Dee’s marketing blog: Brand building… the essentials

Dee Blick is a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Marketing, the world’s largest marketing body. She has 26 years’ marketing experience gained working with blue chip organisations and SMEs. Dee is the author of the bestselling book; Powerful Marketing on a Shoestring Budget for Small Businesses. In the last five years Dee has won six awards for her published work and has featured on the BBC as a marketing entrepreneur. Dee writes for a number of business publications and she is an active blogger and twitterer.

Branding has always fascinated me. When I started out in marketing 26 years ago, I assumed that branding was all about creating logos. Although undeniably important, there is much more to branding than just good looks. So, before looking at how you can build your business into a brand, we need to define what a brand is. In my opinion, there’s no better definition of branding than this one from Philip Kotler, a world expert on the subject:

‘A brand is a promise to your customers, the totality of perceptions about a product, service or business, the relationship customers have with it based on past experiences, present associations and future expectations. Brand reality is always defined by the customers’ view.’

Spend some time understanding this definition and how you can apply it to your business. And above all, remember that it’s your customers’ perception of your brand, not yours, that will determine its success. By way of illustration, can you remember what happened to the Ratner brand when Gerald Ratner made his now infamous speech about the quality of the jewellery he sold? The following day the value of the Ratner brand plummeted. In the light of Gerald’s speech, customers began to perceive his brand as shoddy and cheap, and naturally didn’t want to be associated with it.

If you want to build your brand, what should you do?

Start by focusing on the 3C’s of branding, namely:

· Consistency
· Clarity
· Continuity

Successful brands are consistent. Whenever either existing customers or potential new clients come into contact with your business, they should benefit from the same consistent treatment. Make sure that you identify each customer contact point and look at how it can be improved.

Successful brands are clear in the messages they deliver. They know exactly what they stand for, exactly why customers buy from them and why they will continue to buy. They don’t overcomplicate their core messages, and when developing key benefit statements they look at their business through the eyes of their customers. What are the clear and powerful messages that you are delivering?

Successful brands are in it for the long haul. Customers like to know that the businesses they favour will be around for many years to come. Are you investing in your business at a grassroots level to build strong and sustainable foundations?

I’d like to share with you the results of a business to business branding study undertaken by McKinsey, in which 750 key decision-makers from a variety of sectors were asked what influenced them when they looked to buy products and services from another business.

The results were:

45% said that the reduction of risk was very important in choosing a new provider. Remember the saying: “Nobody got fired for buying IBM” (What are your reassuring messages to reflect that you are as safe as houses?)

41% said that they wanted access to relevant and useful information about a business before making the decision to do business with them. (Does your online presence and sales and marketing collateral withstand critical scrutiny?)

14% said that the visual identity of the business was important. (Is your logo and livery up to the job?)

Finally, you should make an emotional connection with your customers, regardless of what you do. Showing that you understand their needs at a deep level and that you genuinely value their business could be just what makes you stand out in a sea of competitors.

Read Dee’s previous blog: click here.

Tags: branding, Dee Blick, marketing, small business, sme, tips

Posted by Dee Blick on Sunday, February 14th, 2010 at 9:00 am.

Filed under Ask an Expert, Features, SMEs, Starting a Business, Tagged as: , branding, Dee Blick, marketing, small business, sme, tips.