of your business and establishes a strong connection with your audience.
Contact us today and let’s get your business noticed by the right people.
