Chart of the Week: 64% of consumers are now belief-driven buyers who want brands to deliver on societal issues, as well as products
We all know that trusting a brand increases the chances of a customer buying from it. Building trust turns customers into advocates, providing priceless word-of-mouth marketing. On top of this, brand trust means customers keep coming back, which is hugely beneficial considering the fact that customer retention is cheaper than acquisition.
But exactly what does brand trust mean to customers and how can it impact their decision making? Today, brand trust is everything to customers, meaning that once you’ve lost it, you’ve likely lost them.
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In fact, according to Edelman’s latest research, businesses are trusted even more than governments, showing…
When influencer marketing and branded content work together, both sides benefit in the end
Influencer marketing and branded content: They’re useful tools on their own, but they are far more effective within a strategy that treats them as complementary pieces of a stronger whole. Unfortunately, advocates for influencer marketing and branded content tend to see one another as adversaries.
The first group champions influencer marketing’s ability to give a brand street cred with third-party associations. As little as people sometimes trust brands, an endorsement from an influencer can go a long way toward building audience trust, and for niche audiences and micro-influencers, the effect is even more pronounced.
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Lovers of branded content, however, believe that…
If your brand logo or brand message is not connecting with your ideal consumers, the chance of brand recall in the future are slim
Branding is equivalent to telling a story, a story that resonates with your ideal buyers. Visuals form the core of this storytelling.
In other words, visual branding is the first step to building a successful brand image and developing your business. First impressions matter and this rings true even with visual branding. If your brand logo or brand message is not connecting with your ideal consumers, the chance of brand recall in the future are slim.
There are many examples of branding going haywire and the reasons can be anything - a bad logo or poor brand name or inconsistent visuals, and so on. While each brand has a different story, there are a few little design errors that every brand should avoid.
1. Creating a controversial logo
A logo is…
When your employees fail to understand your brand identity, it is nearly impossible to communicate it effectively to your consumers
Establishing a strong brand identity is like building a healthy relationship - you have to believe in yourself before anyone else can do the same. However, getting your sales team, customer service team and every other department on the same page can easily become an uphill battle. When your employees fail to understand your brand identity, it is nearly impossible to communicate it effectively to your consumers.
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To make matters worse, it only takes a single slip-up to lose your customers forever. A simple disconnect between your stated values and the…
Some of the best brands set themselves apart in their industry by coming up with creative brand names. Here’s what we can learn from them
If you don’t believe that having a good name will impact your business, maybe you should. After all, catchy names outperform long and complicated names on the stock market by 33%. Sometimes, being bold when naming a business pays off. These can be the names that stick in people’s heads and set up your business for success.
A name is an outgrowth of a business plan. The right name will support the growth of your business and can help improve your chances of becoming successful.
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Positive and negative PR campaigns can affect brand equity and identity - learn how to apply positive PR across touchpoints in the RACE customer lifecycle
It's a general marketing myth that without PR (positive or negative) consumers won't know who you are and how you can help - wrong. Although effective PR can be the make or break for smaller companies who want to get their name, vision and message out to the public, larger brands have build a brand identity that keeps them noticed regardless of ill-thought out publicity stunts and, sometimes, even the products they offer.
Brand equity refers to the customer's perception of a brand name or company rather than the multitude of products or services they provide. Brands that successfully create a strong online and offline brand equity includes: Apple, Google, Microsoft, Amazon, Netflix etc. You can instantly identify them, even if you don't know everything they offer.
However, solely…
The building blocks of an effective brand strategy
Since the turn of the millennium, more than 50 percent of Fortune 500 companies have suffered or failed due to digital disruption. With so many social media sites competing at nearly every turn, building a successful brand through digital marketing can be quite a challenge. Add ever-evolving platforms, like artificial intelligence, to the mix, and the challenge becomes exponentially more complicated.
Technology and platforms that cater to users around the clock create a need for new business models that enable marketing to adapt appropriately. For example, apps like Instagram and Snapchat are highly reactive, meaning the old practices of curating and scheduling social media posts aren’t always viable.
In many ways, successful marketing means successful storytelling. The goal is to expand the story to reach customers where they are. Therefore, the art of telling it will need to evolve if your brand is to withstand the test…
Whether you’re hastily booking a last-minute meal for two, or boycotting the societal conventions and watching Netflix at home, in your PJs, it’s that time of the year again!
Boyfriends are panic buying 100 roses for £25 at Aldi and the card racks at Clinton’s are only getting larger.
According to research from a retail and shopper marketing agency Savvy, 39% of shoppers said they expect to spend more on Valentine’s Day 2018 than they did last year, rising to 52% among 18-34 year-olds. In addition, 56% of respondents said that they don’t mind spending more to make the day special. The research also highlights that Valentine’s Day spending is expected to hit £726m. Yes, that’s right!
Wondering how your business can benefit from this revenue? To captivate the love-ridden audiences on Valentine’s Day, marketers need to…
Trump defied every expert and still won. The implications for brands are huge.
Yesterday, I prepared a piece about the anticipated Clinton win as President of America.
What a difference nine hours makes…
Despite all the sophisticated big data … the huge political advertising budgets from the Clinton camp… the faceless pollsters who number-crunched rather than listened to the unspoken authentic voice of the people… in the end Trump won.
…So why, from a branding perspective did a reported sexist, racist and narcissistic defy all predictions?
Perhaps the regular American saw what a mess the world has become – despite all the propaganda suggesting the contrary. Looking for example to the UK, they got the impression that its identity had been decimated by an open-door policy leading to the country’s spiritual, commercial, social and political foundations becoming at best ‘in transition’ and at worst, tatters.
They saw Europe down, despondent and divided.
They looked at how former hard-working…
Key lessons for brands emerge from the most anticipated ad of the holiday season
On initial viewing the John Lewis’ £7m Xmas 2016 commercial tells a quaint story of a girl whose trampoline becomes popular with the local wildlife community.
Set against a backing track of Randy Crawford’s ‘One Day I’ll Fly Away’. The commercial features a Boxer dog in a typical Middle-England home. The dog enviously stares out of a living room window as it watches two wild foxes, a badger, a squirrel and a hedgehog liberally jumping on a trampoline built by the household’s father for his daughter.
Come Christmas morning Buster (the Boxer dog) pushes aside a surprised Bridget (the daughter) to merrily jump on trampoline all for itself.
Given a tumultuous political year, John Lewis’s customer director Craig Inglis said:
“You could say 2016 has certainly been quite a year. We…
