What do you want prospective clients or customers to think when they think of your business? What should they feel about your company? The emotional response you get from them is your brand. It represents your company’s personality or culture. It’s what makes them want to do business with you. If your online brand is damaged due to a bad review, faulty product, or bad press, it’s easy to see how fast it can affect your brand and your business.
Think about the last time you heard a story where a brand was put in a bad spotlight online. What did you think of the brand when you heard about it?
Brand is Your Shorthand Introduction
Perception of your corporate brand helps your customers perceive, to some degree, your new product or service even before you’ve launched it. If they understand your brand to include integrity and the pursuit of quality, they’ll already be thinking good thoughts even before they’ve been introduced to your new offering.
Brand inspires loyalty
IKEA, Harley Davidson, Oprah, Zappos, Lulumon and Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream might only have one thing in common: the fierce loyalty they’ve drawn from customers and followers. Each of these brands is known for their cult-like following. When Ben & Jerry’s comes out with a new flavor, it’s perceived to be the best — even before fans have tried it.
A brand is everything in the digital world
Brands get established through word of mouth. It’s not what you say about your company — it’s what your customers say about it. In the pre-Internet dark ages, word of mouth was conducted just like it sounds — by one person talking to another, or perhaps exchanging views with a few people at work or during happy hour or holiday meals. The point is, it was a slow, uneven process. Today, a social media influencer can pass along a recommendation to millions on Twitter or Instagram. The good that you do (or the not-so-good) can be noticed and passed along in a millisecond. Brand truly is everything.
Loyalty won can be loyalty lost
The downside of all the good you can do in building your brand is how quickly it can be damaged. Sears was once one of the most trusted and beloved names in American retail. That makes it a valuable lesson here. The company has a severely tarnished brand today, and that works to keep customers away. The lesson here is that, once you’ve devoted time, talent and resources to successfully creating an appealing brand, you’ll have to work just as long and hard to maintain that brand image. The job is never done. Never take your brand reputation for granted.
Reach out
We are an internet marketing firm in Las Vegas with a reputation for helping clients achieve e-commerce success through superior SEO, social media and content management strategies. We’d love to help you grow your brand. Call us today!
