Every single one of us has our own personal brand. Unique to each of us, this lies in who we are and is reflected in each person by how we present ourselves to the world. It includes how we behave, how we dress, how we carry ourselves, the hairstyle and colour we wear, our grooming, our speech, the way we style and decorate our spaces, and the way we walk, speak, and interact with others. All of these (and more) combine to convey our personality, values, attitudes, and beliefs in a particular way; those (often) curated parts of ourselves that we show the world.
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The same applies to your business.
The success of any business requires that you design and execute an inspired and effective branding strategy. While you may elect to do this in-house, it can be a much better idea to hire a professional, experienced branding agency to access the best branding ideas and results.
Your Brand
Branding isn’t just your logo. It is all-encompassing and an essential part of marketing your business. Branding helps establish how customers, employees, stakeholders, and everyone else understand and distinguish your place in the commercial sphere and within your industry. Your brand is what will attract and compel your target audience to become fans and loyal shoppers.
The Difference Between Your Brand and Brand Identity
Your brand and your brand identity are not the same thing. Understanding these and what they are for you is crucial before you even launch your business.
Think of your brand as who you are, and your brand identity as the “face” your brand shows the world.
Your brand and its identity need to complement the product or service you offer, distinctly appeal to your target audience or customer, and reflect your unique values.
Branding is a vast subject, and it comprehensively covers how consumers experience your business or other organisation. It must tell your story consistently:
- Who are you?
- What do you stand for?
- What do you offer?
- Who are your customers?
- What can people expect from patronising your business?
Brand identity incorporates all of the visual elements that reflect and distinguish your brand and business from others. These include everything from your logo to your chosen colour scheme, fonts, layouts, imagery/graphics, website, other design elements, and more.
Knowing Your Brand
When it comes to branding, your strategy needs to be underpinned by the needs, preferences, and expectations of your target audience. These are your potential customers.
You need to know who your customers are as well as, in terms of your brand itself, its purpose, point/s of difference, unique qualities, areas of opportunity for growth, commercial place it occupies, goals, values, direction, and more.
The Role of a Branding Agency
A branding agency helps its client design, implement, and manage their brand to communicate the voice, values, offerings, and points of difference of their business. The brand must be designed, developed, and nurtured on an ongoing basis to communicate the client’s business identity and product offering. It must also successfully influence consumers to convert in whatever way the client needs them to.
The right branding agency for your business will offer experience and expertise. This may include working with developers, designers, branding strategists, marketers, content writers, bloggers, photographers, a video production team, PR consultants, and others.
The ability to come up with and execute creative, unique branding ideas is an important part of why you should hire a professional branding agency. After all, this is what they offer – their specific area of expertise!