Brand awareness: how to create, measure and increase it with online techniques
Have you ever heard about the concept of “brand awareness”? Your business may have good products to offer your target audience, but there is one essential problem in almost every market: fierce competition. And that’s when brand awareness enters the game!
To achieve a successful company, you should be able to build a recognizable brand, which brings extra value to others and makes customers choose it. Brand awareness is a strategy used in marketing that consists of making a brand well-known and remembered by consumers.
This matter becomes even more important for small businesses, as they should put all their efforts and resources into planning the best way to promote their brand. If you’re ever planning to do this, but don’t even know where to start or want to find the best places to advertise any small business, just keep reading and take note!
Why Brand Awareness is Important?
As you may know, brands are, after all, social constructions, not something tangible, and they can evolve, both in their aesthetics and in their ideas. That’s why it’s so significant to make your brand different and to make it stay in the mind of consumers!
Making your brand recognizable will help people remember it, talk about it, and subsequently reach more potential consumers with little effort. What does all this result? In an increase in sales, gaining the loyalty of regular customers, and getting them to repeat their purchases. With a strong brand awareness, you will help your other marketing strategies be successful – for example, your ads, and social media posts, among others.
What are the Four Levels of Brand Awareness?
Before you start planning the brand awareness for your business, it’s indispensable to comprehend the four levels that compound it, known as the brand awareness pyramid. Based on the ideas of the Marketing expert David Parker, the four levels are the one that follows:
- Zero Awareness. At this point, located at the bottom of the pyramid, you have to build everything from scratch!
- Brand Recognition. On this level, your target audience will be able to identify your brand through colors or visuals – logos, or packaging now come into play!
- Brand Recall. At this advanced stage, your business will come to people’s minds when they require a specific service or product.
- Top of Mind. Your brand is now the first associated with a determined product. It also leads to the loyalty of your customers!
Build Brand Awareness with these TOP 5 Strategies
Let’s leave the theory behind and get into practice! Building and establishing brand awareness is a must nowadays for your company or small business. Making this effort and planning an efficient strategy will lead you to customer loyalty, reach new potential ones, and increase your sales! Here you have some useful examples of brand awareness and tips that will help you along the way.
1. Create a Blog and Write About your Business
The power that words do have are unbeatable. Old ways never die, and having a blog can really be a valuable help for your small business. Besides writing about news or products you offer, providing valuable content to your customers will make them come back, trust your brand, and eventually result in new sales. Unleash your creativity!
2. Attend Events and Develop a PR Strategy
Mouth-to-mouth marketing is truly effective. Going to business events and establishing profitable professional relationships can help you become known, acquire new knowledge, improve your services or products, and reach a wider audience.
3. Put some Effort into your Organic Clients
Even if you put a lot of your efforts into finding new clients thanks to different marketing strategies, don’t forget those clients who have come to you organically. Win their fidelity with exclusive promotions, giving them gift certificates or loyalty cards!
4. Collaborate with other Businesses
Small businesses have a huge and strong competitor: big companies. Collaboration between small businesses helps you to face that competition, provide each other with new skills, increase your network of contacts, reach a wider audience, or even save money by sharing expenses!
5. Work with Local Influencers
Most of us discover new products or services from our friends or families. The local influencers have a small but loyal audience in a particular area who highly trust their criteria when it comes to advertising any product. Relying on them and creating a local strategy can be a powerful and effective way to reach a new target audience!
How to Increase Brand Awareness on Social Media
Social media is an absolute must for any small business nowadays. According to a recent survey, only 21% of them use social media for customer support – which means only 1 in 5 businesses, and up to 85% employ them for brand awareness! Whether you’re offering a service or a product, if you aren’t still present on social media, you’re losing some great opportunities for sales and reach to potential customers. Take note of these tips that will make building brand awareness with social media a piece of cake!
1. Make your Graphics Stand Out
Social media is all about visuals, so make sure you design some eye-catching visuals! Even if you use different formats depending on the social network you are on, you should always include your logo and color palette on them to build a recognizable brand!
2. Interact with Other Accounts
There’s a trending topic on social media, a word you’ve surely heard about: engagement! Actions such as interacting with similar accounts – leaving comments, liking their posts, or mentioning them are a good starting point – will help your profile to gain visibility and reach a wider audience.
3. Benefit from the Power of Hashtags
Welcome to the intriguing world of hashtags! Including them is a simple action that can lead you to great results, as they will make your posts searchable and easier to find. It’s not rocket science, but wisely choose which ones to use according to your niche. One extra tip – creating your own personal hashtag is such a powerful move for your small business!
4. Give Useful Content to your Customers
Regardless of sharing information about your services, products, news, or sales, you must provide your community with helpful and interesting content to keep them engaged! Put yourself in the consumer’s shoes, think about what you would like to see, and start by sharing some tips, curiosities, or how-to’s.
5. Be Consistent in Publishing News
Consistency is the key to success. If you want your profile to be seen, consider posting consistently and being very present! Research the best times to publish your content on each social network, and get a schedule where you can plan and have all the ideas in sight. At Wepik we want to make things really easy for you, so find the best social media calendar template for you among our designs and customize it in minutes!
6. Use Humor and be Approachable
The image of a serious and distant brand is out fashioned. In the era of memes, humor can be your best ally in connecting with your audience! Use a close and colloquial tone in your publications, and use images or funny phrases from time to time to make your content much more entertaining!