Build a good reputation, target your audience and craft a creative strategy, marketing experts say
For meat buyers, branding signals a quality cow. But for business owners, branding can make or break a deal or beat out the competition.
According to Jim Walton, president of a new Indianapolis marketing agency, the term "brand" is thought to have originated from the practice of branding cattle. But in the advertising world, a brand is more than a sign of ownership -- it represents the public image of your company.
"It comes down to what the audience believes," Walton said. "You can have a beautiful logo, but if the product stinks and nobody likes it, what is your brand? Your brand is a bad product."
Branding often is misunderstood in the business world, says Walton, a 30-year veteran of the marketing industry. It is more about a company's reputation -- and what the consumer believes about its products and services -- than a logo.
"When it comes to how to approach an audience . . . it's important to understand who (your customers are) and how they want you to speak to them," Walton said.
His agency, Brand Acceleration, uses three basic steps to create a brand for a variety of businesses.
No. 1: Understand your brand and your audience. Walton caters to three audiences: the customer, the prospective customer and the staff members.
"We look for feelings, thoughts and emotions that are common among all three audiences," he said. "And once you find words, emotions and thoughts that all three audiences agree with, then you have found the core of the brand."
These points of agreement ensure that your business says what consumers want, not what the business wants, and that your employees say the same.
While it is important for the brand to be what the consumer wants, Walton said it also is important for that brand to be honest.
When a community hired Brand Acceleration to create a brand that would attract more people to the area, it wanted to portray itself as a cultural arts community. But it really wasn't. Instead of trying to create the illusion that it was a cultural community, Walton advised that it should portray itself as it really is -- welcoming, friendly and hard-working.
No. 2: Create a strategy to convey your message or brand. A brand can be conveyed verbally and visually, Walton said, but it is how you say it and how you show it that brings your brand to life.
No. 3: Produce and distribute the message or brand. Brochures, advertisements, Web sites and e-mails all can be used based on the demographic of the audience, Walton said.
Lorraine Ball, founder of Roundpeg, discovered that font, color and design would help her Web site say more about the Carmel-based marketing company's brand than its mission statement ever could. She chose bold colors and playful fonts to convey Roundpeg's brand: creativity, collaboration and positive energy.
Ball recommends choosing three words that you want your consumer to know about your business, then using those words to convey the message through your choice of photographs, writing style, type fonts, colors, language and images.
Along with smart branding advice, there are also advertising/marketing mistakes that all small-business owners should strive to avoid:
Inconsistency. Scott Flood, a local freelance copywriter, says that inconsistency is the biggest advertising misstep a business can make.
"You want to make sure that every contact you have with your customer is consistent. Your ads should sound like your brochures, should sound like your Web sites, should sound like your employees. When your employees are dealing with your customers, they should convey that same approach," said Flood, who writes ad copy, brochures and online content.
Your marketing materials are there to act as a salesman for your business when you or your sales reps cannot, he added. So they must look and sound like the business's brand.
Trying to speak to everyone. Ball says a general advertisement designed to attract all demographics is almost sure to kill the brand.
Instead, pick a target audience and advertise to its needs.
"It you are relevant to everyone, you are relevant to no one," Ball said.
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