Creating a unique brand voice can help you stand out from your competitor’s brand, understand your customers better, and grow a business that’s known for more than just its products or services. 

What is the tone of voice?

Are you suffering from stagnating or falling revenue? Are employees not clear on what makes you unique? Are you confused about your customer?

The tone of voice or brand voice may seem like marketing jargon, but the tone of voice is about how you express yourself to your customers. It’s simply knowing your customers, putting them first, and understanding what buying from your business says about them. 

Benefits of having a unique voice

• Improves communication

A tone of voice guide is a document that sets out what your goals are, what your mission is, what topics your content focuses on, how you write, and lots of other foundational aspects of your business. 

Being clear about this means everyone in your organization knows exactly what their goal is and how to go about achieving it. 

• Acts as a training guide

When you have all the information about your company in a document, it saves time training new staff. You simply hand them this guide. 

• Helps with decision making

When making decisions, staff can look at the tone of voice guide and say, ‘Does this help our goal of….’. 

This makes it easier and quicker to reach decisions and be reactive, especially in competitive industries. 

• Saves money

If you’re going to outsource work, particularly writers, it saves you money because they have a lot less research to do. 

• Stand out from your competition

Creating a tone of voice guide means a unique and consistent brand voice that stands out from competitors. Especially when there are so many competitors offering similar products or services. 

What’s in a tone of voice guide and how do I create my own brand voice?

The tone of voice guidelines doesn’t have to be the next War and Peace novel. It can be a few pages with clear and to-the-point information. 

1. Audit current voice

If you’re already up and running, have a look at the way you come across now.

What topics do you talk about? How do customers respond to you? Look at areas you could improve, or do you need a revamp?

2. Audience

The most important aspect of business is knowing your audience and getting your voice of customers right. You should create a customer persona by interviewing customers, interviewing your competitors’ customers, and researching what they say on review sites, forums, social media, and anywhere else they hang out. 

Demographics such as location, age, and job title, aren’t as important as what drives them. They all share common values; what are they?

Are they all people who like to put others first? Are they concerned about their status?

You should have a profile of your ideal customer and for everything you write, speak to this person. 

3. Competition

To differentiate from your competition, you have to know what they’re doing. 

How are they marketing? What gaps are they missing that you could fill? What words are they all using? Don’t use them. 

4. Mission

What do you want to do? This is an overarching message about your company. 

Brand voice example:

The Bodyshop sell skincare. But their mission is about environmental justice. 

Using ethical, sustainable products that aren’t tested on animals and are good for you. 

You can buy body lotion from millions of other places, but you buy from The Bodyshop because you care about what goes into your skincare and its impact on the planet. 

5. Brand vision and promise

How will your brand make a difference?

What is the promise you’re making to your customer?

For example, Patagonia sell outdoor clothes but so do a lot of others. So how are they different?

Their vision is to create the best product in the most environmentally friendly way possible. 

Their promise is to make long-lasting clothes that are repairable and recyclable which saves you money in the long run and helps you reduce your environmental impact. 

6. USP

Your unique spelling proposition can’t be that you’re cheaper than anyone else, or that you have a better-quality product. All these things can be copied. 

What do people get from you that they can’t get anywhere else?

7. Brand personality

If your brand was a person, who would it be? This can help you write from this person’s perspective. Is it something they would say?

For example, Wendy’s is a fast-food chain. And they have a lot of competition. 

But they stand out because of how they talk to their customers. They’re sarcastic, sassy, and funny. 

When their rival McDonald’s tweeted ‘Black Friday ***Need copy and link****’ in error, Wendy’s took the opportunity to make fun of them, replying, ‘When the tweets are as broken as the ice cream machine.’

When people go to Wendy’s, it’s not just about the food, it’s because they resonate with their personality.  

8. Brand values

What do you really believe in? What do you want your company to be known for?

Make a list of your brand values and choose around four of them. 

For example: everbold marketing values are ‘bold, prolific, and opportunists’. This is different form the usual ‘honest, inclusive’, and other bland values that a lot of brands use. 

You should describe what your values mean or give examples of them as what is ‘bold’ to one person might not mean the same to another. 

9. Style guide

Take examples of your writing and put it in ChatGPT and see what tone you’re using. 

Is it optimistic, sarcastic, formal, funny?

Choose a few words to describe it. It may be easier to look at the person you want to represent you, what tone do they use?

What words do you use? What words do you never use?

Make a list of words you use and how you use grammar and now any member of your team can write in a consistent tone of voice. 

Use this tone of voice framework to create your own unique brand personality that will set you apart. If you’re not sure how to do this yourself, it’s a good idea to invest in a brand voice writer to help you create a unique voice that gets you noticed.

Tone of voice is about how you communicate to your audience. It’s about making them buy your product, not just because they like your product but because they like you. 

If you’d like to beat your competition, contact rebeccaboylecopywriting.com to create your own tone of voice guide. 

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Promotions are essential for any business. Different channels of promotions need different budgets. Marketing through custom-printed pens is counted among the most effective and cheapest promotions. Pens are used often and cost-effective to boost brand awareness, build customer recognition, create loyalty, and increase sales. Large companies have numerous options for their promotions, but pen advertisements are one of some options for promoting small businesses. Classic pens are still a preferred writing tool, and the cost of branded & customised pens for promotions is lower than any digital promotions.

It is a tried and tested formula for the promotional campaign as it exposes the target audience to a publicity message. 

Benefits of gettings pens customised for promotion strategies

1. Match Customer Demand

The increasing popularity of branded and customised pens shows how customers like them. This helps potential and target customers to find the added value in choosing a company or business.

2. Increase sales and competitive edge

Customers always compare the same product offered by various companies based on the features it has. Customers can be easily convinced through the customizations, and nothing can beat logo-printed pens in terms of price as it offers cheap branding and publicity with the help of a beautifully durable pen model. 

3. Engage customers

Pens have a lot of variety in terms of colour and style, and it is the best fit for the golden rule of marketing which is to give them something they need and can frequently use. Offering a promotional pen out of a list can give a customer a more profound feeling of ownership and improves engagement among them.  

4. Build brand loyalty

Businesses can build a basis for loyal customers with printed styles. Customers will remember the brand and access the niche of the company’s needs. They start word-of-mouth marketing to friends and family about the highest quality and will focus on details.

5. Daily Exhibition

The right model pen and printed styles are in the eyes of people. Branded and customised pens can last very long and can also be used for gifting to peers and colleagues, friends, etc., where others can see that and get aware of the brand.

Other products that can be used for customization

Products that can be used for customisation apart from pens for promotional activities are:

• Packaging items

Packaging items like carry bags and gift papers can be customised for promotional activities. These are commonly used items for marketing a brand.

• Calendars and diaries

Along with calendars, diaries and other stationery items are customised and are very popular among young children and students as they find it engaging and do organic marketing.

• T-shirt and other wearables

T-shirts and other wearables like flip flops and watches are widely used in promotion with designs and logos related to the brand and company.

• Coffee mugs

Mugs and bottles are the most common and easily traceable brand promotion modes.

• Umbrellas and key chains

Umbrellas and keychains are offered primarily on a brand campaign. These items are used for daily purposes and also get exhibited to crowds daily.

Conclusion

Companies are getting innovative daily in finding new and unique modes of promotion for their brands. They come with different strategies and plans to disrupt the market competition by making a place in customers’ minds. These modes include print media, social media promotion, product giveaway promotion, video advertisements, etc. Some of the most tested and effective promotional ways include branded & customised pens to promote brands. It fits all age groups, has been proven the most effective and cheapest promotion possible and is admired by most customers.

The post Should Brands choose pens for Custom Printed Promotions? appeared first on The Startup INC.

New York City is one of the most influential cities in the world, and it’s not just because of its size. Its culture and history are so strong that it has become a symbol for America itself. Having said that, the NYC market is fiercely-competitive; therefore, building brand identity is indispensable.

Branding is a valuable asset in today’s world. It can help your business grow & flourish. A highly-recognized brand will be able to attract new customers and increase profits.

Brand building is one of the hardest things you will ever do. There are plenty of resources on building your brand but very few ‘how-to guides for beginners.

This step-wise guide will help you develop your brand identity and have it be successful in the marketplace.

Step 1: Research Your Audience & Competition

Before building a brand, you need to know who you’re building it for. Start by conducting market research. This will help you determine what your target audience is looking for when considering buying from you. It’ll also help you understand how your product or service compares to others in the marketplace, which will help narrow down the best marketing strategies and tactics.

Conducting market research & analysis is not everyone’s cup of tea; therefore, it is high-advisable to hire a Digital Marketing Agency NYC. They have a panel of experts to help you with your comprehensive audit, which is an effective way to know your target audience and the products they are looking for. This knowledge will help you make better decisions about your products and services and how you communicate with them.

Step 2: Design Your Logo & Pick a Color Scheme

Designing your logo is a crucial step in branding your company. The logo should be simple and easy to remember while representing your company’s overall brand identity.

In this step, you’ll need to create a logo using Adobe Photoshop or another image editing software. You can use any type of design software you like, as long as it can handle vector graphics — which means that it can scale up or down without losing detail.

The color scheme you choose for your logo will significantly influence how it looks when printed on promotional items, like business cards and stationary. If you’re not sure where to start with this step, there are plenty of resources out there that can help guide you through the process.

There are no standard rules for logo color choice—it depends on what works best for your company’s brand identity and marketing strategy. But one thing is certain: You don’t want any colors that look dirty or dingy because they won’t reflect well on a printed piece of material like an envelope or letterhead (or even on computer screens).

Step 3: Define and Implement Your Brand’s Tone of Voice

Your brand’s tone of voice is how you communicate with your customers. It’s the language you use to sell your product or service, talk about it, and communicate with others. The tone of voice is essentially the same thing as branding — it’s all about communicating in a way that resonates with your audience.

The tone of voice concerns how you write, speak, and think about your business. The tone is how you make people feel when they hear or read what you write. It’s everything from the words to how they are arranged on the page, from the length of sentences down to whether or not there are any periods.

In short, tone of voice is all about communicating in a way that resonates with your audience and makes them feel like they know exactly who you are and why they should buy from you over someone else.

Step 4: Monitor Public Perceptions of Your Brand Identity and Reputation

The fourth step to branding is monitoring perceptions. This is where you will have to be the most proactive and vigilant. You need to know what your customers think about your brand, its products and services, and how they are perceived in the market.

You can do this through surveys or by surveying your customers directly. The latter method is more cost-effective but requires more time and effort, while the former gives you a better idea of what’s happening on the ground.

The Bottom Line

The world has changed considerably, and identity is getting crafted in narrower niches. The old rules have not gone away, but the box has shrunk. However, there still is an overarching code for building your brand identity that remains constant—understanding who you are as a brand, identifying your target audience and what matters to them and what they value, staying true to the core values of your brand, communicating those values through your brand identity across all channels. 

The post A Step-Wise Guide to Create a Powerful Brand Identity appeared first on The Startup INC.

With more and more people spending time online, many businesses take advantage of video production for their marketing strategy.

They invest in creating quality videos or even hiring video production companies to ensure the effectiveness of their content.

If you want to find out more about what video production companies do, you can visit dreamengine.com.au and get your answers.

But for those who haven’t been using videos for their brand yet, you might be wondering what makes video production essential and worth the effort.

So, let’s cut the wait and get started.

Top Reasons Why Your Brand Needs Video Content

For people who have been watching videos online, you might already know how this type of content can impact a person’s interests. But if you’re a company that’s thinking twice about investing in video content production, here are the top reasons why you should start doing it:

Must Read: Smart Guide to Branding Your Business

1) Video content is a great way to explain your products or services.

Video content production is an effective way to reach out to your target market, especially if you’re a start-up. Videos posted online tend to capture their attention and make them understand your message more than when the same target audience is reading long written content. 

In addition to that, many individuals today use social networks and get exposed to social media videos daily, giving you more chances of getting plenty of viewers. With the right strategy, many people will be aware of your products or services.

2) Videos can boost your sales.

Many shoppers online usually prefer to watch videos about certain products before they buy. If you manage to capture your target market’s attention using your videos, they will see the main features of what you’re trying to sell and get engaged. Aside from that, many companies who use videos get higher conversion rates on their landing page. The more conversion you receive, the more sales you’ll earn.

3) Video production can increase web traffic.

Creating high-quality videos can make people more engaged and stay on your website for a longer time. That long exposure will make your site good for search engines increase your chances of ranking higher in the search results and improve your overall web traffic.

4) Videos show your brand’s value.

Your visual content will enable you to express your brand’s value and give people a reason to rely on it. With the right content and video marketing strategy, you can increase brand awareness and make your target market trust your company.

Tips to Create a Successful Video Production

Social media and corporate video production come with a lot of benefits that could significantly impact your brand. However, to experience these incredible advantages, you need to make good video production and do your video content marketing successfully. Below are some useful tips to consider:

1. Use the Right Video Style

There’s a variety of video styles that are suitable for certain types of content. So, before starting your video production, make sure to choose the right one. You can select from animation, real-life action, whiteboard, or motion graphics.

2. Create a Good Script

To make your video production a success, you need to take some time and plan accordingly, which includes writing a good script. If you are planning to use a real-life action video, you need to write down the lines that the actors and actresses will say, as well as organize the settings for the scenes. If you want to do animation, you also need to design the flow of the content or coordinate with the person who’ll do the editing and voice-overs.

3. Produce HD Videos

The quality of the video is critical, especially if you want your brand to look professional. So, if you will create videos for your website or social media platforms, make sure to use the right gear, like camera and lighting accessories, to achieve HD quality.

4. Choose the Right Video Production Company

If you can purchase quality gear for shooting or animation and has all the skills you need to produce quality content, you can surely create your own videos. However, if you’re too busy to handle the workload and want to save money from the costs of buying new equipment, you can get video production services for your brand.

The right video production company will understand the needs of your business and coordinate with you to achieve content that will increase your brand recognition, website traffic, and conversion. Just make sure to do your research, check testimonials and their knowledge about your industry, and ask important questions to ensure that their pricing is worth it.

There are plenty of companies out there that will give you great offers. Yet, you have to stay smart and select the right one because you want what’s best for your brand.

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Your brand is your business’s most valuable asset. And like any other business asset, your brand needs a review from time to time. But how do you know when to change your business image?

Too often the red flags get lost in the hustle and bustle of work insanity. And even when you notice them, the decision to embark on a makeover initiative is seldom an easy one.

So how do you know when it’s finally time to pick up the phone and call a brand agency?

15 Signs Why You Should Consider Rebranding

To help you, we’ve put together a list of the top signs that it’s time to rebrand. In the following, we’ll take a look at each of these signs, what they mean, and how a new brand may approach them. We’ll also look at why rebranding is essential for your business to succeed and what are the first steps to take once you’ve decided to rebrand.  

1. Your Brand Name No Longer Reflects Your Brand Vision

Sometimes changes in cultural context can alter the meaning of a brand name and it might not seem appropriate for the brand’s next iteration. What may have appeared like a huge name years ago may not really be relevant to your brand today.

If you think that your current brand does not reflect the vision of your business anymore, you might want to consider, not a total rebrand, but a few changes that will still keep you recognizable by your past customers/clients. 

2. You’re Not Proud of Your Brand Preference

You picked your own color scheme without consulting specialists, only to discover that they were obsolete. After all, if you’re embarrassed by your brand, chances are other members of your organization are as well, which can take a big toll on external promotion and morale.

Being embarrassed about your brand doesn’t always indicate the need for a complete rebranding. Your brand’s visual and/or verbal identity may just need to be refreshed. Primarily a cosmetic solution, a brand refresh is a readjustment of the look and feel of your brand. A brand refresh may still have a strong influence on a stagnant or outdated brand if it keeps your business’s DNA or core market position intact.

3. You Failed to Differentiate Yourself from the Competition

Another way to know when to rebrand is to know when your brand starts to look like everyone else. Ultimately, It’s all about differentiating yourself from the competition when it comes to your branding strategy. However, you’d be amazed at how many businesses are unable to connect – or even identify – their main differentiators. When you don’t have clearly articulated differentiators, growing sales and business can be extremely difficult. It’s important that your employees and customers understand why your brand is superior to the competition.

A brand name may assist you in identifying and refining your key differentiators, such as your strategic edge: what you are doing better than anybody else. Your competitive advantage is the differentiator that sets your brand apart from all others. Ultimately, no competitive advantage is as powerful or enduring as a strong brand. A strong brand allows you to compete, whether or not you have a tangible advantage over your competition.

4. Your Brand Has Become Too Complicated or Diffused

Is your brand experience scattered or confusing? Does it sound like a tangle of offers without any unifying brand narrative? If so, maybe it’s time to rebrand your business. 

Maintaining a brand across time is challenging, particularly for big businesses with numerous stakeholders with opposing interests. A lack of brand direction offers major difficulties to its efficacy, whether as a result of unrestrained expansion or just bad brand management.

Non-target businesses frequently diversify their product offers or simply mimic the competitors. They are distinguished by a general lack of relevance and weak or vague value propositions. The more complex your brand, the harder it is for customers to understand. If the complexity of your brand is causing your audience to lose sight of it, it’s probably time to take a step back to simplify and target. And a brand new is the only way to get that kind of perspective.

5. Your Business Model or Strategy Has Changed

Another sign of when to change your business image is a change in your business model or strategy. You can’t constantly foresee the outside factors that will drive you to modify your organization. But when your business model or strategy changes, your brand has to change too. How your business is viewed by those it serves should always align with how it operates behind the scenes.

When changing your brand to accommodate a fundamental change in your business, you need to start with the basics: your brand’s compass. Any complete rebranding begins with consolidating your business purpose, vision, mission, and values. Why does your business exist? Where is she heading? How will she do it? What are the values ​​that define the culture of your company?

The clear formulation of these guiding principles is the starting point for any new branding, especially those inspired by a change in business strategy. Your brand’s compass forms a basis for the many other elements of your brand and sets the course for your brand’s future success.

6. You Have Exceeded Your Mark

Knowing when to change brands can be as easy as realizing you’ve passed your brand. Even if you manage your brand expertly as it evolves, there will come a time when you get past its initial iteration. It’s not a question of if, but when.

When you change brands to keep pace with growth, you don’t have to leave all of your old brands behind. If it’s likely that your brand has weaknesses, it’s just as likely that you want to continue to build on its strengths to move forward.

7. You Are in the Process of a Merger or Acquisition

A sure-fire sign that it’s time to rebrand is that you are in the process of making a merger or acquisition. Consolidations nearly usually necessitate some kind of rebranding. In each purchase, it’s critical to consider how the acquired brand fits into the purchasing entity’s brand architecture. 

In the case of mergers, brand architecture is just as important. Ensuring optimal relationships between newly merged brands, products and services helps avoid redundancy, inconsistency, confusion, and cannibalization. Costly inefficiencies like this might detract from the overall value of a strategic alliance. A consistent marketing architecture is critical to any company’s success, but especially those involved in mergers and acquisitions. A rebranding strategy by carefully emphasizing the brand architecture is the best way to ensure the lasting success of all entities involved in the transaction.

8. You Have Moved or Developed beyond Your Original Geography

Another sign of when to change your business image is if you’ve moved or expanded beyond the city or state where your business started. Regional businesses often face the reality of rebranding when faced with expansion. If your brand name is related to where it was born, chances are a name change is needed as well.

But regardless of the brand, expansion into a new region will always bring new customers whose needs are as yet unknown. And the only way to understand new customer needs is to do customer research. As the foundation of a new brand, in-depth customer research allows you to identify the unique challenges of audiences in your new territory. 

9. You Need to Dissociate Your Brand from Negative Perceptions

Another sign of when to rebrand is that you need to dissociate your brand from a negative image. These days, it doesn’t take much for a word or concept to take on a devastating negative connotation. Thanks to social media, political and business missteps can spread like wildfire, turning a once harmless brand into a real hot potato.

Rebranding is often the easiest and most effective remedy in these situations, starting with an internal brand audit to assess where and to what extent associations are managed. A thorough examination of your company’s numerous touchpoints will reveal crucial information about the sources of unfavorable opinions. Negative associations aren’t always as dire as those faced by Philip Morris – who renamed his brand Altria to counter the deep negative associations with smoking – but they can be difficult for a business to disentangle nonetheless. Rebranding is often the only viable way forward.

10. You Struggle to Increase Your Prices

A telltale sign of when to change brands is the fact that you are struggling to raise your prices. If the market price of your product or service seems hopelessly fixed, despite the rising cost of materials, rebranding can be an effective way out. Because, at the end of the day, brands are all about how customers perceive them. in the minds of the people you serve, the cost of your products is entrenched. Rebranding offers you the ability to reinterpret the value people place on your items and raise your prices in response.

Strong brands use their price power to dominate their markets, revive lagging assets, and defend themselves against competitive threats. Like few other market characteristics, pricing power is a growth driver.

11. You Are Trying to Get in Touch with a Target Market

If you’re trying to capture the attention of an audience that has just become profitable, it’s probably time to give your business a facelift. The first step in retaining new customer segments is to make sure that your brand meets their needs. Brand repositioning allows you to integrate brand tracking into your brand revitalization efforts.

With brand monitoring, you can keep track of new and existing consumers’ motivations, preferences, requirements, and purchasing behaviors, and modify your brand experience appropriately. After all, it is good for businesses to stay tuned to changing demographics. The last thing a savvy young population wants is to associate with the dubious brands of their parent’s generation. A new brand allows you to redefine yourself to reach these new untapped audiences.

12. You Don’t Attract the Best Talent

The final sign of when to change your business image is that you are failing to attract the best talent. After all, the best talent wants to work for the best brands. If you are having trouble recruiting top candidates to grow your business, it may be because your employer’s brand is not up to the task. A new brand allows you to redefine your brand for your customers and your current and future employees.

In a competitive employment market, a great employer brand will entice the most talented and competent employees. It will allow you to make sure that you are interviewing candidates who match your values ​​and who are ready to deliver on your brand promise. A new brand image focused on your employer brand is one way to start attracting candidates who will become enthusiastic employees who will positively contribute to the culture of the company and foster trust between colleagues and clients.

13. You Sell Less or Have Lost Customers

An outdated image doesn’t appeal, plain and simple. So your image may be out of date and, as much as your products are good and the price competitive if your brand seems “old-fashioned” people perceive your products or services as stagnant in the past. Visual and graphic codes evolve with us. Your brand image has a limited lifetime. That’s why all the big ones adapt every X years.

Who trusts a company that doesn’t take care of something as basic as, for example, its logo? The logo is very important because it is the main element that the customer identifies with the brand. In other words, the potential customer many times all they see of a brand is its logo.

14. It Is Time to Change Your Brand If You Want to Get Rid of an Old Image That Is Detrimental to Your Business

You will understand this with an example. For many years, the Burberry brand was not as well regarded as it is now in England. In fact, the people who used this brand associated themselves with the typical thug and problem gangs. Thanks to this negative association that the brand had, Burberry lost many potential customers. And he needed to do something to change the situation: completely change his brand.

Therefore, Burberry bet everything to position itself as a high-end clothing brand. And for this, he did not hesitate to be seen among celebrities like Emma Watson in his advertising pieces. Do you know what is the most surprising? Burberry did not change its appearance, nor its prices. Instead, the brand focused all its efforts on cutting-edge art and fashion in its new presentation.

So think about it. You may not be in as drastic a situation as Burberry, but you may be attracting a different customer base than you had planned. This is a sign that you need changes.

15. Discuss Ownership of Any Copyrights in Creative Results as Part of Your Rebranding

Finally, there is the question of creative property. When hiring an independent artist, design firm, or graphic designer, make sure you obtain the right to utilize the intellectual property exclusively.

While the laws vary significantly from one country to the next. You’ll likely want to start a “job for hire” business arrangement. Talk to your lawyer and brand advisor about the best way to move forward. Although you don’t wind up owning the creative, it’s a good start. You can pay to block its exclusive use. Alternatively, you can create visual content using free tools without worrying about copyright issues. It’s going to be so much easier to use tools that will aid you to create and design original images for your brand or company.

Ready to Rebrand?

The decision to change your company’s corporate image can have a great effect on your current customer base. New companies making their leap don’t have much of a history to lean on, but for an established company with a large following, changing a key element of your brand can have a huge impact on your core audience.

Therefore, it is important to consider how your past and current consumers will react to such a change, be it your logo or name design. A failure at such a stage can lead to a reduction in your brand recognition and trust among the people who know you and love your company.

One of the challenges of the corporate makeover is maintaining value. This can leave consumers feeling that their loyalty has been trampled on. Whether you’re already on your way to changing your corporate image or planning the stages, you need to have a solid marketing strategy to handle this challenge. We hope that our 15 tips and signs have helped you to decide whether it’s time to rebrand or not. All the best!

The post How To Know If It’s Time To Rebrand – 15 Signs appeared first on The Startup INC.

Do you know what makes a brand unforgettable? There are many answers to this question, and those answers may depend not only on your brand but the way it’s positioned in the marketplace. The fact is, some brands are more easily remembered by consumers while others are easily forgotten.

Factors Influencing Your Brand’s Memorability

Here’s a closer look at some of the factors that influence your brand’s memorability:

1. Your brand starts with its name. How memorable is yours? A brand name is often the first thing that comes to mind when people think of your company, so your name should be succinct, powerful, and memorable. Just as important as your brand’s logo. Because humans are visual by nature, a compelling logo can stick in the memory longer than a name. A compelling logo should indicate what your brand is about and what you stand for, and be simple and clear. Too much detail can be distracting, as can using too many colors.

2. The colors used in your logo should be chosen with care, as they are often part of what makes your brand noticeable. Different colors produce different reactions. For example, a warm color such as red tends to be attention-getting and may be associated with energy and heat. People tend to associate grassy green with nature and the environment — while a darker, grayer green is often linked to money and financial matters.

3. In addition to your name and logo, a catchy tagline or slogan can make your brand more memorable. Finally, your company’s unique selling point (USP) can also help your brand stand out to customers in a saturated market. In short, your USP refers to what makes your company different than similar ones, and should encourage potential customers to choose your company over the competition. Make sure that you know and communicate your brand’s USP to improve memorability and attract customers.

Reasons Why Your Brand Is Forgettable & How to Make It Memorable?

This infographic was created by Golden Rule Signs, a provider of LED marquee signs

Final Thoughts

Keep in mind, creating a memorable brand doesn’t happen overnight. Take the time to determine how you can make your brand unforgettable, considering the factors that will impact customers. The time you spend could help you attract and retain customers for years to come. The accompanying resource describes more about how to make a forgettable brand more memorable.

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Have you been scratching your head to streamline your business value?

Well, if yes then remember that identifying and applying the right business model can provide a holistic framework to your business.

No matter whether you are leading a small or a big startup, you need a business model to define if your business idea is viable or not.

Over the last few years, I have observed that many startups test and experiment with different models to analyze their cost and revenue streams.

Still many failed to grow their business and measure their progress and craft their strategies accordingly.

That’s why I have mentioned this advice from top entrepreneurs and 5 business models that will drive your company to success.

Advice from Top Entrepreneurs

1. Gelare Danaie (President of dexd )

Dexd is one of the largest design companies. As a senior leader Gelare Danaie was aiming to shape the future of cities, public infrastructures, and transportation.

She was able to witness huge profits by approaching clients.

Gelare Danaie quoted-

“They need to work on different tasks and projects at the same time, and the reality is the business model of consulting business has no luxury for design thinking and co-creation. The outcome is projected to miss one crucial ingredient: innovation.”

So, she was determined to work on uniqueness when she launched her design firm.

Initially, she hired professionals from many different disciplines along with architects and designers.

She mainly focussed on strategists, wayfinders, experts, and researchers to her team.

The motive of the team was to approach new projects with design workshops. This allowed every other party to contribute.

She never wanted to use that traditional consulting model. Therefore she focussed on creativity, not just the shareholder profit.

2. Amelia Kruse (Leadership Coach)

Amelia Kruse started her coaching practice. She always knew that this is going to be the core for the rest of her career.

Do you know she always wanted a sustainable business model that can work in every situation?

She was very much enthusiastic and never wanted to work on a business model that will just work on the present scenario.

Amelia Kruse quoted-

“I was thinking less about building a traditional business model and more about building the foundations of a life for myself. I thought a great deal about what my values were, what drove me as a coach and a person, and what meaning and purpose a coaching practice held for me.”

So, she first thought for a philosophical foundation and then placed a budget for logistics and launching the business.

In her business model, she focussed on the kind of people she wanted to work with.

She believes-

“A great perk of this is that as you evolve as an entrepreneur, you can also evolve aspects of your model since the foundation of your business is unshakeable.”

3. Marta Subko (Founder of subko)

Subko was the second company of Marta Subko that aimed to provide business and marketing solutions.

Marta was in debt after her first startup failed due to the cofounder’s disagreements.

The idea of Subko was much influenced by her first startup.

Marta Subko quoted-

“After this learning experience, it was clear to me that my next business would have the following criteria: quickly generate money to pay off debts; be able to run without any funding; allow me to have total ownership and responsibility for the projects. On top of these things, I needed something that would lift me after feeling incredibly burnt out.”

At that time there was a need for a marketing agency in the French market.

So, first, she figured out that there are no other Francophonic agencies nearby her place.

Marta believes that working as a marketing agency is not a new business model.

It’s just that you need to be curious, innovative, and find a particular niche market that will differentiate you from others.

4. Elana Reinholtz (Bird and Stone CEO and Founder )

Bird and Stone is a jewelry brand that serves directly to customers.

The uniqueness in her business model was giving away the portion of proceeds to nonprofits.

Moreover, she always wanted to start with a movement to revolutionize, instead of just creating beautiful ornaments.

But during the early days of funding, she got lukewarm feedback from investors.

One of the investors told her that merging commerce and philanthropy could never work.

Then she started by self-funding (bootstrapping).

She said-

“If I had listened to him, we wouldn’t be where we are today. Having donated over $100,000 to our impact partners across causes like women’s health, girls’ education, and fighting climate change.”

So, just stick to your aim and don’t convince yourself if you feel that would not work in your case.

If you are starting a company for the first time, people will guide you.

If you think their advice will not work so just ignore them and work the way you wanted.

5. Kristiana Tarnuzzer (Founder of thecausebar)

The Cause Bar started with a movement to bring a change in philanthropy for a new generation of citizen leaders.

Kristiana Tarnuzzer was a philanthropist and she got some suggestions from her network to bring a culture of philanthropy.

The business model was based on building an online platform that provides simple and meaningful ways to lead a cause-focused life.

Kristiana Tarnuzzer quoted-

“I identified a real need and opportunity to unleash the good in those that wanted to be of service more often, but were seeking clarity and motivation on how to do so.”

So, she planned on launching her business to the next level. Philanthropists were able to highly impact by providing personalized plans.

6. Lourdu Mary (Franchise owner of My Apple School)

When Lourdu Mary got retired from the teaching profession, she always wanted to start her school.

With her vast experience, she never wanted to sit at home but the organizational and administrative technicalities were hindering her way.

She bought a franchise of My Apple School by self-financing. The company provided support, curriculum, and training to her staff.

Lourdu Mary quoted-

“But as I was very keen to start something, I started looking around for options that could help me. Buying the franchise of a pre-school chain was the best one.”

So, it’s all about working on a good idea and then starting and turning it into a venture.

Business Models To Follow

1. Supply Chain Business Model

This model helps in monitoring supply chain activities such as distribution, retail, and manufacture.

You can have better control over producing your product and delivering it to the end-user by yourself.

This model helps in providing products at lower prices to customers.

But if you manufacture a product and use a distribution channel then you will have to bear the additional cost at every step.

And this process will continue until your product reaches your customer.

This model was adopted by Amazon, Walmart, Apple, and other grocery stores.

2. Crowdsourcing Models

These models are often used with advertising models. In this model, a group of people contributed content for the website of a company.

For example, if you have a designing website. Many other designers are designing t-shirts and you give them a percentage of profit upon sale

This model is widely used by companies that are trying to solve a problem through an open platform.

If they find the solution then they give incentives or rewards and grow their company further.

Youtube and P&G connect used this model to grow their business.

3. On-Demand Business Model

This model is based on the demand of the consumers. The main objective is to provide products or services to consumers safely in less time.

Many companies are using mobile applications to increase their outreach to customers.

The users request the services in the apps. Then these requests are catered by companies by delivering their goods and services.

These companies are hiring local workers or outsource their delivery services to other companies.

For instance, SpotHero provides parking on demand based on the location of customers in the city.

Also, Glamsquad provides on-demand services for the beauty industry.

4. Blockchain Business Model

Blockchain is a ledger that relies on cryptocurrency. This manages transactions, exchanges between people, and interactions with the help of a technology called a blockchain.

With that revolution, bitcoin became famous worldwide. Since its launch blockchain protocols have been evolving.

Steemit uses a blockchain-based business model. This is a social networking platform that is challenging the Facebook Business model.

Steemit uses a blockchain protocol known as Steem.

5. Ad-Supported Business Model

This model is based on providing free services by providing ads. Spotify is working on this model in which it runs ads on its free version.

So, in this way they are not dependent on their premium users to support their free versions.

The ad-supported version supports 10% of its revenue.

But as the ad-supported model scales, it generates threats to the scalability of business models. The licensing cost for the streamed content increases instantly.

Then the company will have to pay for more royalties.

Wrapping Up

Many startups just copy and paste business models.

Instead, every startup should test the feasibility of their idea by implementing strategies.

Business modeling is a journey that never ends. Every company needs to transform its business model and make it more sustainable for the next stage of growth.

Just remember you don’t need to reinvent a new business model if you are just starting your company.

You can innovate your idea with the above mentioned existing models and grow your business to success.

The post Unique Business Models Behind The Success of Top Entrepreneurs appeared first on The Startup INC.

What’s difficult with developing a new product or service isn’t coming up with a great idea, but putting the idea into action. Entrepreneurs should be taking the right steps to turn their dreams about the next best product or service into a tangible and valuable reality.

From being a concept to finally becoming a reality, a product or service goes through several stages until it’s finally launched in the market and made accessible to consumers.

Of course, the basic idea behind coming up with a new product or service is to solve consumer problems and help make their lives easier.

The roadmap for bringing a product or service idea to the market isn’t straightforward. It’s a long process that involves several risks.

It makes sense why many startups and even established businesses seek help from new product development services to successfully go through the entire process. This post takes a closer look at the different steps involved in taking a product or service from concept to reality.

1) Customer Exploration

No customer means no one will pay for your product or service. This is why knowing your customer is the first big step you must take when converting your business idea into a reality.

What customer segments are you trying to address? Answer this question by stating the major needs and pains your customers are facing. Elaborate on what they want to get done.

These are the things that you must define from the start. Try to really feel and understand the problem of your customers instead of forcing a solution.

Any product or service can be successful so long as it’s creating value for consumers. As you identify and define your market, it’s, still, essential to keep in mind that your product or service doesn’t have to serve every consumer.

Find your niche market by concentrating on one customer segment. Things will become a lot easier that way.

Part of the customer exploration process is problem validation. So, what’s problem validation? It’s the next step you’ll take after identifying a problem.

Does the problem matter to your ideal customers? Does it really exist? Surveys and interviews with a small number of consumers representing your ideal customers are of great help in this respect.

2) Assessment Of The Competitive Advantage Of Your Product Or Service Idea

There’s always competition. Even though you might think that you’re the only one, you’re not. However, as long as you have an idea who your competitors are, there’s no reason to be afraid of competition. Identify your main competitors and analyze them.

Identify the secret sauce that will make your product or service idea stand out in a competitive niche by listing all its relevant benefits to your ideal customers. Lastly, evaluate yourself with your competitors and implement any necessary changes.

3) Building Your Business Case

Now, your product or service idea is already taking real form after pouring over your ideal customers’ input. You’ve fleshed out your idea, and you know it’s going to satisfy a real market need. You now believe that building it will be a good decision. So, what’s next?

The next step is to build your business case. It’s a document examining the benefits and risks that are involved in launching your product or service idea. You should only move forward with your idea if your business case concludes with a compelling argument that it will be a good decision to do so.

It’s pretty straightforward to create a business case. However, keep in mind that along with the scale of your product or service idea, there could be changes in what you might need for your business case. It also holds even when you’re still taking your initial steps.

The following are the key points that a business case elaborates:

• Product Or Service Description – What does your product or service do? What kind of market does it serve?
• Justification For Building Your Product – How much potential for success your product has in the market? It can be measured by taking a closer look at its intended market.
• Project Plan – This is where you outline an estimate of how much a product or service launch will cost. It also includes the steps to take for a successful launch, as well as your sales target in your first month or year.

4) Developing The Concept Of The Product Or Service

It’s now time to conceptualize your product or service idea. Validate precisely what it is that you’re going to build, how things should work, and the features or qualities your product or service should have. Also, describe the materials you need, and how your product or service idea could look or appear.

In the product or service design process, developing the concept of your idea is a critical milestone. It’s where you start building out what exactly you’re going to bring to consumers. It’s in this process where your product or service idea starts to take shape.

It’s essential since you must be sure that you’re producing something you can easily test with your team and customers to find out whether your product or service idea really has the potential to succeed. Idea conceptualization will help you figure out the direction your design should take.

5) Ensuring The Means

After exploring your ideal customers, identifying and analyzing the competition, as well as estimating the different requirements that’d go into launching your product or service, you should next gather all the requirements.

First, make sure that you have resources, both financial and workforce, to invest in the startup. You can approach someone who can partner-up with you or apply for a startup loan in the bank to get some extra help.

The intellectual property right is the second essential requirement you should focus on. It’s the process that you should take to own the rights over your created product. Trademarks, copyright, or patents–these are all covered by intellectual property (IP). IPRs can help you or your company avoid any unnecessary lawsuit and benefit you in the long term.

6) Pricing Your Product

You should know if there’s a demand for your product idea and have a comprehensive view of the competition by now. You can begin the pricing of your product using those insights.

To start with, calculate the costs of product manufacturing and distribution. Your budget for marketing and promotion should also be considered. The numbers, of course, don’t have to be accurate, but they must be close enough to provide you with a clear picture.

Add them all together after you’re done calculating the costs. The sum divided by the number of product units produced will give you the cost per unit of product.

Add a safety factor of 30-50% of the value of each unit to the cost per single unit to take all necessary precautions. You’ll, then, have the adjusted final cost per unit, which will be your final product price.

Why is identifying the adjusted final cost per unit important? You can’t go lower than the adjusted final cost per unit without suffering a loss. It serves as the proverbial floor for your product pricing.

Aside from the adjusted final cost per unit, it’s also essential to figure out the pricing ceiling. It’s defined by how much your ideal customers are willing to pay. To get the pricing ceiling, check the standing of your product in relation to your competitors’, as well as their prices. Of course, your profits increase the closer you get to your ceiling.

7) Creating A Prototype

An initial prototype helps you determine the viability of your product. It’s the physical representation of the product concept. Every product starts out with one.

It’s time to design your product if the researched statistics already ensure a positive opportunity for your idea in the market. The prototype can help you in identifying areas of problem in your product, making the required tweaks possible, and ensuring that your final product is flawless.

A prototype can be as complex as a replica of your final product or as basic as a drawing. Design your product based on the requirements you’ve defined earlier.

Printing out three-dimensional or 3D prototypes has become the newest norm, all because of advancements in the technology for 3D printing. Using computer-aided design (CAD) software, a 3D digital model of your product can now be created.

Implement the necessary changes and develop a couple of prototype batches. It’s an iterative process that you can repeat until you obtain the perfect prototype.

8) Testing With Pilot Customers

It can be a huge risk to launch your service or the first batch of your finalized products in the market on a commercial scale. It’s true even after gathering feedback via surveys and accounting for all possible hiccups.

Therefore, arranging pilot customers to use and experience your product or service is a great idea. It’s a way to warm up towards finally making your product or service available to consumers. Of course, these pilot customers should provide you with honest feedback.

Because your product or service is now in its final form, the pilot customer-provided feedback is more significant than any prior feedback you’ve received.

You can use them for fine-tuning your product or service instead of implementing any last-minute major changes. The product can, then, be launched in the market after any required fine-tuning.

Conclusion

It, indeed, takes a lot of hard work and time to turn your idea into a profitable product or service. But, by adhering to the steps discussed in this post, you’ll have a better chance of succeeding in your endeavor.

The post How To Convert Your Idea Into A Real Product Or Service appeared first on The Startup INC.

As a matter of fact, this is neither the development of the recent past nor is developed by the internet or e-commerce. Studies indicate that it started way back in the 1960s, the early days of television and since then, television viewers have been watching as many as 5000 advertising messages every day.

The fact of the matter is that marketing in today’s world is unreasonably over communicated and at times, they make no sense at all. The idea of market positioning has evolved back in the 1960s itself to help genuine brands break out of this advertising clutter and create a brilliant impression on their target audience with a reasonable amount of advertising messages that emphasize on making a whole lot of sense.

Understanding Market Positioning Strategy

Market Positioning is a meticulous branding plan which comprises a very deep analysis of the consumers’ consciousness and behavior. Based on that, a business or marketer will develop the most precise and accurate approach to reach and influence the target audience in a more meaningful way at a perfect time and place.

If you are still wondering if it is really possible, it is absolutely possible. It may take a considerable amount of time in collecting the most authentic business data as well as developing the most effective and organized way to create the best impression on the target audience but it is certainly worthwhile in the long run.

Ways to Position Your Brand in a Competitive Niche

Positioning your brand in a competitive niche isn’t really impossible and in fact, you can help your brand rank higher even in a competitive niche provided that you follow the right approach. There’s one thing for sure; there is no shortcut to it.

Research is the only thing that will help your brand in ranking higher and the deeper the research, the better the results are going to be. In this post, we are going to share six brilliant ways by which you can conduct a deep research in all sense for a better positioning of your brand.

Evaluate the current position of your Brand

The success of any business lies in going right the basics first. Evaluating the present position of one’s brand or business may seem to be a pretty basic thing but it is how one should start if at all one cares to position one’s brand in a competitive niche. This is going to give you a very clear picture of the competition. Now, when you plan to do it, the first thing you need to consider is the target audience.

Also, it is quite crucial to comprehend the various aspects of your audience. This can be studying their behavior with the other brands, their exact requirement, their purchasing power and of course, their grievances pertaining to the product or service that they have been using so far.

This will certainly help you define your customers well. The next best thing you can probably do is identifying your mission, values and of course, the factors that make your pretty different from the rest of the market. Also, analyze as to how friendly is your current position towards your audience for them to approach you.

Determine your competition

After you make it this far, it’s time to take a close look into the market and see who are the ones who are doing really well in your niche. There are various ways to go about it.

One of the most common ways is enquiring from the sales team as to who are the competitors that are coming in the way of their sales. Also, you may so a search using a market keyword related to your niche and see what are the companies listed for that keyword.

Another brilliant way of determining a competitor is asking the customers about their favorite brands or products in your niche. Choose the ones that you think are the best and begin your competitor analysis. Now, a lot of you might wonder as to why would one even need to do a competitor analysis and might genuinely feel that it’s a waste of time.

However, in today’s world, every business performs a competitor analysis as it helps a business comprehend the various strategies that one’s competitor has used in attaining to such a brilliant position in a particular niche. Of course, you ought to pick a competitor who is doing unimaginably well in your niche.

Competitor analysis

After determining your competition, the next thing you can probably do is perform a deep research on your competitor. If you really think your competitor is doing exceptionally well in your niche, you ought to find out as to what is actually helping your competitor do so well.

Most importantly, you need to ensure that you don’t miss out on any important aspect of competitor analysis. Here are the most important factors to bear in mind while conducting a competitor research:

• The kind of products and services your competitor deals with
• The strengths and weaknesses of your competitor
• Marketing Strategies of your competitor
• The current position of your competitor

You can’t afford to miss out on any of these above points else the research would be just so incomplete.

Analyze the things that make your brand unique

You ought to ask yourself a very simple question as to why the customers will even care to buy your products or services when there are already multiple vendors dealing with the same products or services in the market.

Customers would only consider buying the same thing from you if you can offer something better or unique, right? The competitor analysis will certainly help you comprehend the strengths, weaknesses and marketing strategies of your competitor but in addition to that, you need to find out if there’s anything better or unique you can provide the customers with.

It can be achieved by comparing your products or services to those of your competitor and you never know; you might find a certain area of weakness of your competitor in which you are good. This will eventually help you offer the customers something better and find a leading edge over your competitor.

Develop your positioning statement

After you fully understand your strengths and weaknesses as well as that of your competitor, it’s time to create a brilliant positioning statement. A positioning statement is usually a declaration comprising a couple of sentences to emphasize the unique value of your brand and communicate it well to the customers. Most importantly, it should answer the following questions:

• Who is your target audience?
• What’s your category?
• In what ways your products or services are better than that of others?
• What’s the proof of that?

It is important to create a positioning statement that will stand out among several others. One of the best examples is Amazon’s positioning statement: “Our vision is to be the earth’s most customer-centric company; to build a place where people can come to find and discover anything they might want to buy online.”

Must Read: How to Build Customer Loyalty Through Your Brand Image

Check if the positioning statement is workable?

Although there’s no denying the fact that it takes a great deal of time and effort to create a positioning statement, it is still seen as a small part of the whole thing unless and until it achieves its goal. However, the actual success lies in measuring the impact of the statement on the consumers, going through their feedback on a regular basis, working on the feedback and making it more workable.

The Bottom Line

Positioning your brand in a competitive niche is never an easy job and it can be only achieved with a great deal of hard work and research. Understanding one’s current position as well as that of one’s competitor and finding out the best strategies will certainly help you create the best positioning statement.

However, the hardest part is achieving the goal which will, of course, take a lot of tests, experiments, and gathering of customers’ feedback. If you are prepared to do this meticulously, you can certainly position your brand higher even in a competitive niche.

Brand Positioning Infographic

Source: http://browniecomms.com/2016/09/infographic-8-ways-position-brand/

The post How to Position Your Brand in a Competitive Niche? appeared first on The Startup INC.