How to Increase Brand Awareness
Top question: how to increase brand awareness?
Gaining more eyes on a brand is one of the most significant marketing challenges we hear when talking to businesses. Not limited to B2C (Business to Consumer) or B2B (Business to Business), companies all want to be seen and known in their markets. Even with the end game of growing market share, it all starts with how to increase brand awareness.
Of course, this is a means to an end because they want to grow their business. The more people know about them, the more opportunities to sell.
Easy, right?
Before crafting messages and communication vehicles are launched, the process of increasing brand awareness needs to start somewhere. This is where strategic marketing development starts: 3 key building blocks that should be in place before spending a dime on online or traditional marketing and advertising begins.
1. Know Thyself
Who are you (brand-wise)?
How is your brand better/different than the competition, and why should your target audience care about you? A positioning strategy for your brand is a crucial building block because it should provide the foundation for all communications. For instance, this 2015 SuperBowl ad for mass-market beer brand Budweiser proudly grabs its rightful “King of Beers” position as a macro beer for the masses by positioning it against tiny micro-brew brands. So what’s your brand’s rightful position — are you a macro or a micro…or somewhere between?
Why does this matter?
Understanding your brand position becomes the touchpoint and foundation for your brand awareness communications.
2. Know Thy Enemy
One thing that helps a brand succeed is defining what it is not. For instance, when this famous ad series started, Apple knew all the right cliche and perception buttons to push to make the PC look like a stodgy, slow, out-of-touch product. So instead, Apple comes off the approachable, effortless to use, and fun-to-own computer brand. So how are you better / different from your enemy?
Why does this matter?
Your brand is different, and customers love you for it. Understanding your competitive difference is the catalyst to understanding what to say to appeal to new customers.
3. Know Thy Audience
A brand can’t be everything to everybody. However, the tighter the focus on the target audience, the higher the success rate. For instance, Similac speaks to common ground and sympathy even in the most comically divergent cliche philosophies when feeding a baby by knowing the market of first-time moms and the things for which they care.
Why does this matter?
It’s a big, loud, busy mess out there. A highly focused message speaking to the target audience in their language has a better chance of cutting through the clutter to get heard.
Your brand is ready for investment in brand awareness when you meet these top 3 commandments. Knowing your brand, competitive advantage, and audience means you should know who you need to reach, how you are different from the competition, and what the message is to grab their attention. In short, how to increase brand awareness.
