The Dos and Don’ts of Branding in 2020
If you look at the industry press, you’d be forgiven for thinking that the world of branding in 2020 is totally different from 2010. Amid widespread talk of the importance of personalized branding, influencer marketing, and data-driven approaches, brand managers can forget the importance of getting the basics right.
There are plenty of things people won’t tell you about opening a business, but here’s one of them: the old ways are often the best. Getting the look of your brand right is still as important as ever, as is designing a beautiful logo and making sure people see it.
In this article, we’ll look at how to successfully brand your company in 2020, making use of the newest statistics available. The picture that emerges might surprise you. In many ways, the key elements of a successful brand in 2020 are the same as those from 2010, or indeed 1920.
Use Color Correctly
Using color to heighten the recognition of your brand is still one of the digital marketing basics. Recent research has shown that having a unique and striking brand color can improve brand recognition by over 80% and that 80% of consumers report that a brand’s color is an important factor in identifying it.
Given this, the statistics on how often marketers actually use color to heighten recognition are surprisingly low. Just 21% of marketers use their brand colors on 8 out of 10 of their presentation slides.
Why? Well, it seems that in the rush to find new ways of branding their company, many marketers see using their brand colors as too simple an approach. In reality, simple is often best when it comes to branding.
Make Your Content Relevant
Most marketers are aware of the importance of great content and devote plenty of resources to producing it. The problem is that in the rush to produce unique content, a lot of brands end up either producing bad content or content that doesn’t fit their brand image or voice.
This is a huge problem because research shows that 56% of online consumers say that most of the branded content they see is irrelevant to them, despite 80% of readers thinking that authentic content is the main factor that drives them to follow or engage with a brand.
All this points to another simple truth: That while unique content is still one of the best marketing investments you can make in 2020, you also need to ensure that your content conforms to your overall brand strategy. That’s why the best web hosts give you tools to analyze the way that your readers interact with your content so that you can see which pieces are offering genuine value to your customers.
Think About Your Employer Branding
Most brands are focused on reaching new customer groups and ensuring the loyalty of their existing customers. There is nothing wrong with that, but in 2020 brands need to go further. The way in which your brand appears to prospective employees is just as important because strong employer branding can help you to attract the best talent and ultimately improve the sustainability of your business.
The stats back this up. 50% of employees think employer branding is an important part of their HR approach, and 55% of recruiters want to invest more in employer branding. Not only does this type of branding help in building up your reputation – especially among millennials – but it can also significantly reduce the cost of hiring new staff. Research suggests that brands that invest in an employer branding strategy see their average cost of hiring reduce by 43%.
Your Logo Is Still Important
Brand logos can sometimes seem like an outdated way of increasing brand recognition, but in reality, they are more important than ever. Recent research has shown that consumers need to see a logo nine times before it becomes recognizable, but that after this has occurred brand recognition is much more effective than before.
That’s why successful brands take every opportunity they can to get their logo into the mind of the public: not only plastering their logo across their website and corporate materials but also approaches like t-shirt printing and other branded items.
Despite this, many small businesses don’t invest sufficient resources into ensuring the quality of their logo. While 67% of small businesses are willing to pay $500 for a logo design, that number drops off significantly when the cost increases – only 18% of small businesses are willing to pay $1000 for a logo design. Given how frequently a logo is used, an investment of $1000 doesn’t seem that much, even for small businesses.
Use Social Media To Actually Engage
Most brand managers are aware of the importance of social media in promoting their brand. However, many don’t have a strategy for social media success that takes into account the primary value of social media platforms – the ability to directly engage with audiences.
This is reflected in the statistics on the way that customers ACTUALLY use social media. 96% of people talking about brands on social media aren’t following those brands, and so often vast numbers of customers are simply ignored by social media outreach teams.
The trick, here, is to treat social media as a tool for conversation, rather than just another publishing platform. 77% of users feel more positive about a brand after their Tweet is replied to, so make sure you have the resources to do that. You can even take the opportunity to start building a database of potential customers for future outreach, as long as you are aware of how to store personal data in a safe, secure, and legal way.
The Bottom Line: Simple is Best
Many of the recommendations on this list might seem a bit dated to experienced brand managers. Surely brand promotion in 2020 is all about innovative techniques that make use of AI algorithms and automated ad targeting?
Well, yes and no. New approaches certainly have their place in branding in 2020, but only as an addition to the kind of basic marketing practices that have been successful for years. Get a great logo, get it out there, and treat your customers like people.
Sometimes, it really is that simple.
