There are many important things to consider when you are in charge of running a business. One of the most important factors is your brand awareness and how to increase it. If you don’t do this correctly, it can have a damaging impact on your business. Here are several mistakes that businesses make when trying to increase their brand awareness, so that you can avoid them.
Lack of research on their competitors
Some business models try to be too different, and unique without researching their competitors. This can end up causing mistakes for the business by way of missing obvious steps that could be taken, or even avoided, so as to help increase their brand awareness. While it is good to be different and unique, businesses and brands should also pay attention to their competition, as researching your competition can not only help you become more unique, but also save you time, effort, and failure when it comes to things that have not been working for them.
Ignoring their customer experience
When you are trying to increase your brand awareness, an extremely important factor to consider at all times is the customer experience your customers have with your brand. This is because a large portion of your growth will come through word of mouth and loyalty. If you are ignoring how their journey is for them when they are visiting and purchasing your products or services, then this is a fast way to become an unfavorable option when they are deciding where to spend their money. They will instead tell their friends and family how awkward or hard it is to buy and communicate with your business. Try to make any experience that a customer or potential customer has with you, as easy and smooth as possible, no matter how big or small it is.
Not hosting or attending in-person events
When it comes to running a business in the current online climate, a lot of the interaction that your customers will have with you will be through a screen. All the way from seeing your business advertised or mentioned, to browsing your website, purchasing your products or services, and even talking with advisors through a web chat. This can lead any brand to become a faceless number in a customer’s mind, and they will not have any strong connections or even loyalty to your brand. However, if you can become more visible, interactive, and even fun, then you will start to appear less like a faceless business or number in the mind of your customers. Instead, your customers will get to see the people behind the business, and you will appear to them more like the brand that you aspire to represent.
Try and think of fun, and unique things to bring to events so as to get people talking, and to create a positive, memorable experience for them. An example could be hiring a Glambot, photo booth, or setting up other similar activities that will make the event fun, that are accessible for everyone to use. People then forget about business and make real connections with other human beings. These are the kind of activities that will make events memorable for people so they go away, talk about it and spread the word.
Compromising on the quality of their brand identity
Your brand identity is another very important part of your business. It is an easy way to become visually recognized and trusted. If you compromise on the quality of your logos or brand designs, then this could have largely negative implications in the future of running your business and when you try to increase your brand awareness. If you think about many large and well-known brands, they all have distinct and extremely strong brand identities. They also spend a lot of time and money on ensuring that their brand identity is staying modern and relevant. The mistake that many people will make when it comes to their own brand identity is that they will hire someone cheap, with little or no user experience to create it for them, rather than spending a little time, money, and effort in creating the best possible identity to fit their brand.
Not creating or sticking to brand strategies and guidelines
When you are trying to get your business noticed and increase your brand awareness, a very important part of this comes down to proper planning and consistency. If you have neither of these in place, then you and your brand could be facing a lot of uphill struggles that simply do not need to happen. You want to make sure that every part of your business flows together and makes sense. This includes everything from the products and services you sell to your website, logo, design, and what your brand stands for. Everything should mesh together almost seamlessly, otherwise, it can seem untidy, unprofessional, and confusing to your customer base.
Inconsistent content marketing
Content marketing plays a major role when it comes to your business’s online visibility. Similarly to ensuring that you are following your brand’s strategy and guidelines, you should also be making sure that the content you create to market your brand is consistent too. The world we live in at the moment is hyper-focused on maximizing content creation and consumer consumption, but this can lead to a multitude of problems and inconsistencies. Rather than trying to pump out any old content, advertisements, or incentives, take a little time to consider if what you are doing or creating fits with your brand, what you stand for, and your ethos. Don’t feel like you will fall behind, and focus more on the quality and consistency of your content marketing, as opposed to the quantity that you are creating.
Not connecting with their target audience
If you run a business, then you will likely have dreams and visions of where you want to take it. While it is good to follow these dreams and visions you may have, it is also important to ensure that they align with your target audience’s wants and needs. If it doesn’t then whatever products or services you are attempting to sell, or produce, simply will not appeal to them. This will of course have a largely negative impact on your brand, and brand awareness.
So, if you are thinking about starting a business, or even if you are currently running an existing one. Make sure you take these considerations on and avoid making these mistakes when it comes to increasing your brand awareness.
