Why Corporate Branding is Critical to Success
It may come as a surprise to learn that corporate branding is essential to the survival of a company. As the global market continues to grow, companies must find more and more ways to stand out among their peers. This simply cannot be done without a well-planned branding campaign. Consumers no longer have the time or energy to invest in knowing your company without an indication that the relationship will pay off for them. Branding gives customers an idea of your company values, client base, and even service quality before they ever set foot in your store.
For small businesses in Salt Lake City, branding is especially important. As a small or midsize local business, you likely cannot compete with the advertising and outreach budgets of large competitors. Because of this, your branding must make a strong and lasting impression among consumers to solidify your spot in the market. Luckily, most consumers prefer companies, large or small, that have a defined personality. It sounds odd, but the more a customer has a sense of your company’s aesthetic and mission, the more likely they will develop loyalty.
It may help to compare corporations to people — people with strong and solidified personalities are more likely to make an impression and create true and lasting friends because they are being themselves. This type of connection can be made for corporations as well through targeted and effective branding. For local businesses, achieving brand recognition and loyalty requires experienced branding agency services. By hiring a corporate branding agency, you can distill your company into a strong personality to which your customers can easily become attached.
REDKOR – Who We Are
Though we are a corporate branding company, we implement many unique strategies in our branding process. Most marketing and branding companies focus solely on emotion in their campaigns. Though we definitely infuse emotion into our branding campaigns, we build a more solid and comprehensive foundation around these feelings. We begin and end with consumer research to ensure that your efforts are narrowly targeted at your desired markets and that your branding is based on evidence rather than only on creativity.
We use a customized and personal research process to ask your consumer about their perception of you. This teaches us what you are doing well, what you are doing poorly, and, most importantly, what your current reputation is in your markets. We use this research to build a branding campaign based on your already-established reputation, and in the process, we capitalize on the strengths determined by your customers. We believe in evidence-based branding because we know that it works.
Salt Lake City’s corporate market is both diverse and competitive and is full of unique challenges for local businesses. Most corporate branding services don’t have the resources to aim branding efforts at niche local markets. We are different. At REDKOR, our tried-and-true branding research system allows us to develop a branding strategy that is pinpointed to Salt Lake City specifically and highlights your unique traits as a business here. This type of focused and researched branding ensures that the results are as impactful as possible, and your efforts yield maximum returns for your company.
The REDKOR Method
The process for our branding services is extremely different from any other company you will find in the corporate branding world. We follow an evidence-based system to maximize the impact of your branding. Our corporate branding services usually go as follows:
Stakeholder Audit
As with any project, we must first determine the intended results. For this reason, we begin by meeting with you to discuss your goals for the branding efforts. We base this phase on empathetic and open conversation to ensure that we truly understand where your company is and where you would like it to go. We determine your goals to help keep the process focused and on-task.
Competitive Audit
After we meet with you, we move our focus outward one step to assess your competitors. We look at the tactics being used by others in your industry and how those companies are successful. During this process, we can also determine where your company fits in relation to others in the industry — understanding where you fit in the fabric of the market allows us to be strategic with our efforts, especially in terms of taking clients from competitors.
Love Group Audit and Research
The most essential step of our process is talking to your customers because, ultimately, they are the driving force behind any business. Because of this, we spend a great deal of time getting to know what they think of you. This process assesses everything from perception, to values, to their loyalty and can highlight what is being done correctly and what may need to change. The strengths determined here will be the backbone of our branding efforts.
Story Creation and Content
After all of this research is done, we can move on to map out what we will use. We may distill the research down into your strengths, which will act as a jumping-off point for the campaign. This summarizes the emotions that your customers associate with your corporation and key terms and values that we may want to highlight.
Creative Design Concepts
This phase is what most people think of when they consider branding efforts. This is where we develop designs and concepts that may work for your new campaign. This can include everything from graphics to fonts to colors and more and is generally the most traditionally creative part of the branding process.
Concept Testing
After we’ve done some development, we circle back to ensure we’re on the right track. We will present you with several options of how your branding campaign might go. We then take the ones that you like and approach your customers again. They can then tell us what they like and dislike about the campaigns and whether we have accurately distilled your company into a brand or if we’ve missed the mark. Trial and error is the foundation of our research process, and in this way, we can zero in on a successful campaign more accurately.
Notable Brands in Salt Lake City
Your company will not be the first to implement a successful and emotional branding strategy. Many companies right here in Salt Lake City have incredibly successful branding techniques that attract customers every year. Examples include:
Overstock.com
A nationally recognized name, Overstock.com’s branding is immediately recognizable and draws consumer attention to their name as an exciting “other” option. Overstock offers thousands of options for home goods at reasonable prices. The iconic O that represents the brand is also something that users know immediately. It might seem simple, but differentiating your brand from the iconic O of Oprah couldn’t have been easy. Shifting the O off-center and with a bold red transformed what could be a conflicting brand.
Myriad Genetics
Once the only lab available for certain genetic tests, including the elusive BRCA gene, Myriad Genetics continues to offer testing for potential health conditions from hidden genetic issues. The simple DNA icon to the left, a non-capitalized, myriad, capitalizes on its name – they cover myriad results for myriad genetic concerns. Unlike Overstock, Myriad uses language under the name: when decisions matter. Because their work is niche and could be confusing to users who find their brand, the words suggest their eventual intent.
SendOutCards
SendOutCards leverages fonts and simple imagery to explain its offerings. A recognizable digital paper airplane to the left of the name suggests to any digital user the command to “send.” The font, simple and clear, suggests a handwritten note, further revealing their brand mission. Their tagline and slogan, “Sending Moments Through Tangle Touch,” is compelling and suggests the importance of their mission. In a digital world, sending a tangle token of thanks or care is so much more meaningful.
Contact REDKOR
Evidence-based branding can bring your corporation to the forefront of Provo markets. With our system, you can be sure that your company has a solid future in your industry and can operate competitively for years to come. To begin your branding journey, contact us today.
