8 Ways to Grow Your Brand

Benefits of a Strong Brand

Building a strong and distinguishable brand comes with many benefits, like generating more sales, but there is more. Here are some of the most significant advantages:

Customer recognition

Competitive edge in the market

Easy introduction of new products

Customer loyalty

Enhanced credibility and ease of purchase

…and much more

Not sure where to get started? Here are a few steps you can take now that will help you create and nurture a strong brand in the future.

1. Map out your Target Audience

In order to create a strong brand, you first need to know who your customers are. A great way to better understand who your target audience is and what their needs are is to create a buyer persona. This is a semi-fictional representation of your ideal customer based on various pieces of data that you most likely already have available. Mapping out your target audience will help you create more tailored content, launch new products more easily that specifically fit their needs, and more.

How do you create a buyer persona?

First, you need to think about which information you already have to draw a picture of who your customers are. If you don’t have any data available, you can start by gathering information when people sign up on your website or buy your products.

When assessing the data that is available to you, aim to uncover patterns and trends that may lead you to get a better understanding of who your customers are and what motivates them to buy. This includes demographics like age, location, income and where they spend their time online.

The goal is to understand your customers' pain points and which role your brand plays in solving them. What does your buyer persona struggle with, and how can you help them solve this problem or achieve their goals?

2. Develop your Brand Voice

Creating a unique brand voice for your brand can help increase brand recognition and amplify your brand’s messages. You can start by thinking about what your brand stands for and what the tone of your business should be. Are you a serious brand or more relaxed and friendly in tone?

This also depends on the industry you are in and how you think people should perceive your brand. A good rule of thumb is to speak to your target audience as if you were speaking to a friend, but this highly varies by industry and your individual brand’s character. Above all, professionalism should always lead the way.

3. Obtain Funding

After you get a good picture of who your ideal customer is and you have tailored your messaging and product development towards solving your customers’ problems, you more than likely will find yourself in a position of (accelerated) growth.

Growth is good, but too much of it in a short period of time can push a brand into chaos. To scale sustainably means creating a plan and being prepared to handle any issues that are thrown your way. It’s the difference between getting a sudden spike in sales and processes falling apart, and getting that same spike and handling every order smoothly with great customer service to complement it.

Even though you are growing, cash might be tied up in receivables and purchase orders. Through funding, you can ensure that your business has enough cash on hand to grow, increase marketing spend and develop new products to keep up momentum.

Inventory financing, as an example, allows you to use inventory in your warehouse to finance your next batch of inventory before your current inventory is sold. It is a less costly solution for your business than raising equity capital, and allows you to have cash on hand when you need it. To find out more about funding options for emerging businesses and how they work, check out our Guide to Capital Funding.

4. Build your Marketing Campaign

You already know who your target audience is and which problems you are aiming to solve, but where and how do you reach them?

There is more to marketing than just that, but you should ask lots of questions to better understand who your target audience is. Who’s your ideal customer? When are they compelled to buy? Where are they buying?

It is important to understand your audience’s behavior, like where your audience spends their time in order to come up with an effective plan on how to reach as many people as possible through that channel. Do they spend most of their time on Instagram or is Twitter their platform of choice? Maybe your customers spend more time on video platforms than on Instagram, therefore you should aim to connect with them in the right place.

Your targeting should be aligned with your buyer persona(s), so that only people who are interested in the kind of product that you offer are seeing your marketing messages. The aim should be on leads that have a high potential of converting in order to drive sales. Think about your marketing campaigns as a way to address the specific problems your customers face and how exactly you aim to solve them with your offerings.

5. Introduce New Products or Services

Another great way to grow your brand is by introducing new products or services. If you are looking to grow your customer base, increase brand awareness and sales then this is a crucial step for your brand’s growth.

But don’t just blindly dive into launching a new product. Rather, carry out market research first to understand what else you can offer that fulfills your customers’ wants and needs.

You can use customer surveys, your own sales data and customer feedback to get a better picture through primary research. Secondary research means looking at industry trends, consumer trends and other data that was made public by other companies in your industry. By combining these two research methods you’ll be more likely to launch a product your customers will actually want to buy, and ultimately reach more prospects along the way.

6. Build a Strong and Consistent Business Reputation

Word of mouth is a form of marketing, and can spread like wildfire. When people feel good about the experiences they have had with your brand, they’re much more likely to tell their friends and post about it on social media.

When handling customer orders, be sure to put professionalism and customer satisfaction first. Delays in fulfillment should be avoided and order problems addressed promptly. Consumers have become increasingly used to easy shopping experiences and lenient return policies, and you should aim to live up to these standards as much as possible to avoid losing customers.

7. Find and Retain Loyal Customers

This may be self-explanatory, but we can’t stress this enough: Creating customer loyalty and making sure to retain those customers is crucial for growth.

Retaining loyal customers increases ROI (return on investment) and is less costly than acquiring new customers. By tracking and understanding customer churn, brands can make the necessary changes to retain more customers. Put a customer feedback system in place to better understand why your customers aren’t coming back, and what you can do to make sure they do.

You should also aim to build trust with your customers, something that takes time and consistent effort. Just because someone buys from you does not necessarily mean that they fully trust your brand. Businesses should make sure to always follow through on their promises and communicate clearly to build a rapport with customers.

8. Pivot your Strategy

Businesses continuously face a certain degree of uncertainty when doing business: Changes in the political, economic, technological and environmental landscapes can cause businesses to deal with unexpected obstacles.

These issues cannot be foreseen, but you can create and put a plan in place for when things go wrong. Being prepared to handle any issues that are thrown your way and pivoting your strategy is an important aspect of ensuring your brand’s growth.

Companies that are in a phase of hypergrowth also have greater ranges of uncertainty in planning than established companies do. By nurturing core competencies, brands can make sure that they stay ahead of the competition, and are headed towards sustainable profitability.

Grow Your Brand with Assembled Brands!

When things don’t go as expected, or you find yourself in a phase of rapid growth, having enough cash on hand is crucial to be able to smooth out rough patches and fuel growth sustainably.

A line of credit can be a great way to relieve some of the cash strain your brand may face. When you partner with Assembled Brands, you set yourself apart from the competition. Through business development, industry insights and an unparalleled network of emerging consumer brands, you get the tools you need to make sure you are growing the right way.

Follow in the footsteps of many household names in the direct-to-consumer space like Juneshine, Wardrobe.NYC and Violet Grey among others that have leveraged Assembled Brands to fuel their rapid growth.