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BRAND & MARKETING
Brand & Marketing
A distinctive brand should represent your business values and vision, embodying the reputation and goodwill that you develop over time. Your marketing can then raise awareness of this brand and in turn of your products and services, attracting the customers you want.
BRAND
Design, Look & Feel
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You may want to use your trading name as your brand name, or create another one. Think about creating a logo and stylised packaging, all with the same colours, fonts etc. Try to apply these consistently across all materials, online presence etc.
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Do you have a slogan or 'strapline'? This can help indicate your purpose, vision or values.
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Try to make all these elements original and distinctive and ideally not descriptive - this will make it easier to obtain trade mark protection. See Copyright, Etc. (next), and Trade Marks specifically.
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Multiple brands? Also consider: will you sell all products or services under a single 'house' brand, or will you develop different brands for each?
Purpose & Values
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Your brand is more than just your logo or name and should embody your core values, vision and overall value proposition.
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That said, try to ensure your logo etc. represent this in a way that will appeal to your intended customers - for people to buy into why your business is doing what it does.
Behaviour & Reputation
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Over time, the business and goodwill of your business will become associated with your branding.
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As you develop, ensure corporate personality is represented by you and your staff in all interactions with customers, partners, etc.
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Aiming to provide good quality products and consistently good customer service, will encourage people to rely on you - and to spread the word to others.
MARKETING
How are you going to get people to buy your stuff? You need to generate brand awareness and customer interest, and maintain and develop this as your business grows.
To do this, be clear who your target customers are, and tailor your marketing content and approaches to attract them. Whoever you target, an online presence is pretty much essential.
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Website: think about setting up a website to showcase your business, even if you don't plan to sell your products or services on it.
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Online branding: as well as consistent branding (name(s), logo(s), colours, style, fonts etc. ), try to make your website, and any shop you open on an online marketplace, easily accessible and navigable, with clear descriptions, clear ways to contact you and so on - it all helps to reinforce your brand.
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Social media can be extremely effective. Videos and animation can help. Think about which social media your intended customers are likely to use, and how they will use it. (Instagram, for example, is very effective for displaying images of creative products and designs. LinkedIn, although its reach is smaller than Facebook's, tends to have more pro-active business users.
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SEO (search engine optimisation) is a fundamental part of success online. Choose your 'metadata', key words, product descriptions etc. carefully to attract the customers you want, being mindful of what they are likely to search for and what search terms they would use. Again, how can you distinguish yourself? Videos and animation, for example, may help more than static text.
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Offline: you might want to think about flyers, leaflets and business cards you can hand out at events, about renting a stand at an exhibition or fair or maybe sponsoring or speaking at an event. Iterative 'face to face' testing of products with consumers can also help generate interest from an early stage.
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Advertising can also help - whether online (using, say Google Adwords or similar, or influencers) or in local or trade press or magazines.
There is an increasing trend to leverage technology as the marketing industry embraces digitalisation and 'big data': you may find there are 'MarTech' solutions available that can boost your sales.