As a small business owner or nonprofit leader, you want to get the word out about your business. You want to create a buzz about what it does. But should you use branding or marketing services?
You need to separate the hive from the honey. We can help – keep reading!
Branding Is Your Identity; Marketing Is Your Voice
Both branding and marketing are about communication between your organization and your target audiences (whether that means customers, donors, investors, or new talent). It’s connecting an idea to your people.
Branding Your Hive
Branding is about your hive’s identity. Your brand creates correlations and memories your audience will connect with. How do you differ from everyone else out there? And why should your audience care?
Branding always comes first. Every time you share about your products and services, you are marketing the brand through your logo, color scheme, brand name, distinctive fonts, and the unique experience you provide. Aka your brand assets.
As a branding agency, we work alongside you to uncover and clarify:
- Your guiding values (what you and your team care about most)
- How you are different from your competitors
- The emotional response you want to evoke in your target audience
- Your brand’s personality and voice (which is expressed through the language and graphics you use)
The brand aims to tie these elements together so that every time people see or hear the external expressions of your brand, it creates an immediate image in their minds of who you are. Consistently communicating this identity builds brand equity.
Improving your branding helps your hive stand out to potential customers and attract talented new worker bees!
Marketing Your Honey
Marketing, whether outbound or inbound, is about creating buzz around the sweet products and services you have to offer.
If you don’t create a buzz around your honey, you won’t make sales today, and your hive won’t have the cash flow it needs tomorrow. You need to be reaching new audiences and promoting your offerings!
However, your company’s long-term success depends on retaining loyal clients who will keep buying from you, writing positive reviews about you, and defending against the stings of negative customers.
Such loyalty is built on a relationship of trust between you and these loyal fans. Every interaction between you and your audience should also be a brand interaction, whether they are viewing your website, reading marketing collateral, or seeking help from your customer service.
It comes down to this – your marketing will vary according to where a prospect is in your sales funnel or between different campaigns in response to changes in the marketplace. However, your brand should remain constant.
Promoting Your Hive and Your Honey Go Together
Although branding and marketing are two clearly defined tools for creating awareness of your company’s identity and your golden products and services, they are intimately connected.
Whenever you engage with people to promote your offerings, things like your brand name, logo, color scheme, personality, and unique emotional experience your brand evokes reinforce your identity.
Honey Creative is all about the hard work that produces that sweet honey your customers crave! Find out more about how we can help you with branding and marketing – reach out today.
