Let’s talk about seven branding secrets for small businesses when it comes to carving out your niche. The real secret to success in small business and entrepreneurship is simply hard work, but when you’re working hard, you want to make sure you’re working hard on the right things, because there’s nothing worse than working very hard and not building any brand equity for your efforts.
So, in this blog, I’m going to share with you 7 secrets, 7 key themes, for small business branding. If you focus on them, you’ll be on the right path to success. Frankly, the principles of branding haven’t changed in decades. But I want you to stick with me until the end because I’m going to share with you one big thing that has changed about branding, one that could mean the difference between your business’s success and failure in today’s market environment.
1. The Power of Your Brand Story
Now, the first secret is the brand story. You’ve probably heard me say this before, but people value people more than brands, hence word of mouth. Referrals are always better than any other form of marketing, but a brand isn’t a person, that’s for sure. There are people behind brands, but if you don’t tell their story: who they are, why they started the company, what their mission is, no one, not even a single customer, will ever care. That’s why founder stories are so powerful.
Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak were building the first Mac from Radio Shack parts and plywood in their garage in Palo Alto, California. Business legends are made of this stuff. Here’s another one: Colonel Sanders started Kentucky Fried Chicken as a side hustle after retirement. After working as a salesman and gas station manager all his life, he started KFC in a converted gas station in North Corbin, Kentucky, and 10 years later, through franchising, it became the world’s largest restaurant chain. Now, these are human stories that people remember; they feel them in their hearts. So, I want you to think about what your brand story is. How will you tell it in a truly emotional way? How will you connect with people on a human level?
2. Design Your Brand With Intention
Number two. To build a strong brand, you have to design the brand. You have to build it with intention. You have to create a brand look and feel. Yes, in addition to the logo, you’ll also need to consider the color palette, specific fonts, photography, illustration styles, perhaps patterns or textures, and layout styles. You might also consider sound, scent, or animation styles, and then you have to use them consistently from day one.
In my years in the branding and agency business, this is the biggest mistake I’ve seen small businesses make. They don’t invest in brand design upfront, and before you know it, the whole thing becomes a mess of logos, styles, and colors. And let me tell you, cleaning up that mess is very expensive. Created for small businesses, they’re on a mission to make entrepreneurship more inclusive for everyone with support, tools, and insights.
3. Define Your Brand Voice
Third on the list is brand voice. Just as you need to create a visual appearance for your brand, you also need to carefully decide how you speak, what your brand voice will be. Will you be stern, will you be soft, will you be sensual, will you be friendly, will you sound comforting or cautioning, will you guide people, will you be protective, will you be inspiring?
There are so many voices to choose from. Your voice should fully match your brand story and your customer personas, and what they really want from your brand. It should be what they want to hear, not just what you want to say.
I have a quote that I like to say: the graveyard of broken brands is filled with companies that only cared about the message they wanted to convey, not what their customers wanted to hear.
4. Build a Strong Brand Presence
Number four is brand presence. Now this is a big one. Where will you be seen? How will you be seen? Now it’s time to start building your brand ecosystem: your website, all your social channels, and your content. This footprint includes things like podcasts and video content, blog posts, articles, newsletters, imagery posts, and live streams.
This should include your push marketing, your paid advertising and promotions, as well as your pull marketing, which is your inbound marketing, which includes things like content. Where will you be seen and heard? What will your presence be like, and what will your message be? Now, here’s a power tip: I really want you to think about what you can do consistently.
Many small businesses try to be everywhere at once, and they disappear everywhere. It’s always better to go deep on one or maybe two platforms and only expand after six months of consistent presence without any gaps. You have to be visible enough to be recognized and remembered, which is part of those three hours I always talk about.
5. Deliver Your Brand Promise
Number five is to be recognised, remembered, and respected. Okay, now you know where and how you stand. What value are you going to bring? It’s not just social media or content value; it’s the bigger value question. What are you bringing to customers that will be an irresistible solution to their problem? What brand promise are you making? What is your mission? How are you better? How are you different from your competition? This promise to your customers should be repeated like a mantra by every person and employee in your company.
Your products should deliver it. Your services should deliver it. It should be in the DNA of your people and associates. A brand promise is like a wedding vow; it’s forever.
6. Build Brand Equity
Number six is great: brand equity. It’s not something you actually do. It’s something that results. It’s the result of everything you do. When you show up consistently, when you look and feel authentic, when you deliver on that value and deliver on that promise. Equity is the result. Brand equity, like financial equity, builds over time. It’s like compounded interest. It takes time, but if you build brand equity with your customer base, something magical will happen. They’ll share you with their friends through word-of-mouth marketing, and word-of-mouth marketing is the gold standard for brand building.
One thing to remember about brand equity is that brand equity typically has a very long lifespan. Brand preferences are passed down to children, and brand preferences are passed down through generations.
7. The New Age of Brand Engagement
Number seven is brand engagement. This is the major shift in branding I mentioned at the beginning of this blog.
Video branding is no longer a one-way street. In the old days, a TV ad would come on, your mom would buy detergent, wash, and repeat, and everyone would be happy. Life used to be simpler, but now we post content, livestream, host events and conferences, tweet, share stories and short posts, exchange comments via DM, AI, and chatbots, and then deliver products or items. There are countless ways to engage today, but the important thing to remember is that brand building is now a two-way street. Customers have a voice.
And to build strong brand equity for your small business, you need a platform where your voice can be heard. You must connect with your customers. You must connect with them as humans, genuinely and honestly. Your brand mission must be lived out in every action and every interaction.
Let’s do a quick review.
- Number one was brand story, where we come from and what we are.
- Number two was brand look and feel, how we appear.
- Number three was brand voice, what we say, how we say it, and how we sound.
- Number four was brand presence, where and how we appear.
- Number five was the brand promise, what the values are, and what we deliver.
- Number six was brand equity, the results of our hard work, and
- Number seven was brand engagement, conversations, and true relationships. So that’s it.
Seven secrets to building your small business.
Master these seven secrets, and you won’t just build a brand, you’ll build a business people love, trust, and share.
