The startup market is more prolific than ever. Businesses need to do more than just old-school marketing to gain visibility and for their consumers to start noticing them.
In that light, branding is a continuous process that has to keep evolving with time and consumers’ needs. While some consumers get attracted to color palettes, others prefer an authentic brand image. About 86% of consumers are drawn to an authentic brand image. So, you need to pick your roadmap based on who your target audience is.
Branding also depends on which phase of marketing your company requires. Typically, there are three phases of growth that marketing strategies target. This article will shed light on the different elements that constitute these phases.
What Are the 5 Key Branding Elements?
Following are the 5 key elements that every marketing strategy should focus on irrespective of the approach.
1.Image
A brand’s image is its identity. It is about what consumers perceive when they see or think of the brand. For example, Bugatti or Ferrari is a brand of luxurious and high-performance automobiles. It wouldn’t make sense for them to make low-budget cars even if there is a market demand for them. Why? Because it will dilute the image; this brand has built over time.
Before you start building an image for your brand, analyze what kind of customer pool you want to attract, and focus on them. Circling back to the above example – Bugatti and Ferrari focus on premium customers, so they cannot diverge their services into affordable or low-budget automobiles.
2.Positioning
Brand positioning is about how you want to place your services or product in the market. The trick is to make it customer specific. Here is an example.
Gillette, a popular name for manufacturing men’s personal care products like razors, launched a new range for women, Gillette Venus razors. Although the fundamentals of both the products are the same, they made it women-centric by choosing a women-appealing color and giving it a flexible shape. So, when positioning a product or brand, design your offering in a way that is distinctive to your target audience.
3.Equity
Brand equity is the commercial value a brand name holds in terms of its products and services. Equity depends on both tangible and intangible aspects, i.e., financial share value or revenue and strategic benefits, respectively.
Apple is one of the best examples of exceptional brand equity because of its cutting-edge technology products and premium brand image.
4.Differentiation
Brand differentiation focuses on demonstrating what makes your product and services truly unique. The idea is to present the brand as a leading expert in the market, building an area of specialization.
Differentiation strategies make your brand credible and trustworthy, driving customer loyalty.
5.Communication
What message does your brand name convey? – that is brand communication.
Advertisements, punchlines, hoardings, etc., communicates what your brand stands for. It is one of the key strategies to build a good perception of your brand in the customers’ minds. So, all copywriting practices come into action here.
If you wish to grow your brand exponentially, be clear in communicating the core benefits of your brand.
How to Incorporate These Elements into Branding Strategy?
Here are the three phases of growth in which you should plan your branding elements.
Phase 1 – Create Key Marketing Assets
Marketing assets are essential to promote business online. It may include anything that can be used to promote products, services, or the overall brand. For example, emails, brochures, sales letters, images, articles, logos, etc. You must identify the key assets vital for company growth and strategize their execution.
Creating key marketing assets plays a crucial role in determining the brand image and its position in the market.
Phase 2 – Plan and Execute Digital Campaigns
Many digital marketing campaigns focus on flashy tactics, but it should be more than that. Digital campaigns can help create opportunities through social media, emails, and content-based marketing. You can start by sharing content like blogs on your website and make a consistent presence on social media so that you start getting noticed by your target audience.
Brand visibility and engagement gained by digital campaigns are vital in building brand differentiation and communication in the competitive market.
Phase 3 – Build a long-term marketing calendar
Building an organized marketing calendar is a long-term game targeted at achieving continuous growth. While you plan for wide-ranging branding tasks and strategies, maintaining a marketing calendar can help you streamline the process and make it straightforward.
A marketing calendar should be an integral part of your brand workflow. It will help you build equity for your brand in the long run.
Branding can be overwhelming to plan and execute, so it is vital to keep everyone on the same page, be it marketers, project managers, designers, or writers.
How Can We Help?
Aroscop offers advanced programmatic advertising technology that is backed by data science. We can help you target the right audience at the right time by enabling AI-based learnings into customer insights, business analytics, and an evolving digital landscape. Explore our customer-centric branding services for guaranteed results.
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