By Michael Wirth, Junior Marketing Manager, Simplaex GmbH
The age-old question of how to increase a business’ brand awareness has been on marketer’s minds for years now. And it won’t go away anytime soon, even after a year as up-and-down as 2020.
Brand awareness has been at the forefront of priorities for digital marketing managers the last couple of years and has become even more important amidst obvious market changes. So what exactly does it take to achieve this?
Let’s take a dive into the depths of brand awareness.
What is brand awareness and why should you care?
How does your brand resonate with your audience? The greater brand awareness you possess the more people can associate with your business’ messaging or logo. And the more people can associate with your brand, the more likely they are to trust your brand.
If you can build brand awareness among your target demographic, you can help your brand become top-of-mind when these consumers are ready to research and make a purchase.
The importance of brand awareness becomes clear when you think of global brands like Coca-Cola or Google. Both are synonymous with their respective industries, so much so that googling something has become a verb in itself.
How can you build your brand awareness?
2020 has fundamentally changed how we interact with one another. From lockdowns to social distancing, a lot of formerly face-to-face interactions have now moved to the digital realm. And with that, opportunities arise as well. With more and more of us being active online, brands also have the opportunity to establish themselves here by using several different techniques.
- SEO
Search Engine Optimization has become vital in order to distinguish yourself as an organization from your competitors. Research common keywords and phrases used in your respective industries as these are the terms that are being used to find businesses like yours.
In addition to that, it’s also important to then write content and landing pages that include relevant keywords for your niche. Your target audience should already be established in order for you to optimize for keywords that this audience uses. However, don’t overdo it with the keywords, as Google can penalize you for using it too much and in a manner where it doesn’t make sense context-wise.
- Social Media
Social media is a game-changer when it comes to the enhancement of brand awareness. Think of all the influencers you know on Instagram. Since their customer audience is able to relate to them and have a clear understanding of what their content is, they can be considered a brand. If you transfer this knowledge to an organization, one thing that can be quickly identified as a driving force is consistency. From content posted in regular time intervals to the actual content itself, consistency is key.
Furthermore, social media can also be used to host giveaways or quizzes. Having your audience engage with your content is great as it associates your brand with fun as well as permitting you to generate valuable leads this way. 70% of marketers say that interactive content is effective at engaging visitors/buyers. This is simply due to the fact that visuals are processed a lot faster by the human brain than text.
- Brand Partnerships
Brand Partnerships are a great way to increase brand awareness. Not only does your own audience’s trust gets enhanced, but you’re also adding the audience of your collaborator to your network. Lastly, both customer bases receive an insight into a business they likely were not aware of. This is a win-win for all parties involved.
- Paid Advertising
All ad platforms, like Google have the option of having campaigns use brand awareness as a goal. Using this, you can reach new people who might be interested in your brand and even target audiences based on specific behaviors and preferences. While the process of setting the campaigns up might appear to be straightforward, the optimization process and scaling might be a bit more tricky and this is the point where you might require an expert helping hand.
2020 was a challenging year but it has also brought out the best in us. With the accelerated emergence of the digital sphere and all the opportunities that come with that. Increasing your brand awareness is primarily a digital feat as of now. Using these specific techniques, nothing should stand in the way of growth for your business in 2021.