If you have just started your business in the online space you may be wondering how anyone is going to know about what you offer. Well my friend, you are in the right place – It all starts with Brand Awareness.
Your Brand comes from the unique style you use to sell yourself or your company. Let’s take a look at popular fast food brands Subway and Mcdonald’s. Although these two well-known brands may market food, they both have their brand personality and voice and appeal to different target markets.Subway are known as a healthy fast food for working individuals. McDonalds is a family-friendly fast food restaurant with meals and activities marketed for the children. (If your family is anything like mine, we end up McDonalds for the happy meal & playground to keep the kids happy).
How did these two brands build their popularity in their ideal market? You guessed it – it started with Brand Awareness!
What Is Brand Awareness?
Brand Awareness is the familiarity and recognition of a brand to their target audience. It is a is a measurement that shows how well consumers know a brand, product, or service. These levels answer the question, “How well-known is your brand to the people you want to reach?”
Think about brands like Coca-Cola to help you understand the idea better. People often say “Coke” when they mean “soft drink,” no matter who makes it.
That’s because Coca-customers Cola’s know the brand well.
One of the best things you can do for your brand is to make sure people know about it. High levels of recognition can make your product or service more valuable and give your company an edge in the market.
The Benefits Of Brand Awareness
Strong brand awareness can make a real difference in your business’s performance.
The benefits of building strong brand awareness will affect many parts of your business, from marketing to design to customer service.
Look at what’s good about it!
More Customer Trust
When did you last buy something from a brand you didn’t believe in? Probably never or a long time ago.
In the 21st century, trust is the most important thing. People rely on what their family and friends say. They find out what people think about a brand, product, or service and then make decisions based on what they find out.
Brand awareness helps you build consumer trust because people will know what your company stands for and what it wants to do.
Customers will be sure to come back to you if they know your brand well. In other words, brand awareness is what makes people loyal to your brand. How reliable your customers are has a direct effect on your sales.
This is even more important when you’re giving a service online. Since your clients don’t meet you in person, making them more familiar with your brand can help them trust you.
Recognisable Marketing
Brand awareness helps people make connections. A lot of people use Kleenex instead of handkerchiefs, order Coke instead of soda, and so on. Consumers think of the brand name first, and they don’t always know the difference between brands.
It links things that happen to certain products. We replace common words with brand-name ones. Part of our marketing is done for us in this way. If you offer a service online, this can be very helpful. Need help with your books? Go to xxx, if you need someone to write a blog post, go to xxx. And so on.
Getting You In Front Of The Right People
The key to success is getting to the right people at the right time. Brand awareness is an important part of building your brand and getting more people to buy your products. Brands that are already well-known can spend less on marketing and still make sales and get more people to buy their products.
Once brand awareness is high enough, you can work on customer loyalty or brand associations.
Why Is Brand Awareness Important?
Brand awareness is important because it is the first step in the marketing funnel and a key building block for getting customers in the future. People’s ability to remember and recognise your business is what is meant by “brand awareness.” Building and increasing brand awareness is important for several reasons.
First of all, brand awareness helps your audience remember your brand. People can get used to and comfortable with your brand if they know it. Then, if they have to choose between you and a competitor, they are more likely to choose you.
Having people know about your brand also helps you achieve several business goals and objectives. It can help you reach more people, get more people to visit your website, build brand loyalty, and find new leads.
Brand awareness is at the top of the marketing funnel, which shouldn’t be a surprise. Brand-awareness campaigns try to reach a lot of people. They tell a lot of people what you have to offer and take care of the most interested people.
How to Increase Brand Awareness
Have a branding board to ensure design consistency
An important factor of brand awareness is using consistent colours, typography & imagery. This can be established using a branding board that your designer can create for you.
Brand Awareness falls under brand recognition, where a client can recognize your brand through visual indicators such as colors and logos. For example, I spoke about the two fast-food chains that cater to family-friendly individuals. Still, as soon as a person sees the noticeable golden “M” arch, they are fully aware the logo belongs to McDonald’s. Therefore, brand awareness is essential if you want visibility regardless of your business type.
Brand awareness can take a while to become recognised, and you will need some tools and strategies to build your brand awareness outside of your branding board.
Make sure your brand is publishing content where it’s ideal target audience hangs out
As a new business owner, you must show up on the platform where your ideal audience hangs out. Each target audience is different and the platform they are most engaged on is different. So the key is to really understand WHO you are targeting, WHAT they will find valuable & WHERE they hang out so that you can have an effective marketing strategy to increase your brand awareness.
Be Social on Social Media
Whether you are outgoing, introverted, quiet, or bubbly, we all thrive on human interaction. It is healthy to have meaningful connections, spend time with each other, learn new things and become known to others.
This is important to increase brand awareness because you must create rapport with other business owners if they turn into a hot leads. For example, if your ideal target audience is on Instagram, posting engaging reels and stories to provide free value will increase your brand awareness. You should never start pitching your services to random people on social media (seriously, I HATE this).
People like to buy from those they know, like & trust. So show your REAL self- be social on social posts about both your business and personal milestones. Interact with your audience by asking questions and engaging in content. By adding value on social media by engaging with member posts you are not only increasing your brand awareness but you are also increasing rapport with potential clients.
Nurture your ideal target audience so they remember you!
Everyone loves a freebie right? Well it goes a long way to increasing your brand awareness when you get something for free that is valuable and memorable. Here are a few ideas to get you started:
Lead Magnet: Provide a free guide that is valuable to your audience to establish a relationship that can eventually lead to buying your product or services. Once you provide a piece of content that helps solve a problem, you increase the likelihood of being remembered and having them come back to your website to take the next step (your paid services).
Email Marketing: Once you create a free lead magnet to offer your potential audience, you can create an opt-in form on your website for them to provide their email address in exchange for the lead magnet. Once they subscribe to your email list, you can nurture your leads with more free content from you that in time increases the likelihood of you getting a sales as they get to know you, resonate with you & become mmore interested in your services. Ideas for email marketing content include newsletters giving them free advice, templates, or directing them to your latest blog post or free webinar. Email marketing has great conversion rates and is something that can be super valuable to increase your brand awareness.
Facebook and IG live: If you are hanging out on both platforms, you should do your best to provide video content to show your audience that you are the face behind the brand (Eeekk, if you’re an introvert like me it’s scary I know).
The thing is, your target audience needs to know that your brand is legit and that you can provide the value at an accessible cost to make them become paying customers. Putting your face out there is a quick way to build trust with your audience.
Use A Co-Marketing Strategy
If you need to increase your brand awareness, try Co-Marketing. You can collaborate with other business owners with the same target audience as you to get more brand awareness. For example, you can:
- Be a guest on a podcast
- Be a guest blogger
- Be a guest at a summit or masterclass
This can benefit you to show your brand personality with knowledge and expertise, and you can network and pitch your services for more brand recognition.
Conclusion
As you can see, there are many benefits to increasing your brand awareness. When working as an online service provider, brand awareness is so important to help cut through the noisy online spaces and be seen by your target audience. After all, you may be the best in the biz, but if no one knows about you then no one will ever benefit from your services. So get your self out there and be SEEN.
If you would like a website to increase your brand awareness & be found online you can contact me HERE.