13 minute read
Business Focus During Challenging Times By Adrienne Varga How Often Should I Refresh
Next Article
How often should I refresh my brand?
BY SARAH GARNER
From the clothes we wear, hairstyles we rock to even the accessories we flaunt, they all change as we grow. Sure, we’re the same person at our core but on the outside? We’ve evolved.
The same goes for your brand. As your business matures and evolves, doing the same old thing with your branding often doesn’t cut it anymore. To avoid your biz donning the mullet and hipster jeans (honestly, what were we thinking?!), we’re sharing 3 times to consider a brand refresh.
YOUR BRANDING DOESN’T LIGHT UP YOUR DREAM CLIENTELE
Customers in 2020 are smart. Like super smart. They consume hundreds of pieces of media a day to know when a brand is doing their sweet thang and when a brand has forgotten to get with the times. They’re also ultra-quick decision makers and use the face value of your brand to make instant decisions about how they feel about your business. Savage right?! This alone showcases how important it is to be on top of your brand game.
A solid brand lets potential customers know who you are and what they can expect from you the moment they come into contact with it. It stands out in the eyes of your customer and feels fresh and attention-grabbing in a crowded industry. From the look of your logo, emotions evoked by your brand colours to the fonts and taglines used to introduce yourself, these branding elements are all strategic decisions that you can make to reach your dream client.
If your dream client is forwardthinking women in their 30’s but your brand is giving them more 1980’s retro chic, then it’s not enough to light them up and win their business over the competition. In a world where your brand introduces you before you even speak, a refresh is a must when it’s not connecting you with the right people.
YOUR BUSINESS IS TELLING A DIFFERENT STORY THESE DAYS
It’s very common for businesses in the hair, beauty and wellness industries to evolve and become more niche than they were to begin with. Whether you’re a salon that’s transitioned into offering strictly skin treatments, a business that’s introduced a whole new wellness menu or a hair studio that’s now the go-to for toxin free hair services, these business achievements need to be proudly represented in your branding.
With a change in business focus comes new demographics of clients to target, new messaging to convey in marketing and a whole new visual identity that needs to be celebrated. We cannot expect customers to “just know” when we’ve made significant changes to our business (that we know they’re going to love). They not only have to be able to find out about it through your marketing but sense it through your branding.
A brand refresh ensures your new focus is acknowledged in every element of your business, your existing clients are kept up to speed and your new clients know exactly what they’re getting when they walk through your door.
YOUR BRANDING FEELS OUTDATED IN A COMPETITIVE MARKETPLACE
Even some of the world’s biggest brands have refreshed their image to stand out against the competition! Think back to the 90’s where we had the multicoloured apple on our bright coloured computer versus today where we experience nothing but clean fonts and monochromatic products when we step into an Apple Store. Looking at some of your favourite brands, what is it about them that keeps people coming back? How have they adapted and evolved as their industry has changed? Why do they come to mind right now to begin with?
Take some time to reflect on your own brand and whether the way your brand is seen by the outside reflects what is on the inside. Is your logo representing your business ethos? Do your colours and fonts speak to your ideal customers? Is your lack of brand meaning you’re getting lost in the crowd? Picking up on these opportunities is a great way to identify whether a brand refresh is needed.
Refreshing your brand can keep people engaged and interested in your brand. In a society where we’re constantly scrolling, we want to ensure it’s your brand that makes them stop, read and book.
Sarah Garner is the Founder and Creative Director at Digital Bloom, an industry-specific branding boutique dedicated to making your hair, beauty or wellness brand turn heads for all the right reasons.
Visit Digital Bloom’s website (www.digitalbloom.com.au) or contact Sarah hello@digitalbloom.com.au
CLIPPER LIFE
ALL IN ONE SPRAY
Sanitise and service your tools between each use.
DISINFECTS* LUBRICATES CLEANS COOLS PREVENTS RUST
Contains pure Australian Tea Tree Oil, known for its anti-microbial action.
*Delivers germicide action 70% Isopropyl Alcohol on contact with the blade.
Made in Australia. Cruelty Free.
WHY DOES SOCIAL MEDIA MATTER FOR YOUR BUSINESS?
BY GEORGE HAWWA
It is now an embedded part of most of our lives; it lives on our phones, on our televisions, people talk about it at the pub and bring it to the dinner table with them. What’s this intruder into our lives, you ask? It’s social media – LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Snapchat, etc. This article is going to present a very basic explanation of social media and how it can affect your business. If you think you know quite a bit about social media, still have a read, because there may be some fundamental elements in this article that you may need to revisit in your study of the most powerful interactive medium we’ve ever experienced.
Whether one likes it or not, social media has become a part of our lives. It allows us to connect and maintain relationships in our busy lives, use it to do our shopping, vent our viewpoints to an audience (whether they want it or not), and to stay relevant in a world that seems to be moving very quickly.
Social media has also brought in another dimension, in particular for business: it allows businesses to connect with current customers and would-be customers and transform the way a business can connect to the world.
HOW HAS BUSINESS CHANGED BECAUSE OF SOCIAL MEDIA?
Very powerfully… Social media offers businesses: free marketing; audience engagement; validation of services; visual showcasing of products; education about goods and services; a forum through which a customer can interact, including a means of asking further questions about products and services; as well as a platform for them to make a purchase – these are all now vital prerequisites to the growth, credibility, and above all, sustainability of a business. Add to this the fact that social media provides a stage to deliver a message from business owners as to their credentials as a thought leader in their field. All the above, presented to the public in an aesthetic and engaging way, can generate further interest in the business, product, service or brand. It’s available and achievable at your fingertips, and allows a business to market their services locally, nationally and internationally.
Just viewing the basics of social media makes it an extremely powerful tool for business. However, we have just skimmed the surface; there is so much more that can be offered and businesses generating billions of dollars have been built by simply engaging with audiences through social media. Here’s how it’s been (and being) done:
Engage through content with your audience directly as you may or may not already know, you can create a specific business page on social media platforms such as Facebook or LinkedIn, to then promote your brand, business, products and services. The advantage of this is: you can then build a following in which people will follow your page. Content you put onto your page(s) will subsequently be viewed by your followers. These public platforms allow you to create content that is engaging with your followers. In turn, it will create brand loyalty and recognition. The more your followers engage with you, the more likely they are to see your brand or business as a trusted source to engage with. This is a major reason why social media is so powerful; it allows a business to constantly be in front of an audience without the need for huge marketing or advertising budgets. The more engaging, educational, aesthetic and interesting your content is, the more engagement you will receive from your followers and the more likely you will see this turned into revenue further down the track. An example content could be: as a mediator you post on Facebook/LinkedIn about a neighborhood dispute and how it can be easily and cheaply resolved using your services rather than going through the legal system. Someone may be going through a dispute and contact you about this exact topic – basically a free referral using your knowledge to assist people but at the same time promoting your services. Imagine the cost of placing this in the local newspaper?
This type of content creation is educational and allows your audience to see your brand as a point of trust as well as a thought leader. It is not a good idea to always promote to your audience and always ask for sales, as your audience will begin to see you as ‘cheap’ and not adding anything of value to their newsfeed. It is better to be more holistic in your approach, educational and engaging. This way you appear genuine, by adding value to the customer and not driven entirely by putting a buck in your pocket. Allow for more specific and precise targeting.
There was a time when social media advertising was print/ radio/TV based, and pretty much hit and miss. You would concentrate your advertising around a certain demographic through a newspaper ad, say, choosing a newspaper that had a main readership of between 35-55 years old, and then put an ad in that newspaper and hope for the best. With social media today, we are able to see what a person likes, what age they are, what their marital status is, how often they are posting, when and how often they are clicking on ads, etc. Advertising today through social media offers incredibly specific profiling and targeting opportunities. Through social media, the option of paid advertising can target people from a specific age group, and/ or specific gender who like certain things, and/or concentrated in a certain area around a specific suburb or city. For example, if you are a mediator specializing in neighborhood disputes you could target people between the ages of 30-60 and who are homeowners/tenants located within 50km of the area you practice in. Pretty incredible! The ad will then only be shown to these people, who are a very targeted audience. These are the people that are most likely to request your services. There is much more to social media advertising than this, of course, in terms of strategy. But at a basic level, this is how it works.
Customer Service and Questions Regarding Products and Services Social media provides a format in which you are able to have a page that is similar to a website that you can present to the world your knowledge, products and services. The difference between a website and social media page is that with social media, followers can directly engage with the business through comments, likes, sharing or reviews. All other followers can also view this engagement. While on a website, this is usually done in private when someone obtains contact details from a contact page on your business’ site.
Let’s say you have just placed a post on your Facebook business page about a recent promotion you are running – a follower is instantly able to write on that post a question they may have about the promotion. For example, “How long will this promotion be running for?” to which you can respond immediately. Not only will that specific follower see that comment and response, but so will all the other followers and anyone else who visits your Facebook page. This is incredibly powerful from an engagement viewpoint, because it creates trust with the brand. If you were to respond positively, your brand and business will be seen positively. If you respond poorly or not at all, your brand and business could be seen negatively. This gives another medium for people to interact with you other than the phone, website or email. And for a lot of people social media is the preferred source of interaction.
Place your audience through a sales funnel. What is a sales funnel you ask? Imagine ‘collecting’ a large amount of your target audience and ‘feeding’ them through a campaign where it steers them towards a specific purpose. This could be guiding them to make a purchase of your goods or services, giving you a call, sending you an email, or having them simply give you their email address. Essentially this is what a sales funnel is: it is putting your target audience through a series of campaigns, whether they’d be email campaigns, advertisements or through pages on your website, that gets them to a point where you want them to take a specific action. With a well-structured sales funnel, you are essentially warming your leads. Giving them valuable information, education, introducing them to certain areas of your business, and allowing them to feel like they are part of your ‘brand family’. Once you have initiated brand consistency, improved your value in the eyes of your audience, and allowed them to gain trust in your business, brand and products, you can then show them a campaign that allows them to take action, such as a campaign that engages them if they are in conflict or in a dispute. Or a campaign that asks them to make a call to your office for an enquiry. Your sales funnel campaign is one of the most important campaigns in your business’ digital marketing that allows your business to flourish and generate sales, as well as enquiries. A well-thought-out and patiently built sales funnel can be a huge asset to your business online and has made many businesses millions of dollars.
Your social media campaigns and your business presence on social media, in general, should be strategic from the outset. It is very important to have an influential reach and be methodical in your approach. Social media has to be a part of any business that is looking to grow and gain/maintain the trust of consumers. It should be the cornerstone of all marketing plans and campaigns. Today, more money is spent on online retail than in the physical retail world. Your presence online should not be taken lightly, and you need an adding-value/substance approach and well-done social media campaign to take your business to the next level in its revenues and growth.
