To achieve success in the business world, you have to look at your company as a brand. Viewing it as a brand will bring multiple benefits. For one, you give your business an identity, something for consumers to relate to and align themselves with. As a consequence of this, you could see an increase in customers as people relate to your brand image and are more likely to be attracted to your services/products. A brand image can also go a long way to improving public perception of your company and boosting your reputation. If you create a respectable brand, then you’ll gain respect and people will see your business in a more professional light. Likewise, if you create an image that’s built around being different, then you’ll be viewed as innovative, fresh, and exciting.
A good brand image can do wonders for any business and set it on the right path. There are two difficult tasks for you to deal with here. First and foremost, you need to create your desired brand. This can take a lot of time and effort but needs to be thought through. The best advice I can give you is to think about what your company stands for and who your target market is. This should help you figure out which path you should go down with your brand image.
However, this article isn’t about creating your brand. No, it’s focussed on the second difficult task you’ll have to complete. Arguably, this is the most difficult of the two as it requires a lot of work. The task I’m talking about is maintaining your brand image. Once you’ve created it, how can you maintain it and ensure your company sticks to this image? In this piece, you will find two key parts of your business that are crucial to maintaining your brand. Hopefully, the information provided will help you learn how to maintain your image all year round.
Employees
We’ll start things off with your employees who are a key focal point for your brand image. These are the people you rely on to work for your company but also to help promote and maintain your brand. This is done in many ways, for example, the clothes they wear can have a bearing on your brand. Let’s say you’ve worked hard to promote your business as a very professional establishment. Your logo and the design of your website is all geared towards giving off a professional image. Then, your employees turn up to work in casual clothes every day. Anyone that enters your office will think it’s a bit strange how such a professional-seeming company has employees in casual wear. So, you need to ensure they wear clothing that aligns with your image.
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Secondly, their background plays a big role in maintaining a positive brand image too. Every company should be building a brand that’s built on diversity and showing that you accept anyone of any gender, race, etc. Then you can’t only hire white males for your company, there needs to be some diversity. Of course, don’t go out of your way to hire diverse people even if they’re not the best candidates. Look for the best candidates at all times, and you’ll probably end up with a diverse team anyway.
Finally, the way your employees interact with customers is very important regarding your brand image. If you’re a company that’s built on prioritizing customer service, then you need your employees to act in a certain way. They have to be caring and kind, making sure the customer’s needs are the most important thing at all times. If your staff give off the impression that they’re bored and don’t like interacting with customers or handling problems, then it reflects badly on your brand. People will think your company doesn’t care about its customers, which goes against everything your image is trying to promote.
The bottom line is, if you can get your employees representing your brand values, then it’s far easier to maintain your image.
Marketing Material
The second key part of your business is your marketing material. There are so many ways this can influence your brand image and help maintain it or rip it down. To start, let’s look at more subtle marketing material like branded items. Whenever your business sends documents to someone, they need to be branded with your logo. As well as marketing and promoting your business, it also reinforces your brand image. With enterprise document management software, you can create templates that brand every document you work on. This ensures that you never forget to add the logo to a letter or email, and your brand image is maintained.
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Your marketing content is also crucial for maintaining your brand. Especially on social media sites where you’re likely to get a lot of impressions. Some social media posts can be viewed thousands of times every day. So, if people are viewing content that relates to your brand, your image will build and be maintained. For example, if you pride your company on its innovative nature and want to appear different and quirky, then your posts won’t be the same as a company looking to appear professional. You’ll have an informal tone to your social media posts and produce quite jokey and quirky content. This goes a very long way to maintaining your brand image, and I’d argue social media is probably the biggest factor in this whole process.
However, you shouldn’t ignore other marketing material like print adverts, tv commercials, etc. Again, the way these are designed or filmed can have a huge bearing on how people perceive your brand. The last thing you want is to film a TV commercial that gives off the complete opposite impression of what your brand image represents.
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On that note, we’ve reached the end of this piece on maintaining your brand image. I will sign off by saying that it’s so important you maintain your brand. If you’re not, then your business ends up confusing people. They won’t be able to fully identify with you as your values differ based on your content, your employees, etc. Make sure everything (and everyone) in your business is geared towards the same brand image.