Company branding - What is it?

It is a popular marketing technique aimed at creating and consolidating brand awareness in the minds of potential customers. Branding consists of elements such as name, logo, advertising slogan or consistent visual identity. What else is worth knowing about it?

Determining the brand's target audience

The first step in branding is to define the target group to which the company's offer will be directed. The key issue here is the appropriate adaptation of activities and message to the needs of this group. The analysis should be carried out in as much detail as possible, describing the exact behavior pattern and lifestyle of potential customers. For example, they could be young people interested in travel, or employees involved in recruitment. Narrowing down the target group when building a brand makes its message much clearer and more influential to customers. Defining the target audience can also bring tangible benefits to marketing efforts. Companies with a website can take advantage of Google Analytics statistics here, and Facebook profile owners can take advantage of Facebook's dedicated analytical tools. They can find a range of valuable information about their age, gender, interests or most frequently visited websites.

Defining the brand mission

The next stage of branding a company is defining its mission. Every entrepreneur should be aware of what value his brand offers and what its guiding idea is. It is worth realizing that the advertising slogan will influence each aspect of the branding strategy. Each element - the slogan, logo, communication language or modus operandi - should reflect the brand's mission.

Competitor analysis

The overriding goal of building a brand is to make it stand out from the competition and convince potential customers to decide to buy products or use the services of a particular company. When analyzing the competition, it is a good idea to focus on how different brands have managed to approach the topic of branding. It is advisable to create a table and include issues such as mission, marketing activities, identification, customer feedback or quality of products and services. The next step should be to consider issues such as how competitors advertise their products and services in traditional channels and online, and whether they are consistent and coherent in their message. It is best to select 3-4 local companies for such analysis.

Benefits and brand strengths

A very important step in branding is to take a closer look at the products or services you offer and find something unique in them that competing products do not have. Here it is worth focusing on the values and benefits that make a brand stand out from the competition. Knowing your target audience, you can try to find the reason why potential buyers will choose our company over the competition. It is not about creating features or functionalities of products and services, but finding added value. This could be, for example, a reduction in the time required to perform daily duties, an improvement in productivity or the ability to reduce daily expenses.

Logo and slogan

An effective visual identity for a brand is one that is consistent with its mission and appropriately tailored to a predefined target audience. The task of creating a logo is worth outsourcing to specialists. This is because it will appear on all advertising elements related to the brand, becoming its business card and the most recognizable visual element of branding. The ideal logo should be both simple, clear and easy to remember. Most often it is also accompanied by a logo book, which is a kind of instruction manual for the logo.