The main methods of brand promotion

In a highly competitive environment, brand promotion in the market is an important task for any business. And if earlier there were not too many opportunities to form a positive image, and the cost of offline advertising limited opportunities even more, now with the use of Internet technologies one can achieve excellent results even with a relatively small budget.

What is a brand?

Most often, the word “brand” means a certain brand. In fact, the concept of brand is somewhat broader. This is a trademark, and a set of images and features that distinguish the company from its competitors and are associated by consumers with this trademark. Those. A brand is a certain image formed by potential customers.

For example, if the name of the brand of any crackers is called for you, a whole set of images will immediately form in your head: this is the color of the package, the logo, certain taste qualities, and emotions associated with them.

If it comes to expensive products, then there are also added associations with quality, status, success. So, the person who bought the Toyota car obviously looks more successful than the one who drives a Lada Kalina or DEUWOO. A washing machine or vacuum cleaner, assembled in Germany, is much more credible than the analog with the same characteristics, but with the mark “Made in China”.

Of course, the quality of a product or service affects the brand perception first of all. On the other hand, today, in conditions of an excess market, it is almost impossible to achieve success without a competent advertising and creating a positive image. That is why brand promotion is very important.

Concept of company promotion
Very often, businessmen spend large sums on promotion, but at the same time they no return. The result is frustration, refusal to invest in image and reputation, and attempts to concentrate on direct sales.

The reason for such failures is the lack of a sound strategy. And it, in turn, is created after a detailed analysis of goods and services, studying competitors, as well as customer needs.

What do you sell?
The first thing to understand is what exactly are you selling. How does your offer differ from many other similar ones, what are their advantages?

In many cases, there are objective features of the product and service, on which it will then be possible to focus on the creation of PR materials. Moreover, the feature not necessarily found will be a real advantage.

Perhaps this is just a difference, which can be interesting to beat. Or even something that everyone has, but nobody has paid attention to this quality yet.

For example, in the 20th century, one American beer company in its product description indicated that they only poured beer into “steamed bottles”. Competitors even rebelled at first, because the company described the standard practice for all. But no one guessed to focus on the features of packaging processing in advertising. And it worked. The brand became associated with high standards of cleanliness and hygiene, which had a positive effect on sales.

So try to find something special for your products too. This will be your unique selling proposition (USP).

What do others sell?
You must be different from competitors. And therefore be sure to learn what they offer their customers. And when choosing your UTP, try not to repeat. Otherwise, the promotion of a new brand will not be effective, because you will be confused with competitors. And in some cases, you can even get into trouble in the form of lawsuits from trademarks, whose decisions you accidentally repeated.

Another reason to study the market is dropping out unsuccessful decisions. Pay attention to successful brands and not so. Analyze what advantages are promoted in your line of business, what your colleagues base their marketing strategy on. And draw conclusions. As they say, it is much better to learn from the mistakes of others. And on the successes, too.

We make a portrait of the buyer
To understand who you are going to sell a product or service, you need to “get acquainted” with your client. Here is a sample list of questions, the answers to which will help in this matter:

Are most of the buyers male or female?
What age category are these people in?
What is their income level?
Are there any common interests, for example, most of the potential customers – car enthusiasts, wood craftsmen, needlewomen, etc.?
Are these products more often chosen for yourself or as a gift to someone?
The level of education of potential customers? (needed to understand which language is closer to them)