5 Ways To Build Brand Recognition. Quickly

When you think about the biggest companies in the game, you instantly think of their branding. Imagine Coca-Cola, Nike, and Apple for a second. You immediately picture the red branding of Coca-Cola. You picture Nike’s adrenaline-pumping, adventure branding and iconic tick. You imagine Apple’s apple, and its link to beautiful, creative products.

This is an exercise in great brand awareness and recognition. Unfortunately, it’s why many startups fail to make an impression. Establishing your brand and building recognition is one of the hardest mountains for new startups to climb. Why? Because there are simply so many others out there. How do you get people to become familiar with your branding? If you have a fleet business, you may consider installing industry fleet graphics to show your brand identity. You may also click here if you are looking for new and innovative ways to connect with your audience and grow your brand.

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  1. Media coverage

Step one, secure as much media coverage as possible. Seeing your startup’s name in national newspapers and high profile websites has a subconscious effect on people. They instantly begin to see your brand as established, and respected. Customers respond to brands that are supported by media outlets. So, once you’ve honed your branding, start a PR campaign to tell your story or launch a product. Use a press release distribution service to get your message under the nose of key journalists. With your name in lights, you’ll start to build that brand recognition.

  1. Partnering with another brand

We’re big fans of startup partnerships here. So long as you pick a company that doesn’t compete directly with yours, you’ll gain a lot. Consider partnering with a related company to host an event or sponsor a new initiative. This cross-promotion allows you to tap into their customer base, and get your name in front of new people. Think carefully about the right company to approach. Don’t choose a rival, but do chose a business that has a similar target audience.

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  1. Let the product promote itself

The smartest new companies let their product do all the heavy lifting. Media outreach and marketing is expensive, not to mention exhausting. That’s why organic ‘word-of-mouth’ promotion is so fantastic. It teaches customers to buy from you, without you imposing on them. But, how do you start the ball rolling? Consider Uber’s marketing model. It used the simple process of referrals to grow. They offered their users a free $20 taxi ride when they referred a friend (who also then got a free $20). It was a domino process, and these referrals drove brand recognition (and sales) through the roof.

  1. Content

Establishing a name for yourself online is rarely easy, due to the sheer competition. However, phenomenal content might just set you apart. Start by creating great content (articles, videos, infographics), and brand it heavily with your imaging. The best content is shared far and wide across the internet, taking your brand name and imaging with it! Simple.

  1. Advertising

So far, we’ve covered the organic methods of building brand recognition. If you’re looking for a quicker method, tap into the incredible reach of advertising. By using online ads or real-world advertising, you can get your brand and image in front of thousands.

Remember, people need to see your branding roughly seven times before they’ll trust your startup. Where would you start?

Category: Marketing | 1 Comment »

Creating Brand Engagement

Fifteen years ago, buying books or shoes on-line seemed novel. Seemingly overnight, though, e-commerce and traditional commerce merged. So it’s easy to forget that e-commerce is a recent innovation. Human behaviour has changed, from browsing to buying, from surfing to selling until finally, there was no more “on-line business.” Only business.
A similar shift is unfolding now with social technology. Social media’s leaps in the past five years only hints at what social technology will do over the next five. This is the beginning of a new genre of business, one that presents an opportunity to earn customers by becoming relevant to their needs and aspirations.

IT’S YOUR COLLEAGUES AND YOUR CUSTOMERS.

Social technology is about more than engaging fans and attracting “likes.” It’s about empowering your customers and partners to engage with your brand, to build relationships that will help build your brand. It’s about building communities within your workforce where colleagues create and share ideas.

Leaders in every industry have begun taking advantage of social technology, erasing distinctions between “social business” and business. Human behaviour is changing again.
Increasingly, your customers and employees expect you to integrate social into your core business processes. Any business that isn’t social by design won’t stay in business.

A SOCIAL WORKFORCE IS A PRODUCTIVE WORKFORCE.

We are social animals, even at work. With 1.5 billion of us using social networks, you don’t need to convince your workforce of social’s value you just need to create a culture that guides and supports the application of social to your work processes.
Picture a company that doesn’t follow the flow of a strict organisational chart, but thrives as a network of communities. What if your employees could spot gaps in their expertise and quickly identify the best colleagues or candidates to fill them? Or if your staff could instantly crowd source and share their knowledge across departments, across languages, across oceans?

These aren’t idle fantasies. For example, a cement giant that faced some familiar issues above, was aware that its corporate knowledge had become globally spread. Vulnerable to file
deletion, career changes or retirement. Employees are now  building a network of communities around shared skills and projects, helping the company launch its first global brand
in just a third of the time it had anticipated.

TURNING CUSTOMERS INTO ADVOCATES.
It’s only taken social media half a decade to alter consumer behaviour. Social inputs like reviews and comments could drive up to a third of consumer spending, and it’s estimated that, by 2022, social technology will enable four out of every five customer transactions. With consumers so empowered, it’s crucial for your entire workforce to use social technology to help delight customers. Your brand’s success will depend on its ability to match what it promises with what it delivers.

What if you could harness the Web into an infinite focus group. Applying social listening to on-line discussions, your company can creatively and nimbly respond to consumer sentiment. In fact, social conversation on sustainability has inspired one company to introduce greener packaging. And by incorporating social into on-line experiences to reach new audience segments, they turned customers into advocates.

ITS NO LONGER BUSINESS AS USUAL.

Investing in becoming a social business—in helping your work-force deliver an exceptional customer experience—has never been more urgent.
A 5% decrease in customer attrition can boost profits by up to 95%. And finding new customers can cost up to  five times as much as keeping the ones you have.
Becoming a social business goes beyond building a social network. It demands capturing and analysing the vast amount of data that the network creates. Harnessing that data can remove boundaries inside and outside your company. Before you know it, there will be no more “social business” Only Business.

 

Where do you want to take your business? What are the questions you want answered?

skills and projects, helping Cemex
launch its first global brand
in just a third of the time it had anticipated.
Smarter workforce solutions help
companies attract employees, enable them to develop their skills
faster and show them how
delighting customers can improve
business performance. After outdoor retailer Cabela’s used smarter workforce technology to
rally its employees around a
formalized brand culture, its stores
with more engaged employees realized significantly higher sales
per labor hour. That’s the promise
of a smarter workforce.
TURNING CUSTOMERS INTO ADVOCATES.
It’s only taken social media half a decade to alter consumer
behavior. Social inputs like reviews
and comments could drive up
to a third of consumer spending, and it’s estimated that, by 2022, social technology will enable four out of every five customer transactions.
With consumers so empowered, it’s crucial for your entire workforce to use social technology
that faced some familiar issues. Its
corporate knowledge had been
spread all over—vulnerable to file
deletion or one engineer’s
retirement. But since 2009, IBM
solutions for social business have
helped product-development teams in 50 countries trade ideas and insights in real time. And employees have built a network of communities around shared
as a network of communities. What if your employees could spot gaps in their expertise and quickly identify the best colleagues or candidates to fill them? Or if your staff could instantly crowdsource
and share their knowledge across
departments, across languages,
across oceans?
Those aren’t idle fantasies for Cemex, a $15 billion cement giant
It’s easy to forget that e-commerce
is a recent innovation. Fifteen years ago, buying books or shoes online seemed novel. Seemingly overnight, though, e-commerce and traditional commerce merged.
Human behavior changed—from
browsing to buying, from surfing
to selling—until finally, there
was no more “online business.” Only business.
A similar shift is unfolding now
with social technology. Social media’s leaps in the past five years
only hint at what social technology
will do over the next five.
IT’S YOUR COLLEAGUES.
AND YOUR CUSTOMERS.
Social technology is about more than engaging fans and attracting
“likes.” It’s about building
communities within your workforce where colleagues create and share ideas. And it’s about
empowering your customers and
partners to help build your brand.
On a smarter planet, leaders in
every industry have begun taking
advantage of social technology, erasing distinctions between “social business” and business. And
human behavior is changing again.
Increasingly, your customers and employees expect you—and your
competitors—to integrate social into your core business processes.
Any business that isn’t social by design won’t stay in business.
A SOCIAL WORKFORCE
IS A SMARTER WORKFORCE.
We humans are social animals, even at work. With 1.5 billion of
us using social networks, you don’t
need to convince your workforce
of social’s value—you just need to create a culture that guides and
supports the application of social to your work processes.
Picture a company that doesn’t follow the flow of a strict
organizational chart, but thrives
to help delight customers. Your brand’s success will depend on its
ability to match what it promises
with what it delivers.
In 2010, the Italian poultry leader
Amadori Group used IBM
solutions for social business to interpret the Web as an infinite focus group. Applying social
listening to online discussions, the
company can creatively and nimbly
respond to consumer sentiment.
In fact, social conversation on
sustainability has inspired Amadori
to introduce greener packaging. And by incorporating social into online experiences to reach new audience segments, Amadori can turn customers into advocates.
THERE’S NO BUSINESS
BUT SOCIAL BUSINESS.
Investing in becoming a social
business—in helping your work-force deliver an exceptional customer experience—has never been more urgent. A 5% decrease
in customer attrition can boost profits by up to 95%. And finding
new customers can cost up to five times as much as keeping the
ones you have.*
Becoming a social business goes beyond building a social network.
It demands capturing and analyzing
the vast amount of data that the network creates. Harnessing that data can remove boundaries
inside and outside your company.
And before you know it, there will be no more “social business.”
Only business. To learn more, visit
us at ibm.com/social-business
“LIKING” ISN’T LEADING.
The social-technology industry,
worth $600 million in 2010, will grow tenfold by 2016 to $6.4 billion.
Could you use an extra day of productivity from your staff each week?
Social technology can increase efficiency by as much as 25%.
THE RISE OF
SOCIAL BUSINESS.
By 2014, nearly four out of five
companies plan to invest in social technology
to foster internal collaboration and to
listen to customers.
LET’S BUILD A SMARTER PLANET.
*Frederick F. Reichheld, The Loyalty Effect: The Hidden Force Behind Growth, Profits, and Lasting Value (Boston: Harvard Business School Press, 1996).
IBM, the IBM logo, ibm.com, Smarter Planet and the planet icon are trademarks of International Business Machines Corp., registered in many jurisdictions worldwide. A current list of IBM trademarks is available on the Web at www.ibm.com/legal/copytrade.shtml. © International Business Machines Corporation 2012.

Category: Smarter Business, Smarter Planet, Social Media | No Comments »

What Social Consumers Want From Brands (And What They Actually Get From Marketers) [INFOGRAPHIC]

Did you know that while more than three-quarters (76 percent) of marketers feel that they know what their consumers want, only about one-third (34 percent) have actually asked?

This divide, coined as the perception gap by industry analyst Brian Solis, naturally presents a problem for brands looking to maximize user engagement and conversion rates on platforms such as Twitter and Facebook. For optimum results, marketers need to put their egos to one side and reach out directly to their audience – or suffer the consequences.

Last fall, research from the Pivot Conference, set to take place this year between October 15-16 in New York, revealed a clearer picture of the disconnect between what consumers want and what they actually receive from brands they follow within social channels.

What Consumers Want From Social Brands

  • Deals and promotions (83 percent)
  • Rewards programs (70 percent)
  • Exclusive content (58 percent)
  • Feedback on new products (55 percent)

What Marketers Think Consumers Want From Social Brands

  • Insights for buying decisions (59 percent)
  • Customer service (58 percent)
  • Feedback on new products (53 percent)
  • Deals and promotions (53 percent)

Given how many fans want deals and how relatively few marketers are likely to be offering them, at least consistently, there must be an awful lot of disappointed social media users out there.

Pivot Conference have underlined their findings with this infographic, which takes a closer look at the perception gap between social consumers and social marketers

(Source: Pivot Conference. Marketing image via Shutterstock.)

Why do you follow a brand?

Category: Marketing, Social Media | 1 Comment »

Don’t Confuse Audience with Influence

The biggest issue is that we tend to confuse audience with influence. Having a lot of Twitter followers doesn’t give you the power to drive action, it gives you the power to drive awareness. Those are different abilities with unequal degrees of usefulness, just like the power to fly (Superman) is better than the power to swim fast and talk to fish (Aquaman).

Category: Social Media | No Comments »