When getting ready for the first moments and actions of your startup, there’s a whole lot you’re going through: your emotions and expectations are reaching for the sky, you are getting used to the burden of every decision and being held accountable for every next step and action. This is when you start to realize that the key to success stands in your management and organizing skills but also relies on things that are out of your control such as the customer’s first reactions to your business. A contingency plan? Let’s find out in the following paragraphs where we speak of one important aspect of the business: branding.
A Starting Point
In order to have a business you would have identified a customer need for which your business is the solution or maybe you have a new and innovative proposal for the market. Either way, you need to know your business and your customers. He needs to understand what you are selling, its perks and advantages over the other products he’s been using or simply why he would want to interact with your brand and eventually stick around in the long run. Therefore the image that they interact with first, gives them the overall feel of your brand. In the age of visual identity the focus has shifted from organizations to individuals, all brands craving for brand equity. Your site interface, your logo, your display, they give your customers the first feel of your brand and here the first judgment is made: is your identity confusing? Does it show exactly what you are trying to convey? Will the customer like to associate him or herself with your brand image?
Visual content is dominating in 2015 therefore you need to start with your logo and work your way up. Designhill.com made an interactive guide to show us the secrets and stories behind famous logos. There’s much more than meets the eye so creating your logo would preferably require hiring a specialist that understands your brand’s mission and vision. What you would need is quality, logo design and an overall theme and brand feel that makes customers remember your brand. Take for example juice brands that have become so famous that customers recognize them only by seeing their font, swoosh or colors.
Things as subtle as the FedEx arrow hidden inside its logo are meant to spice things up by challenging the visually based consumer in better understand the speed of the business in this particular instance.
A Couple of Tips
- Show cohesiveness in every media and every communication. Your identity needs to give the same feel no matter the platform or context. Loyalty is built through time. Show consumers that there are people behind the brand. Everybody loves to see the human element especially these days when we get more and more curious as to how things go around and function. Because of the advertising boom that took us over, we need something to help us filter through our favorites and those who get our attention, the emotional factor being one of the more strong criteria people base their decisions on.
- Be responsive and interact with customers on the social media channels no matter the message they sent. Talking to an abandoned wall or other consumers is not going to flatter anyone, nor will they give any second thought to a brand that turns its back while they speak.
- Monitor your competition, learn from their mistakes and don’t make them yourself. You’ll make plenty of mistakes along the way, that’s how everyone of us learns but try to make sure they’re as few as possible
- Your visual identity is the first thing that tour consumer comes in contact with and the first step to building credibility. Everything from the shape of your logo to the colors you choose for it says something about your business. Here you can find a detailed infographic that can help you choose your colors by explaining them not only in one word but by characterizing every color choice with its personality traits.
Conclusions
Having your custom graphic design, helps put your brand at the top, by engaging consumers and tackling their curiosity. That is why it is best that your greatest brand investment begins with its identity. Choosing who you work with on this matter can be as influential as the choice of school for a first grader: it contributes to its whole life afterwards.
Check out this great Infographic about small business trends.
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