What is Brand Identity?
Brand Identity is the visual, emotional and cultural image associated with a company or a product. Branding is the complete professional image that a business wishes to project to make it recognisable and distinct. A successful business identity and branding is consistently carried through all aspects of a company’s access to the public, customers, and potential customers: website, social media, business card, letterhead and envelope, brochures, print advertisements, media advertisements, signage, etc.
The purpose of having people remember the brand name and have positive associations with that brand is to make their product selection easier and enhance the value and satisfaction they get from the product. Research has proven that consumers are more likely to purchase familiar or well known brands – they feel more confident and are more likely to trust known brands. Even if you have a small business, you still need a strong brand.
A Brand is more than just logo design, and successful marketing starts with the 5 key elements of brand strategy.
What are the benefits of a strong brand identity?
1. Trust & Recognition
Strong branding naturally grows customer recognition. When customers recognise your brand, you will see several side positive side effects. The power of familiarity can create trust and therefore, more purchases from customers.
A strong brand should be easily recognised through its slogan, theme, color scheme, or logo.
2. Stand Out From Your Competition
Strong branding ensures that you stand out from the competition. Any professional marketing agency will ensure that your brand’s content outshines the industry’s opposition. Your products should not look like other brands’ products, or this will diminish customer recognition.
3. Boosted Customer Loyalty
When customers recognise your strong branding, they are more likely to become loyal to your business. Customer loyalty is the way of the future for any marketing strategy. If you do not have loyal customers, your business will suffer.
Customer loyalty can function as an extension of your vibrant social media presence. Your target market may form a community around your brand’s mission or message. This is critical for any social media marketing strategy.
Loyal customers can also make your brand more recognisable. The more viral your virtual presence, the more your company stands out. Strong brand loyalty supports your business’s future growth, all while generating leads.
4. Better, more loyal Employees
Where you have loyal customers, you have loyal employees. People want to work for a company they respect and trust. Strong branding is not just an external marketing ploy to generate leads and turn a quick profit.
A strong brand is built on strong relationships, from within the business as much as outside it. Your company will attract qualified, dedicated employees with a credible brand. Loyal employees are another way to protect your brand.
Where there is strong brand loyalty, there is usually a strong purpose.
5. Cultivate B2B Connections and Partners
With strong brand identity, your company stands out to prospective partners, too.
Strong branding stands out on a corporate level and inspires interest for business to business connections. These B2B connections are potential partnerships you can leverage to develop your company—no more catering to potential partners who never saw your business from the beginning.
A strong brand brings more than customer recognition, other businesses will prefer to work with a brand that is strong and trustworthy.
6. Expand Your Business
When you cultivate B2B connections in your professional network, you can expand your business. A more reliable brand paves the way for operational growth. Where you save time and resources catering to potential partners, you can now turn to grow your company.
Customers will recognize your brand as even more valuable when you partner with other companies. This increase in perceived equity opens the door for even more profit. It also grants you higher returns on funds you initially invested in marketing and advertising efforts.
With these increased returns, you can invest in new marketing strategies aligned with your brand. You can even consider more than operational expansion, depending on the partnerships you have cultivated in your B2B connections.
7. Increase Your Credibility & Defend against negative exposure
Perception is crucial for a strong brand. You want customers to recognise your brand as credible and valuable. You also want other businesses, both competition and partners, to view your company in a similar light.
Whenever something goes wrong with a product or service connected to your brand, the more credible you are perceived as, the more insulation, you have. Negative feedback, legitimate or not, becomes less destructive with a stronger brand.
When you have strong brand loyalty, you will see customers more likely to discredit negative commentary. Even with valid concerns about adverse messaging, such as less than usual product quality, customers are more likely to trust your resolutions.
Negative messaging is far less damaging, with a strong branding strategy in place. Even if a disgruntled customer or employee’s complaint goes viral, you remain insulated if you have invested in a strong brand. Your business would suffer disruptive messaging if it did not have a strong brand.
8. Connect With Affiliated Influencers
When you develop enough digital clout from your increased B2C and B2B connections, you will attract the attention of people who want to be affiliated with your brand. These potential affiliates resonate with your strong branding and want to use its influence on their campaigns.
Investing in influencers is a potential tactic in social media marketing. Depending on the community and equity of those who want to associate with your brand, affiliating with influencers can open expand your brand recognition. In turn, your company could reach new audiences and generate more leads.
Influencers could potentially negatively impact your brand if your branding is not recognizable enough. A stronger brand can hold its own next to external messaging, which might detract from its central identity. Strong branding remains clear to customers, despite any contradiction from affiliates.
9. Your Marketing Budget Will Go Further
Your strong brand loyalty will save you money. It will also generate more money for your business because you have customers who advertise for you. Loyal customers want to share their favored brands in their communities.
Strong branding engages customers on a personal level. More personalized marketing strategies increase rates of interaction, naturally generating more leads without investing in new advertising projects. Additionally, the more recognizable your brand, the less you have to invest in being seen on any platform.
When you have to allocate funds elsewhere due to external crises or increased expansion costs, the capital you saved on marketing can be invested back into your business. You will have a more economically sustainable business.
10. More Opportunities and More Potential
When you invest in a professional-level branding strategy, it shows. Your opportunities for growth and expansion will go as far as you are willing to push them. Ultimately, your chances are only limited by how long it takes for customers and potential partners to recognise your brand’s value.
Working With a Professional Marketing Agency for Strong Branding
Now you’re aware of how impactful strong branding can be for your business; you might be tempted to try and develop a strategy on your own. After exploring the benefits of a strong brand, you can see how important it is to maintain consistency in your brand’s messages. Consistency requires expertise, and time you may be unable to invest.
Consider your professional image
The flood of Design and DTP software on the market means that just about anyone who can change the colour of a font can call themselves a designer. Don’t be fooled into going with the cheapest quote, or let your mate who’s got Photoshop control the visual face of your business. There are a number of factors involved in creating any graphical work, many of which are utilised before pen hits paper. An experienced designer will call upon things such as market research, current trends and available technology. They will endeavour to keep the professional image you rely on to maintain your current clients and make new ones.
THE PUBLIC IMAGE OF YOUR COMPANY IS WORTH MORE THAN MONEY.
IT IS A VALUABLE, MARKETING ASSET
At Coast Creative, we work in a wide array of industries and have offered top marketing services for nearly 20 years.
