5 Components of a Strong Brand
Not all brands are created equal. In fact, some fall way short of their potential. What makes the difference? There are a lot of components that go into creating a brand and in this post, I'm going to walk you through the five components of a strong brand.
Has a Clear Target Audience & Caters to Them
No matter how superbly designed or beautifully executed your brand is, it won’t accomplish its purpose unless you have a clear understanding of your target audience. While it’s tempting to try and be everything to everyone, not only will this dilute your efforts, but more importantly: if you don’t know who you are talking to, how do you know what to say?
Your target audience is the demographic that the brand is trying to reach. This is different from your “target market” which is defined as “the total of potential customers for a product.” A better way of thinking about these groups would be "the people who will buy my product" or "the people I want to hear about my product." You need both in order to thrive.
Once you have this concrete, you need to be predictable and consistent to this group. Your audience should know what to expect from you every time they interact with your content or product/service.
Voice and Tone
Voice and tone are the foundation of your brand's personality.
When both are done well, they will resonate with your target audience and make them feel good about engaging with your business. If you do it right, they'll associate those feelings with your brand every time. Your voice can be quirky, sophisticated, silly—whatever you choose to make it. As long as it is consistent across all platforms and channels then it will become integral to how customers perceive your company.
As an example of a brand that has a strong voice and tone, take Wendy's. The Wendy's social media team is very active in responding to customer complaints or questions on Twitter in a snarky manner (Wendy's has even drawn attention for trolling people on other fast food chains' social media pages). Their interactions have turned into memes that have been shared hundreds of thousands of times. This helps differentiate their brand from other fast food chains and shows off their personality.
Unique Design
A strong brand should reflect your business’ identity, but that doesn’t mean you have to use a design as old and tired as an episode of The Office. You can achieve originality and still create a design that fits your brand.
The key is to identify unique elements of your business that aren’t necessarily obvious from the outside. This could be anything from your company’s values to its mission to its culture. Then, consider using those elements to inform how you go about designing the visual elements of your brand.
For example, if you want your company culture to revolve around innovation, then try incorporating some modern-looking fonts or trendy color combinations into your logo and website design. If you want people to perceive your business as trustworthy and established, try using more traditional-looking fonts or colors in combination with imagery that evokes feelings of stability and confidence (you know the drill).
Distinctive Marketing Strategy
A strong brand is one that stands out from the crowd. Setting yourself apart from competitors by differentiating your product and services is a common message surrounding marketing strategy, but what does this actually mean?
A big part of developing a competitive advantage for your brand lies in having a clear understanding of what you are currently offering, who you are selling to, and how these offerings should be presented to potential customers. The “4 Ps” of marketing (Product, Place, Price, and Promotion) each play an important role in creating this type of strategic framework for your business, as they help you identify what sets your organization apart from others offering similar products or services.
Ensuring that your marketing strategy is cohesive with your brand can seem like a daunting task at first glance. However, if you take the time to delve into data analysis and research how other companies in the industry are setting themselves apart from the competition—and use these insights to test new ideas—then it becomes much easier to make adjustments as needed while staying on track with company goals.
Customer Loyalty
Let’s take a minute to talk about the importance of customer loyalty. If you want to be successful, it’s important that you place the utmost priority on retaining your current customers. Why? It costs far more time and money for companies to acquire new customers than it does for them to retain their existing ones. In fact, some studies have shown that finding a new customer can cost five times as much as keeping an existing one.
If this is true, then how do we keep our current customers loyal? Well, the first step is being honest with yourself and evaluating your overall brand strength. Are you providing your customers with a quality product or service that’s worth their dollar? And are you delivering on their expectations every single time? If not, then these are things that need to change right away in order for you to earn customer loyalty.
Strong brands are important for companies.
A strong brand helps your company stand out, helps people remember you, and helps you charge more for your goods and services. It also communicates the culture of your company to potential new hires who want to work in a place where everyone is excited about the mission and vision.