8 Components of Your Small Business Brand

8 Components of Your Small Business Brand

Building a small business brand can simultaneously be both a simple and a very overwhelming task. But let me be the first to say, “YOUR BRAND IS NOT ONLY YOUR LOGO AND COLOR PALLETTE!”

Your brand is everything you do; whether it’s how you manage your finances, how you interact with unhappy customers, or what your social media posts say and look like. That is your brand. Your business’s brand is what people think, say, and feel about your brand.

And as such your company’s brand identity is instrumental when working to grow your small business. Without a strong brand that people can buy into, it doesn’t matter how well your operations run. It doesn’t matter how many leads come down through your sales funnel. Your business won’t be as successful as it could be if your business is not staying true to its brand identity

So, here are 8 absolutely necessary components of your Brand’s Identity:

Brand+Definition

BRAND DEFINITION is literally what your business is — who you are, what you offer, and to whom you your products/services are offered.

Have you ever gone to a website and read about what a company does for pages and pages? You scroll indefinitely, and with all of that information you’re still unsure what that company DOES.

Don’t be that brand.

Your brand definition should be the foundation of your brand identity. A well thought out and stable brand definition should be 100% clear to anyone who comes in contact with your brand. This may seem like a given, but it’s often communicated in an over-complicated way. This makes ”what exactly do you do” the first hurdle in the introduction of your brand to anyone that may be listening. Don’t make it a hard one to get over. Keep your brand definition as clean and concise as possible.

Brand+Values

BRAND VALUES are the ideals that your brand identity represents.

What do you stand for? What specific beliefs do you hold about how business ought to be done? Whether your brand values are based around quality products, reasonable prices, or sustainable business practices, these are the things you believe in, that you want your customer (and of course employees) to believe in as well. Many consumers care about doing business with like-minded companies, so make your brand’s values known.

Not only should you make them known, you need to make them part of how you do what you do. You can tell people you care about sustainable business practices all you want, but if you are not showcasing what that process looks like out in the open, then it is doing no good at all.

Brand+Promise

BRAND PROMISE is the guarantee that you’re offering to your customers by doing business with your brand.

Your brand promise should be adopted by every one that represents small business’s brand in every part of what they do. It ought to come out naturally in your messaging (preferably as one of the first things your audience reads), how you talk to and interact with customers, and your dealings with vendors. Your must align your brand promise must be aligned with both your brand values and your brand experience (to be discussed later).

You don’t want to be lied to. So being promised something that is not delivered makes us feel betrayed and we will avoid that interaction at all costs in the future. Don’t put your brand in a position to (whether knowingly or otherwise) lie to your customers about what you can do for them.

Brand+Image

BRAND IMAGE is the visual face of your business — its “look and feel.”

Your brand image is made up of all of the elements used to visually communicate your brand definition. These can include your logo, brand graphics, colors, fonts, and images. Having a well-designed and well-defined brand image will make your company memorable, help define its personality, and greatly improve its public perception.

Is your brand image a strong one? Is every part of your brand’s image supporting your brand identity? If not, or you’re not sure, Vision+Brand can help with developing, refreshing, or strengthening your brand image.

Brand+Distinction

BRAND DISTINCTION is  the Unique Selling Proposition (USP) of your brand identity.

Distinction with a well-defined USP is what makes your brand stand out from the crowd. Today’s consumers are constantly bombarded with brands every single day on commercials on tv radio and music streaming services, ads on social media, billboards as we drive, in the aisles of every store we shop in. They need to know how to organize them all in their minds. When you’ve got a clear USP that distinguishes you from the others, such as an exclusive feature, special benefit, or unique personality or distinct point of view — and you communicate this clearly to the consumer — your brand identiy then holds a special place in the consumers’ minds, and they will remember you.

Remember, it’s not enough to just be better, you need to be different.

Brand+Position

BRAND POSITION is the position in the market held by your brand identity.

Your brand’s market position helps the consumer know how to think about your offerings, especially when there are many other businesses offering the same thing. Do you offer a premium choice for the consumer, with high quality and a high price? Is your high level of quality matched with a medium price, making you a high value option? Perhaps you’re the economy choice, which for some is a lucrative place to be.

Understanding your brand position focuses around three elements: Consumers, Capabilities, and Competitors. You will need to get ag rip on three things.

  1. Understand what your customers want
  2. What your brand’s capabilities are
  3. And how each competitor is positioning their brand.

Brand+Messaging

BRAND MESSAGING is the voice of your brand— what you say, and how you say it.

We all see this brand messaging in action every time we watch a commercial on tv. All of the funny insurance commercials with caricatured personalities, exotic birds, anthropomorphic reptiles and the like. They’re funny, rarely if ever serious, and always tout the same short recognizable brand promise.

Brand messaging refers to things such as your tagline, positioning statement, brand promise statement, key messages, and marketing and social media copy. Messaging strategy is an important part of brand building. The talking points you use and the writing style you adopt help define your brand. The personality of your brand should show forth in your messaging (whether it be serious and knowledgeable, or fun and entertaining). Your messaging is used to invite consumers in on an emotional level. It should always be relevant, consistent, and true to your brand.

Brand+Experience

Brand Experience is the journey your customers take when interacting with your small business’s brand.

How you deliver your offerings is critical. The experience your customers have with your business solidifies their opinions and contributes to powerful word-of-mouth advertisng. You must create an engaging customer experience from acquisition to closeout. To do this you must do two things. First of all, ensure the quality and performance of your offerings. And secondly improve the process of interacting with your company to align with your overall brand identity.

Our resident nerd on call, Tylor, or as he likes to be called, “Mr. T” (but no one does it), is our in house brand story expert. Content creation and marketing are his super powers, but he helps wherever he is needed. More specifically though, he is an avid TMNT and Marvel fan as well as a collector of vintage video games. Also you can thank him for any movie references made in our collateral. (He’s out of control)

Brand Momentum = Hard Work

Brand Momentum = Hard Work

May I Introduce You To The Momentum+Point…

Branding is Hard WorkI’ve been noticing that a lot of people will post on LinkedIn something like, “Behind this marketing campaign there are tons of unsexy hours that make this marketing campaign powerful.” And I’ve seen a few other things like, “building a powerful company is done with tons of unsexy hours.” But that’s true for everything in life. Anything worth doing is going to have a ton of unsexy hours put into it. If you want to get in shape and have a beach body, you’re going to have to put in a ton of hours at the gym and hold to consistent dietary habits to reach that goal. If you want to build a brand like Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk, or Bill Gates have built, go back, and look at pictures from when they first started out. All came from humble “unsexy” beginnings and thousands of hours of hard work.

It takes time and effort doing the things that others will not do to create something amazing. That’s exactly what it takes to reach the Momentum+Point. If you want your brand to reach the Momentum+Point, you’re going to have to put in a whole heap of unsexy hours to make that happen. But it’s a beautiful thing, that as you put in those hours, and you start to see some wins and the future you’ve dreamed of becomes reality.

Talk to anybody who’s really into working out. For them, working out becomes a part of their DNA. It becomes part of who they are.  They get EXCITED about going to the gym! They know what it’s done for them, and they’ve seen the results.

Along those same lines, first, you have got to pick something that you are passionate about, and that you WANT to do. And secondly, you must understand it’s going to take a lot of those unsexy hours we’ve talked about to get to the desired result.

What is the Momentum+Point?

The Momentum+Point for any brand is based on five fundamental areas in any business: Impact, Organizational Development, Revenue Generation, Financial Management, and Operations Management. These five areas work in tandem to drive the momentum of your brand. Underperforming in any one of these five key areas can potentially keep your brand form thriving the way it should.

But, as you know, anything worth doing is worth working hard for. You probably will not be able to start a business and immediately have it running like a well-oiled machine. It will take hard work and somebody who is willing and excited about that hard work to gain the momentum needed.

The five areas of The Momentum+Point correlate to building a solid, impeccable brand. Let’s dive into each of these areas of alignment.

First area of alignment – ImpactImpact is your brand

Most companies out there would say they are about more than just the service or product provided. They’ll say they have corporate social responsibility in place. They understand that they have some sort of responsibility to their community, to the world. Whether that impact is diversity and inclusion, helping the environment, or providing a culture for individuals to empower their mental health. It may be a business or organization that’s aligned to religious view that believes that their impact is spiritual in nature and can be achieved through their business.

Now, how does this impact play into brand? If you look at companies today, there are those that are known for their impact on the world. If they’re a manufacturing company, they may want to lead their company towards zero emissions in the future. So, they set that as their impact vision. And in the world, we live in, many people will buy into that vision.

There is a book called Start Something that Matters by Blake Mycoskie. Blake explains, companies that build around an impact that matters to people beyond their service/product, that it built momentum in what they were trying to do. For example, at Toms shoes, for every pair of shoes they sold, someone in the world got a pair of shoes. This is the kind of impact that he’s wanted to make, and it caught on worldwide.

There are companies, however, that focus on other areas of alignment to build their brand, but at the end of the day, they must understand that just like when making a cake, you MUST have all the ingredients for it to bake and taste scrumdidlyumptuous! These brands and organizations understand the power of the impact they have, and how it builds their brand. So, if you truly are wanting building a small business that has a solid brand, you absolutely cannot forget about impact.

Second area of alignment – Organizational Development

Culture is Brand

Organizational development really focuses on a few key areas within a company. First of all, Org Dev is responsible for creating company culture. Creating a culture within your brand that focuses on the needs (both physically and emotionally) of your employees not only the bottom line is arguably the overarching function of the organizational development within your company.

Secondly, Org Dev is responsible for talent acquisition and optimization. This ensures that you’re not only acquiring the right talent, but also retaining the right talent. Making sure that the talent within your company is properly stratified and placed within the proper roles within the proper divisions. Ultimately that you’re utilizing people’s strengths and creating opportunities for their growth within your organization.

Finally, putting technology in place to make sure that your employees can be successful. If you are not utilizing technology, then that’s going reflect in the performance of your workforce. Your employees are the greatest assets that you have to work with, and most likely your most expensive as well. If you’re not attracting the right talent, if you’re not paying the right amount to get quality hires, if you’re not giving them opportunities for growth, then this is all going to be reflected in your culture and ultimately your brand.

You can tell the organizations that are not paying for the right talent, that their culture is horrible. Their service, operations, and looks on the employees faces tell it all. The great resignation has been quite the indicator that many companies had stopped focusing on providing a healthy culture. So, people left to go find companies that do.

So, we see that Organizational Development is another key ingredient in creating a brand that is healthy, well known, and growing.

For the final three parts of the Momentum+Point framework check out our post: Intro To The Momentum+Point (a sequel)

Our resident nerd on call, Tylor, or as he likes to be called, “Mr. T” (but no one does it), is our in house brand story expert. Content creation and marketing are his super powers, but he helps wherever he is needed. More specifically though, he is an avid TMNT and Marvel fan as well as a collector of vintage video games. Also you can thank him for any movie references made in our collateral. (He’s out of control)

whiteboard mathematical formulae

"GAINING MOMENTUM FOR YOUR BUSINESS DOESN'T NEED TO BE COMPLICATED

Is your business gaining Momentum? Have you hit a wall? Have you plateaued?

If you are a business owner or leader, then take just 5 MINUTES right now to take our Momentum+Point assessment.

*IMPACT*ORGANIZATIONAL DEVELOPMENT*FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT*REVENUE GENERATION*OPERATIONS MANAGEMENT

"MAY THE MOMENTUM BE WITH YOU"

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