Stop counting likes or views: it’s time to look at metrics that matter. This year, make your marketing even more meaningful by creating a different strategy for filling up each layer of your sales funnel.
In this blog, we’re taking a look at the very first stage of creating awareness and recognition for your brand. Ready to be recognized?
What is brand recognition?
People see a lot of content and products on a daily basis. Scrolling through your Instagram for one minute could expose you to potentially twenty different brands. But which ones stand out and actually stick to your brain?
That’s what brand recognition is all about: consumers recognizing your brand. It’s part of the brand health metrics, which sounds more abstract than it is. You can easily measure how well your business is performing when it comes to recognition, as long as you’re using the right tools.
In simple terms, brand recognition measures how well people recognize your brand, based on factors like the visuals you use, the consistency of your logo, your brand colors, your tone of voice, and so on. The key to brand recognition is being consistent across all platforms.
Just think about the brands that you instantly recognize, whether that’s in the streets or shop, or on your timeline: you’ll feel a sense of familiarity and know what you can expect from them. That’s something you can build on by increasing build recognition.
The different levels of brand recognition
Now, you can either ask an audience whether they recognize your brand or not, or you dive in deeper. There are different levels of brand recognition. Determining which one you are in for most people, can help you adjust your strategy. Let’s take a look at the different levels and corresponding tactics.
1. Brand rejection
It’s possible that someone definitely recognizes your brand, but simply doesn’t like you. If that’s the case, they will avoid buying your product or service and will actively look at competitors.
This is often based on a negative experience they had with your brand, or you have a reputation. Find out what has happened and either come up with personalized responses or launch a bigger campaign to clear your name.
2. No recognition
When consumers have either never seen your brand or you didn’t stick to their brains, it’s a clear case of non-recognition. It’s important to find out what the case is.
In the first scenario, you should be building awareness. In the second one, you should probably look at the content you are producing and why it’s not memorable or consistent enough.
3. Brand recognition
If you find yourself in this stage, it’s key to push through with consistency and differentiating yourself from competitors. Keep going!
4. Brand preference
This is the next step when building brand recognition is done right. When seeing two brands they know, consumers would choose you.
5. Brand loyalty
It doesn’t get much better than this. When you find yourself in the stage of brand loyalty, consumers will automatically choose you and not even look at another brand. You’re simply always top of mind to them.
How do you get people to recognize your brand — in a good way? Let’s look at six tools you can use to build brand recognition.
Effective Channels to Boost Brand Recognition
1. Develop a tone of voice for your brand
First things first, if you want to be recognized, you’ll have to create something memorable. What goes for people, goes for brands: it’s more than just looks. You have to develop a personality, and the key to this is developing a tone of voice.
Often brands resort to ‘professional’ language that holds little to no personality and is basically interchangeable between brands who sell something similar. Avoid that at all costs.
See every piece of copy that you write as an interaction and actual conversation with your potential customers. This is part of conversational marketing, a way of marketing people respond better to. Simply because they feel like they’re speaking to a human, not a computer.
This will help your brand become more ‘real’: less selling, more helping. Plus, you’ll stand out from all the copy that looks like on the web. Don’t be afraid to spice up your web copy!
2. Make an appearance in guest blogs
Having your own blog on your website is great, but it will not build your brand recognition. Anyone reading that, already is familiar with who you are. If you want to reach new audiences, you’ll have to go places you haven’t been before.
One place to go is the blogs of other websites. Often, there are plenty of blogs, platforms, and publications in your industry that allow guest blogs to be published on your website. A simple Google search of ‘guest post guidelines + relevant keywords for your industry’ will point you in the right direction.
On these blogs, you can present yourself as an industry expert and trustworthy brand by delivering tips or highlighting the latest trends in your field.
3. Create shareable infographics
If you want to reach a new audience and build recognition among it, you’ll have to reach people that aren’t already your followers. Time to make use of the friends and family of your fans.
If you create content that is highly shareable, you’ll start popping up on the timelines of your followers’ network. First of all, their friends, family, and coworkers will think you’re a good choice: it has been recommended by someone they know in person.
Second of all, this is a chance to stand out and make yourself stick. Interactive infographics are a great way to do that. They hold a ton of information and therefore value, and you can easily design them to fit your brand’s personality: logo, colors, and copy.
4. Partner up with other brands
You’re not the only one looking to boost your brand recognition. Businesses across all types of markets are looking to do the same, and in some cases, you’re stronger together.
If you find like-minded brands that have a similar target group as you have but offer a different — yet somewhat still relevant — service or product, you can partner up and start a campaign together. A great example is Red Bull and GoPro, who continue to work together, doing crazy stunts.
That way, you’ll break into a whole new audience and get exposure to all their followers. Plus, they will see that one of the brands they already follow and therefore probably trust, is advocating for your brand. That’ll get you one foot in the door.
5. Partner with influencers to review your brand
You can’t ignore the importance of influencers in marketing. They are like a paid middle man between brands and consumers. Both those parties rely on influencers to build the bridges between a business and its clients.
A study found that 61% of consumers in the age group 18 to 34 have at some point been convinced to buy something by digital influencers. Consumers trust other people reviewing products more than they trust brands saying their product is great. It’s a simple modern human instinct.
But before we even get to buying, let’s appreciate what influencers can do for your brand recognition. They’re a great way of tapping into new audiences, and you don’t have to spend hundreds of dollars on Google or Facebook campaigns.
Instead, consider partnering up with micro-influencers in your industry. They don’t have a huge following base, but often they have way higher engagement numbers and their fan base holds their recommendations high.
You don’t have to send them free products, you can also use their services in another way. Because at the end of the day, influencers are great content creators. So, if they know your target group better than you do (which is basically their full-time job), partner up with them to create relatable content that will stick.
6. Use retargeting to be recognized
Someone who’s only seen you once, might not remember you in a few weeks — unless it was a really great piece of content.
The key is to keep showing up — in a good way, of course. Consistently posting on social media platforms is one way to do that, but retargeting takes it a step further. With this, you interact again with people who left you their email address or put something in their cart but never paid. You can do it either over email or by targeted social media or Google ads.
And there you have it, six powerful tools in your journey to brand recognition. Mix and match the ones that fit your budget and target group, and let’s turn those strangers into brand advocates.
