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Want to know the biggest branding mistakes you need to avoid making when creating your brand? Well, keep reading!
When you’re establishing your brand it’s going to take time and effort, along with some strategic thinking in order to become a recognised brand in your niche.
So, what if you put in all the work and it falls flat? Since this is an area of business that’s easily misunderstood, here are the biggest branding mistakes people make with their brand so you can avoid them.
Branding Mistakes to Avoid
1. Failing to Think Strategically
Branding is part of your overall business plan and is the foundation of your marketing plan, so you need to think strategically about it. It needs to connect to your “why” and your broader business goals. Go back and review the reasons why you’re running this business. Take some time to clarify what you hope to achieve and how your branding will help you do this.
The best tool you can use to help you establish your branding strategy is Branding archetypes which helps you to determine your brand values, promise and voice.
2. Your Brand Is Not Your Logo
Many businesses make the huge mistake of thinking a brand is a logo or a set of design features. While consistent design is an important part of branding, what it’s really about is your messaging and the image you’re creating in the minds of your target market. This message tells people how your offerings uniquely benefit them.
It’s important to understand that there are 2 parts to branding, your brand personality which includes your brand voice and values, then there is your brand identity which includes your brand logo, colours and fonts.
Too often entrepreneurs only focus on brand identity, especially in new businesses and not on brand personality. If you want to get branding right from the start and not have to through a rebranding process too early in your business then you need to focus on brand personality first then let that dictate your brand identity.
This is what we do in my Branding with Archetypes VIP Day.
3. Being Generic
The whole point of your brand is to differentiate your business from others in the market. If you can do this successfully, you can compete with bigger companies that have more resources to spend on marketing and advertising. Focus not only on what you do but what you do differently than the competition.
This is where focusing on building and defining your brand personality really puts you above the noise. When you create a unique brand personality that is aligned with who you are and how you want you and your business to show up in the world you position yourself as different.
4. Assumptions Instead of Facts
Don’t make the mistake of building your brand based on assumptions. You think you know how people see your company, but this isn’t good enough. You need to conduct thorough marketing research and base your decisions on facts and feedback from your audience. When you’ve created your brand go out and ask your audience if the brand personality you think you’ve created is what they see.
If you created a brand that you think is fun and sassy but your audience looks at it and think serious but edgy then there is a huge disconnect that you need to correct.
5. Inconsistency and Disconnect
If your branding is giving people mixed messages, it won’t work to engender trust. The message needs to be consistent wherever you have communication with your audience. The design features, the tone, and the unique benefits of using your products all need to be consistent.
Once you have your brand personality nailed down and your brand identity then you need to be consistent on all platforms with both your identity elements and your brand voice and tone on each platform.
6. Clever But Not Clear
While it’s nice to have a message that’s unique and clever, the most important thing is for it to be clear. Branding is a form of communication. People should understand your message easily at a glance. Don’t get so creative that it becomes hard to understand.
7. It’s All About You
While you’re talking about your products and services, the real message of your branding should be what using your products does for your customers. Focus on their needs and how their lives will be improved by using your product.
However the core brand personality should flow from you not your customers. This is how you create a truly unique brand that’s not generic.
That’s what we get done in branding with archetypes, we make sure you create a unique brand by focusing on you the entrepreneur. What makes you unique will make your business unique.
8. Forgetting to Update
Your business will change over time, you may want to reflect different parts of your brand to uplevel your offerings and products. You may want to take a different approach to your business. When this happens, your branding needs to reflect these changes. Sometimes, you need to assess and update. This is where rebranding comes into play.
If you’re looking to get started with any of these steps, check out the Build Your Business Vault – where you’ll find the Branding Guide Template, which will help you to start putting your brand together, the right way!
