Every business owner wants to create a brand that stands out from the others but figuring out how to do this isn’t as easy as it sounds. And it’s hard to know how to be different if you’re trying to learn how to market yourself at the same time.
Lucky for you, there are some ways you can immediately get your brand to stand out without even needing to do any extra work. Read the 9 steps in this article, and before you know it, you’ll start distancing yourself from the competition.
No two people have the same origin story or the same background.
That’s why if you’re trying to stand out with your brand, it’s essential you tell people your own authentic story.
Here are some questions you can ask yourself to put your message out there to your audience.
By communicating who you are and how you started in the business, it will give others the chance to relate to your story and feel connected with your brand.
Authentically telling your story can build repeat customers who establish a deeper connection with your brand and become lifelong supporters of your mission.
If you anticipate the problems of a select group of people and relate to their issues, it will be easier than talking to the entire UK.
The more specific you can get on who your target audience is, the more your brand can stand out as a company that has a particular purpose.
Marketing calls this “niching” and it’s about finding a group within a group that you can service.
If you made watches, you could target runners who wear watches so that when you are marketing your brand, you can talk about your watches’ sturdiness and reliability.
This more focused message will differentiate your company from other high-end watches that people might wear to a wedding or gala.
Find out what brands are already doing in your niche and do some research on the messaging or images they are using.
Make notes or create a spreadsheet to help track the data you find on commonalities in:
Once you’ve gathered enough data, you can look through your findings and establish patterns or holes that your brand can meet.
If you notice that no one is servicing 25-45 year-olds in your niche, then your brand can stand out by talking directly to this demographic.
You could even change your brand’s colour scheme to stand out if you find a majority of companies are playing it safe with primary.
The key to researching competitors is to gather data for several companies so you can make comparisons, spot opportunities and identify your strengths.
With more and more transactions being made online, there are real questions about customer service’s long-term effects.
When someone purchases a gift online, there isn’t the same interaction as talking with a store employee and receiving one-on-one treatment.
Customer service is becoming more and more important as big-name brands establish themselves in the online market.
By taking your customer service to another level and providing help in areas that haven’t previously been explored, you could set up your business to stand out from competitors.
For example, including a handwritten note with each purchase or making sure your emails are personalized for each customer could make a big difference for your business.
You should have a document that includes your brand’s:
These guidelines will ensure your marketing stays on brand, and your brand is conveyed consistently.
If you hire a freelancer or agency to create designs, they can follow your guidelines, and it will help potential customers understand the designs are coming from the same company.
The same can be said if you were to hire a writer to create content for your brand.
Giving them a style guide to follow on who your ideal audience is, your tone of voice, and your visual style will provide messaging that stays on brand throughout all your channels.
Creating the brand style guide is the first step to ensuring that you are aligning your entire online presence.
Every piece of content that gets released for your brand should have the same colour scheme and should be talking to the same audience.
Consider the following online assets and go through each one to make sure it includes your branding:
Including your branding in every piece of content you release your clients and potential clients will automatically associate your marketing with your brand.
One of the best ways to make sure your brand stands out is to position your company as an authority.
Blogging can allow you to write content about the topics that you are passionate about.
When users find these articles, they can relate to your opinions and start to establish a connection with you.
Users will find you because your blogs will rank highly in search engines like Google, and your brand will stand out naturally by having more higher-ranking articles.
When users search for problems, they face and repeatedly see your articles and possible solutions, it will help you become trusted as a source of information for that topic.
But the only way you can make sure this happens is by blogging consistently so that your efforts end up paying off.
Along the same lines as blogging, hosting a webinar is a great way to connect directly with your audience and make your brand stand out.
Especially if no one else in your niche is hosting webinars, it can be an easy way for you to make a difference and get direct feedback on your services or products.
Make sure that your slides are branded by including a logo or having the same colour scheme so that your brand can always be on display.
Webinars are also a great way to establish more authority for your brand so that you are seen as an expert.
Trust is one of the more challenging parts of the customer journey to obtain, but you can immediately position yourself as a trusted source of information by hosting a webinar.
Much like your authentic story we talked about at the beginning of this article, your personality is yours and yours alone.
No one else on the planet has one quite like it. That’s why it’s so crucial for you to let it shine through.
By being your true self, you can attract customers who share your same beliefs or opinions.
Once this starts happening, you will find work to become more enjoyable because you genuinely serve the people you want to be helping.
Allowing yourself to be more of who you are is one of the fastest ways to creating a brand that stands out from others.
To make your brand stand out, it doesn’t take a high-end agency or in-depth sessions reconfiguring your entire company. All it takes is for you to believe in your authentic story and personality and let that speak throughout your whole business. But it does always help to do competitor research and create some online assets that can help carry that message.
