Brand Building Essentials To Help Your Business Flourish.

I’ve noticed with the rate of solopreneurs and small businesses rapidly increasing, a lot of people have lost sight of what it means to establish a solid brand. It seems that most feel that since they have a logo, a business page on Facebook, and maybe even an LLC, that they’ve successfully created a “brand”. While some may reach a certain level of success with these things, I’ve found in order to really scale and grow your business you have to have a solid brand strategy and identity established.

First, let’s discuss what branding actually is. An article I read on Hubspot mentioned how “your brand is not your product, your logo, your website, or your name.” I feel everyone focuses on those elements way too much and that’s how we stay stagnant or fail as a business. Branding has everything to do with your audience’s perception of your business. It’s how your product or service makes someone feel. So while all the things mentioned above are important to have established, a brand is much deeper than that, it's how you connect.

Establishing your brand can be an intricate process. However, if you are interested in taking steps to grow your business organically there are some solid foundations to follow. I have my top 5:

Your Why

Finding and expressing your why helps you keep everything consistent with your brand. You’ll have a clear and solidified objective with your business. So think about why your brand exists, what purpose does it serve? For instance, is your business meant to empower a certain demographic? Do you want to shed light on a certain issue and is your business meant to provide a solution? These are things you should consider to help you better brand and market your products and services.

Brand Messaging

This is a big one. Sometimes people miss the mark because they don’t deem this as important. Brand messaging really seals the deal on the purpose or mission of your business, who it is for, what your goals are and what your brand values are. Having these things create a blueprint for how your brand will look and feel, and what type of content will be created, and even products & services to come.

Target Audience

So, although we would like everyone to shop or book with us, your business is NOT for everyone. You must identify WHO your product is for. You need to go deep, identify their age, location, types of occupations, their gender, and race as well. You need to know what is important to your target audience and what gets them going. What type of terms or lingo do they use, if any? This way you can build a relationship with them through your content and naturally gain their trust.

Voice/Tone

Knowing who you’re talking to as well as understanding your brand’s mission and purpose will help you be able to know how to speak to your audience. If your target audience is middle-aged women who are caucasian and live in a rural area, using terms used by Cardi B may not resonate with them. It’s important to do your research on social media to see what types of things you should say and how you should say them when writing copy.

Visual Identity

Your visual identity is what allows for a consistent look and feel for your business. Your logo, brand color, and style should stand out, yet be simple and effective. You want it to be something people recognize and you want them to get the essence of your brand from your visual identity. This also helps with creating content, it can help your social platforms and website all connect and flow better.

This only touches the surface of establishing a solid brand for your business, but looking into these things can really help you grow. You can build rapport with your target audience better and expand your business organically because you’ve made connections and an impact on people.