Marketing a small business can be very challenging. You don’t have a big name and a big reputation to rely on, and you certainly won’t have a big budget. However, your branding is still hugely important as a small business, in fact it is arguably more critical to your success because successful branding can give you a welcome leg-up in the market, while poor branding can have fatal consequences and cause huge damage to the lifespan of your business.
Here we have outlined five key areas you need to focus on when developing your brand as a small business:
Unique
It is more important than ever that your branding is unique. As a small business you need to make a name for yourself and to stand out from the competition. Try and copy others and you will be swallowed up in the mass of indistinguishable small businesses who struggle or go under. Make your branding, and particularly your logo design, unique and you have a much better chance of establishing a place in the market.
Know your customer
As a small business it should be much easier to identify your core customer base, and even if it spans a number of different demographics, they should be easier to reach, so capitalise on this simpler customer focus and think of their needs. Build your brand around their needs and make sure your branding and messaging is geared towards them. Get this right and your customers become your brand ambassadors, and end up doing a lot of the marketing work you don’t have the budget for.
Standards
Building your brand on principles of quality is hugely important for a small business. You will live or die on how good your product or service is, and having high standards will also help you develop trust, credibility and to become a professional in your field. A big part of having standards is also about being consistent. As a small business you need a strategy and you can’t afford to change it or confuse it. Your message needs to be direct and meaningful and if you believe in it then stick with it, and that means being consistent across all your channels, ie. with the product, with branding, with advertising, with social media and with your website design.
Social Media
Not everybody is a fan of social media, but as a small business it is an effective outlet for growing your brand. Social media can help build your brand and expand your reach, while you can easily, quickly and cheaply target your customer base and develop new, creative tools for promoting your product or service.
Think big
Just because you are a small business it will do you no harm to think big. If you feel like being bold and courageous, be bold and courageous, as long as it fits with your brand and your customer expectations. If you have a strong brand message and believe in it, then take it as far as it can go. You should also have plans and a strategy for expanding your brand, developing your product and service and reacting to market changes. It doesn’t matter what size your business is, you should always be looking to the future and how you are going to survive, and hopefully prosper, and thinking big and evolving your brand are key parts to that. And don’t forget, every business was a small business once.
If you need any more information or help with your brand identity then contact me at the Rebus design and branding agency. I have extensive knowledge and experience of working with clients from many different industry sectors and developing their brand with great success.