Branding for Small Businesses
Branding is sometimes seen as somewhat of a dirty word for small or online businesses. Why? Because it seems to imply spending large amounts of capital to create an attitude or awareness about your company as opposed to directly feeding leads into your sales pipeline. I don't believe these two areas need to be separated. If branding is setup appropriately than you should be able to create a strong sense of authority and trust through all stages of the lead development process towards making a sale.
Here is an example. Website visitors to an online university website would like to see detailed information on courses, interviews with the teachers, Grade A professional logos and easy to access faculty. There are literally over 250 resources, characteristics and customer service functions which must be in place to handle large volumes of traffic to such an online business and these all together create your brand and user experience to your visitors.
While this may seem overwhelming from the start there is no need to invent the wheel. No matter what industry you are in you can always look at your top 10 or top 20 competitors, take an inventory of their best practices, pricing strategies, and unique resources offered online and create the most robust and unique website within your industry. This takes hard work but it then positions your brand well to compete against others who may have been around longer.
Online I believe branding is all about user experience, how quick do you return emails and phone calls? How professional does your site appear? How experienced and diligent is your team?
Tags: Influence of Branding, Branding Tips for Small Businesses, Small Business Branding Strategy, Online Branding Strategies, How to brand your business online, online business tips
Branding is sometimes seen as somewhat of a dirty word for small or online businesses. Why? Because it seems to imply spending large amounts of capital to create an attitude or awareness about your company as opposed to directly feeding leads into your sales pipeline. I don't believe these two areas need to be separated. If branding is setup appropriately than you should be able to create a strong sense of authority and trust through all stages of the lead development process towards making a sale.Here is an example. Website visitors to an online university website would like to see detailed information on courses, interviews with the teachers, Grade A professional logos and easy to access faculty. There are literally over 250 resources, characteristics and customer service functions which must be in place to handle large volumes of traffic to such an online business and these all together create your brand and user experience to your visitors.
While this may seem overwhelming from the start there is no need to invent the wheel. No matter what industry you are in you can always look at your top 10 or top 20 competitors, take an inventory of their best practices, pricing strategies, and unique resources offered online and create the most robust and unique website within your industry. This takes hard work but it then positions your brand well to compete against others who may have been around longer.
Online I believe branding is all about user experience, how quick do you return emails and phone calls? How professional does your site appear? How experienced and diligent is your team?
Tags: Influence of Branding, Branding Tips for Small Businesses, Small Business Branding Strategy, Online Branding Strategies, How to brand your business online, online business tips
