1) Stop thinking of it as a logo – it is all about experience

My biggest issue with anyone wanting a brand or creating a brand is that they think it begins and ends with the logo. Your brand is the perception of your business in the mind of the consumer. It is all about what you stand for and most importantly how that is then experienced.

Think through all the touch points that your business has with customers. From the pre-sale to post-sale journey and see where you can have the opportunity to create a level of connection. That can be something as simple as a thank you for ordering from us email, or sending out a printed proposal with a box of chocolates, whatever it is, there is a way to enhance the experience.
The more times you can get in front of a prospect or an existing customer and communicate and connect, the deeper the relationship becomes, the more meaning your brand has in their mind, and the harder it will be for a competitor to remove you from their mind.

If your business is not communicating regularly with potential and current customers, you are losing a massive opportunity for people to recall who you are and why they should choose you over the competition. So when the time comes for them to make a purchasing decision you are firmly rooted in their mind and they will not look elsewhere.

2) Run your brand in every aspect of your business – make it entertaining and sexy

Look at the brands that you might love or like. What is it that makes you dig them? Is it the cool packaging, the funky adverts, the well-designed store or the super charismatic customer service person. These are just some of the ways that you can bring your brand to life.
A brand creates these impressions across your marketing and communications, your offices or retail unit, your staff interactions, and the actual product or service proposition that you have. All of these are places that your brand can engage.

In each instance, what you have to do is make that experience is entertaining and fashionable. By that what I’m referring to is that you can offer either a very standard and staid piece of communication – where the whole experience is just very functional, or you can make it memorable, put more thought into it and try and evoke a reaction whether that is humour, shock, depth, whatever it is and you can do it in a way that makes someone go ‘wow’ that is just so sexy, I love it. It might be extreme but brands are there to create an impression.

3) Make people fall in love with you – love is not based on reason, it is based on a feeling

The biggest factor involved in the psychology of decision making and getting people to like you or choose you, is that the argument in their mind is an emotive one not a functional one. We like to believe that we are logical rational creatures. The reality is far from that. We are highly influenced by our emotions.

Many businesses try to make it a logical rational reason why a potential customer should choose them.  They give lists of the services or products they offer. This can work if there are not any competitors within a particular market. However, as soon as other competitors enter a market the reason to choose your business can be diminished by cheaper competitors, or more local ones, or ones that offer better functional utility.
Hence if you make the reason why a customer chooses you based not your function but your emotion and the brand personality, then that becomes very powerful. An emotion a brand creates can’t be copied. It is an excellent way to create differentiation and it appeals to the heat and soul of the customer.

A philosopher priest by the name of Dr Erasmus of Rotterdam said we are twenty-four more times influenced by our emotions than we are by the very nature of things. Big brands are very aware of this and use these techniques and tricks to create preference in our minds. Small and medium sized businesses could use these tricks to dominate, as brand building is the one of the best and most underused strategy in creating profitable and long lasting businesses.