Five Tips for Developing a Winning Brand

Small businesses often confuse their brand with their logo, and that can be their biggest mistake. A brand is much more than just what your logo looks like, it’s the first impression that your consumers will get of you and the one that will stick with them. These are five things that you should be thinking about when developing your brand that will help.

Know your audience

Step one to developing a winning brand is to know and understand your audience. Your brand should touch on the concerns, needs, preferences and lifestyle of your target market, not try to be everything for everyone. Do some research on your target audience and understand their buying trends before you do anything.

What’s your story?

Creating a compelling story for your business starts with defining your mission, vision and values. Ask yourself why someone needs your product or service and why you developed it in the first place. Developing your story isn’t a time to talk about why your product is better than your competitors but instead highlight what makes it special.

Stick to what you believe in

What you believe in as a brand should follow through in everything you do. If you’re selling your products in retail stores, you’ll want to make sure the store properly aligns with your brand vision. Where you choose to carry your product can influence your brand and set a tone for it. To help make this easier, Launch Grow Joy recommends that you identify your product’s top two or three most important qualities and match these with the values of the store, especially while starting out.

Don’t cheap out on the design

Although I mentioned that branding isn’t all about the logo, it’s still critical to not cheap out or take any short cuts on developing your visual identity. This is what your consumer’s first encounter will be with your brand, so you want to create a good impression. Spend the money to invest in a designer to not just develop your logo but also your brand guidelines which will be your bible to live by through everything you do.

Grow your community

Last but not least, instead of only spending money on advertising in hopes that it sticks, focus your time on building and improving your community. People trust other people, and are more likely to check out what you have to offer based off of what another person had to say versus what you have to say. Reward and regularly engage your brand advocates, work with influencers in your space that have the same target market as you, and stop only focusing on spitting your message out yourself.

What are your biggest tips for creating a memorable brand? Tweet them to us at @Futurpreneur.

Written By: Lauren Marinigh, Social Media & Content Specialist, Futurpreneur Canada