Branding: A Series – Research
- At April 21, 2016
- By Alice
- In Blog, Corporate Branding
0
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Research is a necessary part of the branding process. Well, actually it’s just a good thing to do if you’re in business in general. You need to take a look around and see where your stand amongst your competition. What audience to they serve? Is their marketing geared to the same target audience as yours? How have they positioned themselves in the market place? What colors are they using? What connection do these have with their / your target audience? What size of your desired market do they currently serve? These are just a few of the questions that you need to look at when you are in the research phase of branding your organization.
As you can see, most of these questions are round the target audience and market share – Not the visual aesthetic. Obviously, you’ll want your materials to be distinct and not mistaken for your competition, but understanding your place in the market is about much more than your logo or color selection.
Branding: A Series – Color
- At April 16, 2016
- By Alice
- In Blog, Corporate Branding, Websites
- 0
Color can be a powerful element in your branding arsenal.
When you are determining the colors for your business you need to keep in mind the cultural influences of your target audience.
Color meanings variety greatly even within our own culture. Look at the color yellow – happiness and joy on side and cowardliness and caution on the other. These variations only expand when you start looking at the color association of other cultures. Some cultures view yellow as sacred and auspicious while others see it as a color of mourning. Whit this range of meanings it is important to understand your target audience and how they relate to the colors you are considering.
This doesn’t mean you have to rule out or not use any color, but you should do so from a place of knowledge and understanding. If you have an awareness of the possible connections that your target audience has with a color, you can make your selections and usage decisions to support your intended message.
For more details about color associations across culture visit www.empower-yourself-with-color-psychology.com/cutural-color.html
Branding: A Series – Elements
- At March 24, 2016
- By Alice
- In Blog, Corporate Branding
- 0
bThere are many things that come together in the creation of a brand…
- Your logo or brand mark
- Colors – both primary and secondary
- Images – both yours personally as well as determining what type and style that will be used across your materials
- Graphical elements – any graphic pieces that will consistently appear in your materials
- The tone, or voice, of your copy.
These are the basic builds blocks a that are applied consistently across media and reflected in interactions Willard in the development of your brand.
Branding: A Series – Identifying Your Target Audience
- At March 09, 2016
- By Alice
- In Blog, Corporate Branding, Graphic Design
- 0
When thinking about your branding your first thought may not be your target audience, but it is a critical element in the development of your brand. It’s the identification of your target audience that aids in determining some of the elements of your brand. For example if you are targeting high end clients, you want to make sure your copy has a tone that resonates with them, that your images are relatable. These images and the voice of your copy is not going to be the same if you switch your target market to young adults who are just out of college, or to new parents in the middle class.
I have a free download to help you start to build your Target Audience profile.
Simply complete the form below & you’ll be emailed a link to download the Target Audience Persona Work Sheet. This worksheet will help you identify the characteristics that make up your target audience and allow you to personify them into a composite that will make it easier for you and your team to relate to when developing materials.
[contact-form-7 id=”692″ title=”Download Your Free Target Audience Persona Worksheet (email)”]
Branding: A Series – Brand = Reputation
- At February 28, 2016
- By Alice
- In Blog, Corporate Branding, Graphic Design
- 0
Welcome to the next post on Branding. Today I want to discuss the concept that your brand = your reputation.
As I touched on last week branding is about the people involved, their interaction and purpose. Let’s take this a step further and look at how those interaction and stated purposes can be supported or undermined by the reputation that is developed by the people and the organization / company they represent.
If your prospects and clients call in and are greeted by a pleasant and helpful receptionist. They start their interaction with you organization on a positive footing. If the next person they interact with is helpful and courteous then this positive feeling continues. Although they may have heard some buzz (good or bad) about the organization – they people they interact with have started to shift or reinforced their positive impression. This scenario creates a stronger and more positive brand for your organization. The next time they hear about or interact with the organization they will reflect back on this experience and promote it in a positive light.
However, if your prospective client calls in and the receptionist has had a really bad day and is short tempered and rude, this can immediately create a hostile response in the caller. Now, even if the next person they talk with is helpful, it may still not be enough to overcome the negative impression.
Obviously, the more positive exposures a person has with the organization — be it with person-to-person interactions, products, marketing materials (that are sincere and ring true to the persons experience ans perception) — the more easily it will be able to overcome the occasional “bad day”.
Ultimately it is the cumulative collection of these experiences that will make up the reputation of a person, a company, an organization, even a movement. The more people talk and share their experiences, the quicker a reputation grows. If it’s positive, everyone is happy, but it can just as quickly been torn down if you / your organization are not living up to the promises that you give your clients, or the public. This is especially true in the world of social media that we now exist in. Unhappy clients, disgruntled employees, even the competition all have a readily available platform from which to strike and an ever growing audience to hear their complains. This is why if you want a strong brand you need to also be managing your reputation.
