Emmanuel Fonte | Music | Art | Leadership
If music be the food of love, play on. Emmanuel Fonte website is about music, art, real estate, architecture, design and decor. Occasionally, I talk about my other passion, hockey.
Do you want to pursue a career in social media marketing? Are you looking to hire a social media manager to upscale your business’ marketing growth?
Regardless of your goal, you need to understand what it truly takes to be an exceptional social media manager.
Thanks to https://www.ezliving-interiors.ie/ for the infographic
Guest article from Mary Aspen Richardson
In the digital age, branding is crucial; from a brand’s logo and mission statement to its website’s color and outreach tone, a brand’s identity will inform customers’ perceptions, expectations, and behaviors. Proper branding will instill positive connotations in brand recognition, inspire trust, and foster long-term relationships. Thus, a rebrand may be highly desirable or even unavoidable when this pivotal element underperforms. However, that’s no easy process, and it comes with multiple pitfalls for the unprepared. To help you navigate these waters, then, let us share 7 tips for a successful rebrand.
First, let’s briefly outline the reasons and motivations for a rebrand. Doing so here will help contextualize the process that follows.
Brands will typically consider rebranding of different scales in such cases as:
Of course, the exact scale of one’s rebranding efforts will strongly depend on the reason. Modernization may require little more than a visual update, for instance. In contrast, repositioning may call for complete reinventions to add proper meaning to one’s marketing.
With this context in mind, let’s outline a strategic, prudent rebrand process.
Feedback collection and data analysis are likely vital parts of your marketing efforts. If so, they can also serve as excellent foundations for rebranding. Consider such practices as the following, through which you may extract meaningful insights.
Monitoring your website’s effectiveness is among the most reliable ways to know what your audience wants, needs, and expects. You may use such tools as Google Analytics, website heat maps, and other dedicated marketing solutions that collect analytics.
Where tracking performance handles quantitative data, surveys offer qualitative data to explain your findings. Audiences are typically very eager to participate in surveys and tend to respond honestly. Moreover, they appreciate the perceived attention to their views on your brand and their experience with it.
Finally, you may monitor what audiences won’t say directly through social listening. Such tools allow you to track discussions on your brand that happen outside of your profiles and content and can perfectly complement your social media strategies as well.
With all your insights, you may now more reliably identify rebranding triggers. In line with the circumstances outlined above, consider such findings as:
If such conclusions can’t be remedied with smaller, hyper-specific changes to your outreach, PR, and content strategies, it may be time for a rebrand. Of course, the key to a successful rebrand is to initiate it exactly when it’s needed.
Still, before you get started, you should also consider the scope of your investment. That is, the costs, time frame, expected returns, and potential risks.
For this step, as you solidify your plans, examine:
By no means should this step discourage you. However, evaluating those factors may inform your choices and guide your efforts toward a safer direction.
With all of the above covered, you may now begin executing a successful rebrand. Here, you may start with your visual identity and then explicitly address all shortcomings you’ve identified above.
The 3 fundamentals for this stage, as the section’s subheading suggests, are the following.
Start with your brand’s visual identity; humans are very visual beings. Examine your logo, website design, social media profiles, and even visual content, and align them with your rebranding’s goals.
Your brand needs a story, and rebranding entails retelling it. Beyond visuals, examine:
The sum of such elements ultimately tells your brand’s story, communicating its past, present, and future.
Finally, consult your insights again to determine what existing audiences expect. Maintain these values and qualities, and keep them at the core of your new brand identity. At the same time, keep an eye on your new audiences – should they be your rebrand’s goal.
Next, you may begin testing such rebranding concepts with key stakeholders. For larger-scale rebrands, at this stage, you should also establish a rigid rebranding framework; as you approach launch, all teams must work in perfect synergy. Without this happening, you cannot have a successful rebrand of any considerable scale.
At this stage, you may move beyond the C-suite and test the waters with existing customers, employees, and other stakeholders. If you have access to audiences of potential customers, they should also help immensely. This step will help identify potential issues and shortcomings early and allow you to correct your course if need be.
Moving beyond closed test environments, you may proceed with a “stealth” launch – a soft, controlled launch to critical stakeholders. This practice allows for a gradual, safer rebrand execution that typically works better than abrupt, explosive announcements and launches.
You may begin with your internal teams, other key partners, and key customers for this step. Outline your reasons and motivations, allow for previews and constructive input, and prepare press releases as needed. This step will serve as the final rehearsal before your full launch, so remain vigilant and attentive.
Finally, once you have fully launched your rebrand, it is crucial that you commit to it. By this stage, you should have
That is not to say you may not need to make minor adjustments by any means. In fact, as with all business endeavors, maintaining a watchful eye over your analytics may always reveal more room for improvement.
However, you should now largely have a solid, data-driven, robust rebrand in place. As such, it is crucial that you fully commit to it; rebranding entails a new brand identity, regardless of size. Customers perceiving your rebrand as superficial or a quick fix will, in most cases, hamper your efforts, if not outright invalidate them.
To summarize, there are many reasons why a rebrand may be essential. A plain visual one may be desirable, or a holistic one may be necessary. In all cases, however, a successful rebrand requires very careful planning and strategic execution.
You may begin with accurate data to identify your rebrand triggers and negotiate its type and scope to best match your needs. You may then evaluate the risks, craft your new identity, and consistently test it with select audiences and stakeholders. Finally, you must fully commit to your rebrand post-launch to maintain trust with your audiences and ensure success. It may not be easy, but with these 7 tips for a successful rebrand, it will certainly be more manageable.
Meta description: From collecting insights and identifying your rebrand triggers to a strategic execution, discover 7 key tips for a successful rebrand.
Photos used:
https://pixabay.com/illustrations/rebranding-branding-brand-graphic-6672112/
https://pixabay.com/photos/podcast-music-studio-microphone-3939905/
https://pixabay.com/photos/painting-pencils-paint-pens-911804/
https://www.pexels.com/photo/group-of-people-on-conference-room-1181396/
The pandemic has sparked a range of significant shifts and changes in how we live, but maybe most notably, in the longer term, could be our approach to work, and what we look for in our professional career.
The Tooth Fairy comes by whenever a child’s tooth falls out to collect the tooth in exchange for some money. You might be surprised how much the Tooth Fairy’s rate changes per state… How Much Does the Tooth Fairy Pay? On average across the United States the Tooth Fairy pays $4.57 per tooth.
As TikTok continues to grow, and become a key culture driver in many regions, many advertisers are logically considering how they can tap into the platform in order to boost their promotions.
But marketing on TikTok is different from other platforms, most specifically in that TikTok users respond better to native-style content, arguably more so than other platforms. The full-screen, short-form nature of TikTok clips means that interruptive approaches are less successful, so you need to align with norms and trends of the ‘For You’ feed for maximum branding impact.
Your brand is much more than your logo or your company name. Brands inherently carry value, and they represent your company’s identity. The best way to inform your audience of the values your brand represents is to take them on an engaging journey and get them caught up in caring about your story. To make these concepts somewhat less abstract, we will explain in detail why your brand needs a story.
Unfortunately, developing an engaging story that captures the interest of your audience isn’t all that simple. You can’t just cobble together an About us page and call it a day. Technically you could, but that isn’t exactly the type of winning storytelling you are trying to achieve.
You’ll need to go back to your core values and ask yourself what exactly you want to accomplish. Think about what prompted you to found the company in the first place. Was there a specific spark of inspiration that led to the conception of your products? Generally, most products and services are created to respond to a need or solve a problem users might be having. Try to put into words the problems you are trying to solve and how you will make that happen for your customers.
Give your audience a taste of what makes your company unique, and inform them how their experience will be different if they choose to do business with you. Have your marketing carry meaning and purpose, and make your company’s values permeate every customer interaction. You might think that your products set you apart from the competition, but you first need to find a way to tell that to your audience.
You actually don’t need too many ingredients for a story to be good. Pretty much all that’s required is to have compelling characters and an obstacle they need to overcome. In this instance, your brand and all the people behind it will be the characters. When it comes to the obstacles – you can simply talk from experience. Stories are always about building a relationship with your audience. It’s time to open up and share your experiences and the struggles your business has faced so far. People always love a good underdog story, and if you present your tale in a compelling way, your audience will empathize and root for your success.
Having a story associated with your brand is a great way to get people to care. There are more businesses fighting for their 5 minutes in the spotlight than there are minutes in the day. It has become exceedingly difficult to stand out in an overcrowded market. However, if you manage to elicit a positive emotional response, you are more likely to create a lasting impression. By creating a captivating story, your brand will get easily recognized. Getting people to know who you are and care for your story is what marketing is all about. This is ultimately why your brand needs a story – because people’s impressions of your brand will make or break your business.
Basic psychology says you have very little time to make a first impression. You either win people over, or you don’t, and getting a do-over is almost impossible. Unfortunately, user attention spans in online spaces are ridiculously short. The average user is constantly bombarded by tons of information, and they have grown desensitized to traditional marketing. This gives you only a few opportunities to tell your story and explain what your brand is all about. Making an impactful first impression is why your brand needs a story that will help you attract the right audience.
You can forget traditional storytelling techniques. Your marketing on social media needs to be attention-grabbing, short, and impactful. Social networks like TikTok and Instagram commonly have users scroll over vast amounts of content in a manner of seconds. Businesses need to go the extra mile to ensure a positive customer experience because opportunities for user interaction are few and far between.
If you are in doubt about how to navigate the social media landscape, you should look at what is trending on those platforms. Both users and businesses are constantly outputting new content. Social networks have transitioned from places where users connect to platforms for consuming content. There is a reason content marketing has become the new industry buzzword. However, to make your content stand out, you need to master the art of short-form expression.
You need to be able to tell your brand story with the fewest possible number of individual elements. In this context, there are many design mistakes and pitfalls you have to avoid. All the design elements need to work in perfect harmony, and even the smallest piece of the puzzle needs to be able to tell your story.
Of course, there is also a necessity to tell your story more broadly once you get your audience to listen to what you have to say. At the end of the day, those small pieces need to connect to the larger and more complex parts. If you keep everything bite-sized, your values will appear to be only surface level. Use your website to post long-form articles that go into more detail about important topics. Create videos that demonstrate how to use your products and the benefits they provide. Most importantly, find a way to distill the essence of that longer content. You have to be able to showcase your best qualities in snippets.
Creating a compelling story will take some work, but it is bound to pay off. Modern audiences want to be engaged and entertained in a way that makes them feel understood. Having them connect to your business on a personal level is the best way to build a loyal customer base. Hopefully, we’ve explained why your brand needs a story and how to go about creating one for your business. Now it’s time to get creative and let everyone know what your brand is all about.
Meta description: Does your business get the attention it deserves? Many brands are struggling to get noticed, which is why your brand needs a story.
Thanks to Mary Aspen Richardson for the submission
