As a business owner, you want to position yourself where you are visible to as many potential customers as possible. The delivery of services and/or products helps to cement the view people have of your brand – whether you want to be seen as reliable, high-quality, convenient or anything else – this is what your business needs to encapsulate for people to see you this way. Being able to define yourself and position yourself in the right space can be highly effective in engaging a loyal customer base, thereby giving your business a competitive edge in the market. This, in essence, is successful business branding!
To achieve this, you should adopt effective strategies for defining and positioning your brand. Read below to get more insight in how to do this.
- Deliver high-quality services
For your business to stand out among your competitors, identify ways that you can deliver a higher quality standard than they do. This, coupled with the uniqueness of your products and services, increases your chances of earning customer loyalty by 43.9%.
Say you run a service business, like plumbing. You want to ensure your workers report punctually to all assigned jobs. This give the impression to your customers that you are organized and professional. The way technicians then conduct themselves in front of customers will give them an impression of the company too. All communications they receive from the company regarding your service will contribute to their understanding of your brand.
One way to make this consistent across your operations and make you look more professional is to use industry-specific work software like Jobber. This smart technology allows you to organize your client history all in one place and keep your customers informed whether you’re at the office or attending a job site. Quotes and invoices can be shared very quickly, payments made online and pre and post job notifications sent instantly – all acting to elevate the image that you are portraying of your company and what your brand stands for.
- Give your brand a personality
Your company’s brand needs to be instantly recognizable with a unique logo and associated visual imagery. This is important as it helps anyone who comes into contact with your company to recognize who you are.
Some of the components of your brand imagery may include:
- Company name
- Logo
- Color palette
- Word font
- Tagline
Images can speak volumes about your business, even more than words sometimes. So, ensure that the visuals you select go some way to defining your business somehow. Building a visual impression also positively influences your customers’ purchasing attitude. For this reason, you may want to consider using a branding toolkit to guide you on how to design exceptional imagery that elevates your business above your competitors.
Consider establishing common values between you and your customers, such as loyalty, respect, and trustworthiness. According to the Corporate Executive Board, doing so effectively increases customer loyalty by up to 64%. This can go a long way to contributing to the success of your company.
- Understand your clients’ demands
Your customers are the cornerstone of your business. Accordingly, you should be aware of their unique needs and expectations. Armed with this knowledge, you can customize your goods or services to address your clients’ unique problems.
If you can find a point where your customers identify with you and genuinely feel that you are able to help them, they will begin to build trust in you. If you have plans to grow your business and expand into new markets it will be essential to have an intimate understanding of who your customers really are in order to be successful.
- Know your competitors
Research competitors’ businesses to gauge your brand’s performance in the market against theirs. You can listen to the opinions of different customers regarding your products in relation to those of your competitors by adopting a competitive intelligence strategy. Ideally you always want to be engaged in this activity to know exactly where you are perceived to sit in the market and how people are viewing you.
One study indicated that from information gathered by doing this, you can work to improve your customer satisfaction and general organizational productivity by up to 71%, maintaining your competitive edge in the industry.
- Offer your customers a variety of options
Flexibility on the range of products and services you offer has proven to have a positive effect on customers’ perception of a brand. When customers are presented with a variety of options, they tend to see your products or services as reliable. This way, they compare your different offerings with each other, instead of comparing your single service with those offered by your competitors.
Proceed with caution if you diversify your options to much. There’s no denying that quality tends to decline if you try engaging in too many goods and services. Look for the optimum level for your business and find what works best for you.
Conclusion
To run a successful business, you must recognize the power of branding. In essence, a strong brand image helps your customers and the general public to associate with your business.
Some of the strategies you can use to define and position your brand include: offering quality services, giving your brand a personality, understanding your consumers’ demands, knowing your competitors, and diversifying your products and services. All of these effectively set your business brand on the path to success.
