Your brand is a lot more than just the name of your company, your logo or your tagline. It encompasses the entire experience your prospects and your customers have when interacting with you.
Your brand is seen by your target audience in a lot of different ways:
- Messages that are conveyed by your website and campaigns
- Quality of interaction(s) that take place between you and your customers
- Customer’s opinion of you as compared to your competitors
- Image(s) that are evoked by the name of your business
So how can you ensure that you create the correct image in the minds of your customers?
You devise a well-thought-out brand strategy that defines who you are, who you’re here for and how you intend to send that message to your audience.
One of the ways in which you are able to communicate targeted messages about your brand is through a landing page, a dedicated page distinct from your website homepage that promises visitors a benefit, usually in exchange for contact information.
What Is Brand Alignment?
Brand alignment is the practice of making sure that all of your company’s communications, visuals, and interactions fit your brand identity.
This isn’t a new process, but it has gotten more challenging recently. Before the internet, marketers needed to make sure that a billboard aligned with a TV commercial. Today, consumers expect a cohesive brand experience across channels, including your website, social media profiles, marketing emails, in-app messaging, and online ads. And this is in addition to any commercials, billboards, or other out-of-home advertising mediums.
Keeping all of these channels aligned is challenging work however the payoff is worth it.
Working With Intention
In order to build a healthy brand, you need to work with intention. Everything from your values to your voice has an impact on how you do business and, most importantly, how you’re perceived in the eyes of your customers. A misaligned content strategy not only dilutes but also actually damages your brand. Like Super Bowl betting you need to be laser focused on getting results.
So how do you make sure your content strategy is anchored to your core brand strategy? Here are a couple of ways to do it.
Use Brand Stories
Your brand strategy should include messaging architecture which gives you a blueprint for how to communicate your brand identity. It’s how you speak about your products/services, your people, and your business if it’s on your website or in your Twitter bio. That messaging architecture should include your positioning, value prop, tagline, and supporting brand stories.
Align Your Content To Your Core Identity
Your core identity is who you are, what you’re about, and what you believe (in other words your vision, mission, and values). It’s the compass that should guide not only business decisions but also your content.
People want to support brands with shared values, and content helps you communicate those values—both directly and indirectly—so it can be a powerful tool, but it is important to use it wisely.
Content can help your brand when you’re talking about causes you care about or sharing an exciting behind-the-scenes look at your office.
