So you've successfully launched a small business!
Congrats!
Most people only dream of launching their own business, but you've gone the whole mile, drafted a corporate business plan, registered your business name, and found your first client!
However, while launching your business is a huge accomplishment, there's still a lot of work ahead of you.
It would be best if you got proactive with branding your business and marketing it to the world.
Below, I've compiled a quick guide on branding your small business so that you can help yourself stand out from the competition and stick in the minds of the consumers you interact with.
Do Your Market Research
If you've already launched your business, you're already aware of the importance of performing market research.
Essentially, market research allows you to find out if there's a demand for your products or services, in turn, helping you assess the viability of your business.
However, when it comes to branding, market research is just as, if not more important.
Before you move on with creating brand guides, designing your marketing materials and promoting your brand, you need to get a firm understanding of who your target audience is.
The best way to do this is to create "buyer personas," which are semi-fictional representations of the people who are most likely to interact with your brand.
Buyer personas should contain as much information about your ideal customers as possible, including their average age, gender, geographic locations, hobbies, interests, and more.
For example, if your small business sells athletic apparel and footwear, one of your buyer personas might look something like this:
Name: Jim Galafakis
Gender and Age: Male, age 27
Location: San Francisco, California
Interests: sports, outdoor recreation, hiking
Ideally, this fictional character will be someone who is most interested in buying from your brand.
So by using this buyer persona, you'll have a much better idea of how to create brand guides and marketing materials that appeal to this type of person.
Create A Brand Style Guide
A brand guide or branded style guide is essentially a rulebook containing all pertinent information related to your brand's look, feel, and voice.
Brand style guides contain the specifications relating to your branded colours, brand logos, image specs and dimensions, typography, and tone of voice.
These are used as a general guide to ensure that your marketing materials will be consistent at all times, regardless of who is creating them.
Design Marketing Materials
Marketing materials, such as business graphics, logos, brochures, pamphlets, business cards, and social media accounts, are essential when promoting your brand to your target market.
BusinessCards is a free tool anyone can use to create and print 100% custom business cards to help with their branding.
Again, your brand's style guide will help ensure that all these materials align with your brand's overall goals and approach to business.
Marketing materials can be created in-house, or for those who need help with this, there are plenty of freelance workplaces, such as Upwork, Fiverr, or Freelancer, where you can find skilled people to help.
Regularly Review, Revise, And Improve
When you first launch your business, you should have a general idea of how you want to be branded.
However, as your progress in the lifecycle of your business, it's essential to regularly revise your brand to ensure that it's still in line with your target demographic and your own businesses' overall goals and objectives.
We recommend that, once a year, you and your team sit down together to re-evaluate how your small business branding has and is resonating with your audience.
