What is Brand Awareness?
Brand awareness is a measurement of the level of recognition your company has in the eye of the public. Companies with high levels of brand awareness are more easily recognized by consumers and have an easier time engaging their target audience. Brand awareness is oftentimes confused with brand perception because of how similar the two concepts are. Brand awareness only measures how well known a business is, brand perception is concerned with whether the recognition a brand receives is positive or negative.
Why is Brand Awareness Important?
Brand awareness is important because it is considered the first step in a consumer’s journey to making a purchase. This is because people have to be made aware of a brand before they feel motivated to become a customer. Companies with a higher degree of brand awareness also tend to have higher sales numbers. The logic here is that businesses that invest in brand awareness keep their company’s name fresh in the minds of consumers. Whenever a consumer wants to purchase a product, the companies they think of first tend to be the ones they end up buying from. It isn’t a guarantee that they’ll come to your brand, but it’s definitely an advantage.
How Does Digital Marketing Increase Brand Awareness?
Digital marketing can directly increase a company’s brand awareness by getting its name out there. There are several different kinds of digital marketing, each with its own strengths and weaknesses. The best approach for your brand will depend on the demographics of your target audience. This is because different marketing methods are more effective for different audiences. For example, social media campaigns are much more effective when targeted at younger audiences than they are for seniors.
Photo by Tracy Le Blanc
Tips to Increase Brand Awareness
⦁ Great Corporate Culture
Corporate culture refers to the behaviors and rules that determine how employees of a company interact. For example, law offices generally have a very professional and serious corporate culture. This usually includes practices such as wearing professional clothing in the office and keeping socializing to a minimum. Building a corporate culture where your employees feel comfortable and productive is important for increasing brand awareness. This is because companies that have a great corporate culture have an easier time catching the public’s eye.
The most straightforward way to build a solid corporate culture is to invest in your employees. This shows employees and the public that your company wants to take an active role in their improvement. Offering your employees professional development opportunities is a simple and direct way of investing in your staff. For example, a leadership development consultant can advise your business on how to promote better senior leadership.
⦁ Build a Stellar User Experience
A stellar user experience is an important component of brand awareness for a couple of different reasons. Firstly, a great user experience keeps customers loyal because they are already comfortable with your product. This is one of the reasons Amazon is so successful. They make online shopping so simple that people hesitate to shop anywhere else. An intuitive user experience also helps a brand grow its audience because it encourages users to share the product/service with their friends.
But your products aren’t the only thing that should be intuitively designed. Your website should also be designed with the user experience as a priority. Consumers should be able to easily navigate to any important page on your company’s website. The checkout process should also be easy for the user to complete. Remember to offer a few different shipping and payment options to ensure every customer is satisfied.
⦁ Content Marketing
Content marketing is an organic method of digital marketing. This means that it doesn’t rely on paid advertising to generate traffic or buzz. With content marketing, the goal is to create shareable content that is informative, entertaining, or interesting to your audience. If the content is successful, people will share it with their friends and it will be engaged with organically.
The most common form of content marketing is blogging and for good reason. Blogs are easy to create and are capable of generating incredible levels of engagement. The most important thing to remember when blogging is to be consistent. Without consistent content, a blog will slowly dwindle in numbers and become irrelevant.
