Have you ever thought about how your company’s brand image impacts your success? You know that the image of your brand is important, but have you ever really thought about whether you’re actively working to develop and maintain your brand image, or if you’re just going with the flow? There’s a distinct difference between the two, and if you haven’t considered your approach, now’s a great time to start.
Your brand’s image is comprised of all of the interactions it has with customers. Employee interactions with customers and prospects matter most of course, but so do the less obvious factors like your visual brand identity, marketing and advertising, website, social media, and many other seemingly insignificant things. All of these different elements play an important role in developing your brand image. And even so much as one small mishap can have significant consequences on the perception of your brand.
Knowing this, it’s important to consider the impact of and regularly reevaluate the image of your brand.
Here are some of the ways your company’s brand image can impact your marketing success, and what to do if you’re looking to make improvements.
Outdated Website
Your prospects come to your website for one of two things. They’re either looking for a solution to a problem, or an answer to a question, and their first impression of your website will decide if they continue on in their buyer’s journey or jump ship. If your website is outdated, it’s going to be difficult to make a good first impression to visitors and prospects. It’ll also be harder to appear credible or relevant, which can have a big impact—especially on sales.
Outdated websites result when other areas of the business take priority, which happens. However, if you know that your website could use a fresh look or feel, move it up on the priority list.
Vague Messaging
Messaging is another aspect of your brand that can have a significant impact on your success. You should have a specific, defined mission and vision, and these statements should be crystal clear to website visitors both new and old. If you don’t have a clear buyer persona (or personas) you’re targeting with your messaging, think about creating one you’ll actually use.
On top of key messages like your mission and vision, it’s also important to ensure that your product and service pages are easy to understand, engaging, and feature bold calls-to-action.
Lackluster “About Us” Page
How does the “About Us” page on your website look? Does it prominently feature your company’s leaders among other employees to give prospects a clear picture of what kind of people lead and work there? Is there a description of what your company does so visitors are encouraged to stick around and learn more?
Make sure you’re filling this critical page on your website with the information prospects and visitors want to know most. Who are you? What do you do? When (and why) did you start providing the products or services you do? Providing all of this information is a great way to inspire trust when new people visit your website.
Unoriginal Content
As the saying goes, Content is King. Good content, that is. And your prospects want to work with credible industry thought leaders. If your company’s content marketing efforts are unoriginal, you’ll give prospects little reason to trust your thought leadership efforts, even if you truly are an expert in your industry.
Even another blog post on a popular industry topic can be made original if you examine it from the right angle and provide a fresh take. If you haven’t evaluated your blog through a critical lens lately, it might be a good idea to do so.
Weak (or No) Social Media Presence
In today’s digital age, if you want to build a consistent online presence, it’s critical to be active on social media. Your prospects are active, and they’re looking for your brand. If you have a weak, inconsistent presence on social media (or worse—none at all), they’re going to be wary, and understandably so. Conversely, having a carefully maintained social media presence that provides insight into your company’s authentic culture, values, and original thoughts will greatly increase your credibility.
How to Enhance Your Brand Image
When it comes to improving or enhancing your image, consistency is critical. And a great way to cultivate a consistent brand image is to develop a brand strategy. Your brand strategy defines key components of your brand—think important messages like your mission and vision, personality and tone, visual identity, editorial guidelines, and even buyer personas. Your brand image strategy is, in other words, a long-term plan for developing your brand in order to be successful and achieve your goals. And each of these components, working together, will help you achieve them.
Building a Strong Brand Image
Your image is comprised of many different factors and assets. When your employees can’t be, your website and social media presence should be the face of your company, and your content and copy should be the voice. Don’t give prospects or visitors any reason to think of your brand as anything other than authentic. For a closer look into how to create these key components and assets for your brand, download our Toolkit: Creating a Compelling & Relevant Brand Identity.
In the end, success is all about building and maintaining relationships, and careful management of your brand image, transparency, and high-quality content can inspire the trust needed to build those relationships.
If you’re looking to develop a brand strategy or enhance your marketing efforts, Sagefrog can help. Let’s talk!
