8 important marketing tips you should be doing now to develop your business brand:
1. Have a well branded website and all business livery Your website, staff uniforms, business cards, letterheads, packaging, annual reports and ‘with compliments’ slips, communicate the brand you want to portray to your customers.
2. Ensure you have search engine optimisation Arrange to have your website rank highly in Google for key word searches relevant to your product.
3. Appoint brand ambassadors Identify staff that live and breathe the company’s brand through their actions and behaviours; and provide incentives for them to promote the core values and essence of your brand in dealings with internal and external customers.
4. Refresh your brand Review at least annually on all elements that make your brand unique. Keep abreast of local and international trends on what other industry players are doing with their brands. Ensure that your brand reflects any changes to company structure, products and services.
5. Invest in people development Ensure your product and services are sold to your employees first, before they are sold to your customers. Engaged employees will engage your customers. Ensure staff receive ongoing training and a career pathway is mapped out with them so they can see how their performance is linked to the growth and future of the company. Engaged employees are more likely to stay with your company and become effective brand ambassadors.
6. Understand your key brand touch points Ensure there is consistency at the major brand touch points. How your brand is perceived at these touch points will determine the strength of your brand in the market. Major brand touch points include employees, website, business cards, trade shows, company presentations, annual reports, the media, industry publications, advertisements, packaging, company car, staff uniforms, mergers and acquisitions and financial performance.
7. Have a work environment that reflects the brand Ensure the physical environment your staff work in, motivates them to higher levels of performance and contributes to open communication. Ask your staff how they feel about the work surroundings – it may only be a splash of paint, new carpet and a coffee machine that will bring some life back to the workplace.
8. Resolve customer complaints quickly Treat all complaints seriously and give them number one priority. A dissatisfied customer can turn into a loyal buyer if their complaint is resolved quickly and with minimum of fuss. This doesn’t mean the customer is always right, but it does send a strong message that you live and die by your brand and the customer is very important.
