How to Build a Brand: 10 Strategies That Work

Knowing how to build a brand is crucial for establishing a successful business in today’s competitive market. A compelling brand can differentiate your startup from the countless others vying for attention, making it essential to get branding right from the start. In this guide, we’ll explore effective strategies for crafting a memorable and impactful brand. By the end, you’ll have the tools and insights needed to understand how to build a brand that not only stands out but also resonates with your target audience.

Knowing how to build a brand is one of the first steps toward starting a successful business. With around 305 million startups launching yearly, a strong branding strategy helps one stand out from the competition.

However, without sufficient knowledge, branding your business can be a long and complicated process.

To help out, this article will cover 10 effective strategies on how to create a brand. We’ll also provide recognizable brand examples for your inspiration and answer some commonly asked questions about the topic.

What Is a Brand

A brand is an intangible concept that gives businesses a distinctive identity, helping customers recognize them better. It represents a company’s values and ideas through well-designed logos, domain names, catchy slogans, unique products, or excellent services.

For example, when people think of Starbucks, they usually visualize its iconic logo, high-quality coffee, or enjoyable in-store experience.

The brand-building process aims to build a good reputation, develop a sense of trust, and foster an emotional connection with customers.

A UK study suggested that when consumers trust a company, they are more likely to make purchases, recommend it to their friends, join the loyalty program, and leave positive reviews on social media.

As such, a solid and memorable brand can make the difference between a struggling and an accomplished business. It distinguishes a global chain like Starbucks from a local coffee shop.

How to Build a Brand

Whether you want to grow a digital marketing agency or start an online boutique, building a strong brand identity is necessary. It’s a long-term process that goes beyond creating a catchy business name or logo.

In this section, we’ll go over the ten necessary steps to build a brand.

1. Define the Business Goals and Values

Before starting the brand-building process, define the business goals and values. This will help you understand the company’s greater purpose and the necessary measures to fulfill it.

Although there is no fixed format, the following can help you define your business’s goals and values:

• Vision statement. Briefly describe the company’s purpose and long-term goals in two to three sentences.
• Mission statement. Explain how the products impact customers and the steps required to achieve the vision.
• Values statement. Define the principles and code of ethics all employees should follow in daily operations.

2. Research Your Brand’s Target Audience

Researching the target market lets businesses understand their potential customers and the marketing strategy that appeals to them.

One of the best ways to conduct market research is by defining a user persona, a fictional representation of your ideal customer.

Here’s how to create one:

1. If you have existing customers, analyze their demographics, such as age range, location, and gender. But if you’re a new small business owner, select a specific market group within a niche. For example, look for consumers who love vintage collections instead of targeting fashion buyers in general.
2. Research similar brands and study their customers.
3. Conduct user studies, interviews, and surveys to understand customers’ needs, interests, pain points, and behavior patterns.
4. After gathering enough information, create a buyer persona based on the common characteristics found during the research process.
5. Go the extra mile by making multiple personas to see how each subgroup fits different products.

3. Analyze the Competition

Keeping track of competitors is crucial to finding market gaps and exploring new opportunities. It also lets you draw inspiration from their successes and avoid potential failures.

To conduct competitor research, follow these steps:

1. Type in your niche on Google and list all businesses that appear on the search results. Alternatively, use competitor analysis tools like Similarweb.
2. Analyze their products or services, pricing structure, locations, and promotion strategies.
3. Conduct a SWOT analysis to determine their strengths, weaknesses, threats, and opportunities.
4. Explore review sites, social media platforms, and forums like Reddit to find the competitors’ main issues.
5. Based on the findings, develop better products or services and solve those issues to win over the market.
6. 4. Determine the Brand Positioning

Brand positioning is the process that helps a business differentiate itself from competitors, establishing a unique value proposition.

Start by figuring out key features and benefits that other companies do not offer, such as:

• Affordable prices. Cost-effective products can attract more customers. However, they often mean lower profit margins and product quality.
• Innovative products. Instead of charging low prices, create innovative and unique products. While it might take years of research and development, having few to no competitors gives companies more freedom when setting prices.
• Excellent service. Provide 24/7 customer support to answer user queries and solve their problems. In addition, offer after-sales service to maintain good relationships with clients, prompting them to become loyal customers.
• Enjoyable user experience. Create a seamless experience throughout the entire user journey. For instance, software companies can develop a user-friendly interface, cross-platform compatibility, and clear information architecture.
• Premium goods. High-end consumers tend to value quality over affordability. To target this market, highlight the product quality by showing the production process, explaining the materials used, and presenting the key benefits.

After that, write a brand positioning statement that outlines the target market and how specific products or services can fulfill their needs. This document acts as a brand style guide to keep internal stakeholders aligned on the same objectives.

If you’re not sure how to write one, copy the template below and customize it based on your own business:

For [the target market] who [their needs], [your company name] provides [solutions to their problems] because [convince customers by explaining the unique selling points].

Here’s an example of how to use it:

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5. Build Effective Branding Communication

A clear and effective communication strategy helps businesses convey messages and resonate their values with buyers. Start with a memorable business name, a catchy slogan, and a compelling story.

Come Up With a Business Name

If you do not already have one, create a business name that people will easily remember. Here are some tips:

1. The name should be relevant to your business. For instance, when people hear Papa Ron’s Pizza, they instantly associate it with a pizza restaurant.
2. Blend two words into one. For example, Netflix combines the terms “internet” and “flicks,” a synonym for “movie.”
3. Use acronyms to shorten longer names. Most people are familiar with BBC, yet they might not know it stands for British Broadcasting Corporation.
4. Take notes from folklore, literature, or foreign languages. In Greek mythology, Nike is the goddess of victory, which inspired the popular shoe brand.
5. Use domain name generators. When making a website, use domain name generators to find available domains that reflect the brand name. This is crucial to help customers locate your business site more quickly.

Write a Catchy Slogan

A slogan communicates a brand’s purpose in a concise yet memorable way. Follow these steps when creating one:

1. Brainstorm a list of phrases related to your industry and niche. Do not hesitate to use powerful words to emphasize the brand’s message and invoke emotion.
2. Take notes from the competitors or use an online slogan generator to help with the process. Make sure to keep the slogan short and straightforward.
3. After compiling the list, create an internal poll with relevant team members to narrow down the options. Then, pick the top three choices.
4. Perform A/B testing on the company’s website, social media platforms, and other marketing materials to see which slogan option performs the best.

Tell Compelling Brand Stories

Good narratives can spark emotional reactions from the target audience, helping companies increase brand awareness and engagement.

You can tell your brand’s story through blog posts, video advertisements, social media posts, or even marketing proposals. The following ideas will help with the process:

• Provide a background story. Telling stories about the founders or the company’s humble beginnings can make the brand more relatable to the audience.
• Share the challenges.SPresent the struggles of building your own brand and what you did to overcome them.
• Aim for the greater good. Identify an issue within your industry and build marketing campaigns around it. For instance, Toms Shoes resonated with customers and became a household name by giving away a pair of shoes for each one sold.
• Prioritize honesty and transparency. 88% of consumers choose authenticity as the deciding factor when supporting a brand.

6. Design the Brand’s Visual Identity

Another way to define brand identity is through visual elements, including logos, color palettes, and fonts.

Apply the following tips when creating visuals for a brand identity:

• Create a memorable brand logo. A unique brand logo helps companies build brand awareness, capture the audience’s attention, and make an excellent first impression. Learn how to create a logo with a tool like Hostinger’s AI logo generator.
• Choose a suitable website color scheme. Studies suggest that colors boost brand recognition by 80% and influence 85% of consumers’ buying decisions. Stick with web-safe color combinations to keep a consistent look across all major browsers.
• Determine the typography. Fonts can make the difference between an attractive and an unappealing design. We recommend browsing through Google Fonts’ free options to pick the right one.
• Match the brand’s personality. Use visual elements that represent your brand personality. For instance, an organic food company might implement a green color palette or use a picture of fresh vegetables in the logo.
• Learn from competitors. Take notes from other companies within the same industry, identify their visual identities’ weaknesses, and develop a better concept.

Create brand guidelines. A brand guideline sets the standards and rules for how employees and business partners should display a brand’s logo, visual identity, and typography. This document helps maintain uniformity and consistency across all marketing channels.

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Original article published on hostinger.com