Why Is a Company's Brand so Important?

In the fast paced technological world of business, it is essential that your company understand the necessity for establishing a brand. You may be asking yourself "why is having a brand so important to the success of your business?".

In reality, a brand is what encompasses nearly every aspect of your business from your name, logo, and website to how you communicate your products and services. In short, it's what your company represents to your current and future customers.

Developing your company brand will necessitate participation from all segments of your company’s operation. One of the more effective ways to insure total cooperation is to develop a corporate incentive program to reward benchmarks achieved in your branding campaign.

Brand Image Creation

Gone are the days when a company could simply rely upon a TV commercial or a radio advertisement to simply showcase their product or service. The standard now is full scale exposure on social media and a company’s website. Update your website so that customers will have access to blogs that supply information on products and services that they want more information on.

Unleash Social Media

If your company is not involved in social media, then you are seriously handicapping your company’s growth and missing out on countless opportunities to expand your client or customer base. Downsize your company’s print and TV/radio advertising campaign and use Twitter and Facebook to reach more prospective clients in local and national markets. With Twitter alone, you can build the brand and image so that readers will follow updates in product or service and take part in an ongoing corporate incentive program that showcases seasonal deals or coupons.

Facebook is another brand development vehicle that must not be overlooked. By posting new services/products and inviting readers to “Like” you on your Facebook page, each Facebook friend will automatically receive all of your special deals and updates and posts. More importantly, they can link directly to your website as well.

Create Emotional Effectiveness

For the 21st Century customer, their whole experience is developed and even lived through interactions on the internet. This means that they will likely never walk into your business before they see your website or Facebook or Twitter page. This means you have to use your brand to allow them to feel and even visualize in a positive way who you are. So again, employees participating in community programs for the needy should be showcased on your social media pages as well as on your website.

Employees love being portrayed in a positive light and it is a great corporate incentive program for building terrific company morale. Remember, a brand is an image as well as a feeling that is imprinting on a prospective customer one click at a time.

Brand Recognition

You have succeeded when your company's brand is viewed as unique and has created a steady flow of attention to your website and social media pages. Improve your company’s valued place in the market by creating your brand as soon as you can.

3 Clever Ways to Make Your Business Look Large and In Charge

 (Photo credits: www.roadtrafficsigns.com)

There are many good reasons why you may want your business to look larger than it actually is and if you can manage to pull off this trick, you will probably be able to gain extra turnover through increased sales activity. Here are some ideas on how to achieve this goal. 

Consistent Branding 

The main aspect that you will notice with larger companies and especially multi-nationals is that they have very solid brand strategies. Consistent branding means that customers instantly recognize your logo and what the business does or what it stands for. You can copy that winning formula by ensuring that your logo, typefaces, fonts and brand colors are all consistent wherever your company name is visible. Using signage at your business premises is a great way of re-enforcing that message and brand image. Apple HQ uses a symbolic giant apple attached to the side of their building and you can follow that same principle of instantly making your company look larger and more professional by using consistent brand signage and even creating a logo that is visible on your building as well as on any company vehicles, marketing material etc. 

Digital Signage 

Using digital signage is not as expensive as many people think it is going to be and it is a great way of conveying a message to your customers who are on your business premises, whether it is a retail store or a trade warehouse. Using a digital sign means that you can change your message as often as you want to without having to print up new posters each time and it is a professional looking system that will tell your customers that you want their business and enable you to promote any special offers or limited time deals as well as conveying any standard message that you may want to get across. They are also very useful in enhancing your brand image by incorporating a log in the message and display whilst generally creating the impression that you are larger and more professional business who have thought about how to communicate in a modern way with their customers. 

Getting your Signage Right 

Every business large or small has a budget to work to, but if you are a small business competing against larger organizations you want the opportunity to compete on a level playing field whenever you can, and using signage in the right way is a great way of achieving this. First impressions count for so much and having a sign outside your business that is poorly designed, too small or simply fails to grab attention, then it is probably serving no viable marketing purpose other than telling people where you are. If you are going to advertise your business to the public try to work on getting your business noticed. A large but well proportioned sign with a professional looking logo and even a strong slogan or marketing message will count for a lot when you are seeking to make that all important first impression. Get you signage right and you will encourage customers to come to you and it will carry a strong message that you are in charge of your own destiny and want to give a good customer experience to anyone that walks through the door.

Scott Quinlan is a business branding consultant. His articles mainly appear on business and marketing blogs where he enjoys passing on his knowledge on the subject. Visit ImpactSigns to get more ideas for your business.