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Whether you run a business to give your family a better life or more to exercise more professional freedom independently, branding is a core element of success. It’s how others see you or your business. It’s a key element in the visibility and recognizability of your business. Branding can affect not only sales, but trust.
When it comes to branding, you have a choice to make: build a personal brand or a business brand?
While that’s an important decision, it’s important to understand all professional branding is personal to some degree. Let’s talk about why that matters.
Business Branding vs Personal Branding
First, let’s look at what “personal branding” means, and what differentiates it from more traditional company branding (which involves more than a visual brand identity).
What is Personal Branding?
Personal branding is when your professional brand revolves around you as a person rather than the company. This type of branding is common among independent contractors, where their own credentials can what most attracts clients. Trust customers feel is rooted in them personally.
How Business Branding Differs from Personal Branding
With more traditional business branding, the emphasis in on a larger company—such as its name, logo, visual presence, and reputation within the industry. It still involves trust, which is why a company’s actions play a large role in brand image.
When you focus on business branding, your individual role matters less.
For example, think about attorneys. If you’re a lawyer who owns your own firm, you could build your brand around your own name and reputation, or you could focus on a separate firm brand in your legal marketing.
If the firm’s branding revolves around you and you leave, clients might leave to follow you because that’s where their trust is placed.
If you left a larger law firm where branding didn’t revolve around you personally, clients would be more likely to stay with the firm whether you were there or not. Their trust might rest more with the collective firm than you.
Why All Branding is Personal (and Why That Matters)
Because branding in all its forms is so deeply tied to trust, all branding is personal in one way or another. It’s what makes customers feel connected to you or your business. It’s about how they relate to you.
Your brand might not be personal in that it focuses on you, but it’s still personal to your customers.
By remembering that as you build (or rebuild) your brand, you’ll have an easier time developing more meaningful connections and relationships with customers who keep coming back.
Branding is the “Human” Side of Marketing
Marketing is often discussed in terms of numbers—like conversions, traffic, and sales. We sometimes neglect the human element of it all. You’re doing business with people who have real concerns and interests, and branding is how you connect to those things.
For example, let’s say you sell an innovative product for new parents. You would likely build a brand around your product or business name rather than a personal brand.
The brand would need to portray what they’re looking for—convenience and safety perhaps. They might also prefer brands with a certain style rather than only practicality.
Having a brand that encompasses the right mix of things that matter to your customers is all about satisfying certain feelings—like belonging, easing their stress, or earning their trust.
That’s all personal.
3 Tips for Building a More Personal Business Brand
To make sure you aren’t missing out on the more personal elements of building your company’s brand, consider these three things:
1. Know What Your Customers Want
You can’t perfect your brand without knowing what draws customers to you (or companies like yours). Research your competitors, and ask your customers for feedback.
2. Decide What You Want Your Company to Represent
Once you know what your customers want, decide what you want to be. When customers think of your brand, what do you want to come to mind? What do your products do for buyers, not just in function but in the broader sense of their lives?
3. Build Consistency Into Your Branding
When you understand what your brand means, not just to you but to your customers, convey that consistently in all branding efforts. That includes your logo, web design, product design, product choices in general, advertising, packaging, and even how you or your staff communicate with customers.
Even though all branding might not be personal to you, it relies on building a connection with customers. That makes it personal to them. Show them you understand them. Show them they can trust you. Do that with consistent brand-building, and you can build loyal customers for life.
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This content is brought to you by Anees Saddique.
Photo by Patrik Michalicka on Unsplash
