If you are looking for business branding, here is an interesting thought for you – ever wondered why we respond to brands the way we do?
The human mind collects data all the time and produces new insights based on this data. For example, when you see a neglected person in dirty cloth on the street, you recognize it’s a homeless person. That means your brain is picking up pieces of information and connecting them to a conclusion based on prior knowledge.
The same applies to branding. If the product is a person, then the branding is the thing that makes the first impression, like looks and behavior. Only in branding, it will be the website, ads, brochures, packaging, etc. No matter how good the product is, its shell has to be flawless to make it great.
The value of good business branding
Studies show that about 60% of consumers prefer to buy products from brands they know. But what makes the brand, and how can we build a brand that evokes emotion and sympathy with consumers?
Many small business owners mistake thinking that the company name or logo is the brand, but they are only a part of it. Branding is so much more! Branding affects the opinions and feelings of customers towards the company and its products. It is the essence of the brand, its values, differentiation, and uniqueness.
Branding is expressed in all visual materials, such as user interfaces, marketing materials, publications, presentations, packaging, and more, by keeping a consistent graphic language and wording style.
Good business branding will contribute to the impression of an established company, convey reliability and trust in customers’ eyes, and benefit the sales process.
How to preserve brand identity?
Small businesses can make a big impression by maintaining a unique, consistent appearance. That includes the logo, colors, fonts, visual style, the brand’s language, the wording style on the website, and all marketing materials. It must look like it was all designed by the same person, no matter how many designers worked on different elements, and like the same person wrote everything. All that with a strong digital presence will help build a trusted, memorable brand.
Perfect is the enemy of good.
Having a professional agency do your business branding is ideal, but many SMB owners can’t afford this privilege.
Precisely for that, some low-cost online solutions can be a good start until a proper budget is available. For example, some websites offer freelancing services. They require some effort going over designers’ portfolios and checking their rates and reviews. A quicker and cheaper way is using an online logo maker. The downside is that the logo will not be unique since other people consume logos from the same inventory. Another option is buying a unique pre-designed logo. A quick web search of pre-designed logos will display sites that offer unique, customizable logos.
As told before, the logo is not the whole branding. Many online tools provide beautiful templates for banners, brochures, presentations, and more. Choosing templates of the same style, keeping the same fonts, and using a consistent wording style is essential.
Brand awareness
Creating quality content and frequently publishing on social media can do the trick. It can be very time-consuming; therefore, if you are low on resources, choosing one network and being active and responsive to followers is better than having non-active pages on a few networks.
Choosing the most suitable network should be considered according to the business type (B2B/ B2C), audience age, product type, and content type (images/ articles, etc.).
Final Thoughts
Branding matter. It can be quite expensive, and it is best done by professionals. However, it is better to have something than nothing, so as they say – fake it till you make it! Do it by yourself if you can’t afford professional work, and hopefully, this will help you grow your business until you can afford professional work.
