Beauty is more than skin-deep when it comes to brands.
We all make rapid value judgements about who we see, or what we see, good, bad or indifferent. Those rapid moments of perception are partly based on our memory of a given experience or collection of them.
With an ever-growing sea of branded communication from competing brands, it is easy to get lost in the common claims that those brands are making on a regular basis. You and fifty other brands at a time are the best at customer service, or have the best selection, or the best quality. The same predictable stock photography and video show up again and again as proof of all those claims.
Yawn…your brand was just forgotten…it faded into the desert of the common…
We don’t mean to trivialize great customer service or quality, because they are essential. It’s just that they are the baseline now, and there is nothing unique about them in general. Because chances are, your competitor can execute those common services just as good as you can. They are not significant barriers for other entrants anymore.
Hopefully though, when it comes to your brand, you have at least begun to make a significant effort with regard to the thinking around it. Clearly focusing on what your brand is, what it is not, and what you want it to be as you grow is extremely important. Your brand is the engine of lasting engagement.
Equally important is who you select to tell your brand story.
Because at the end of the day, if your brand story doesn’t live up to the uniqueness that you have worked so hard to embed and maintain in your products and services, you will only ever be “good enough.”
If your brand is doing well, it can be great. It can be exceptional. It can be exclusive. Your brand can lead and define the market versus follow it and be constrained by it.
And achieving this self-perpetuating status is possible, only if your brand is visualized as uniquely and differentiated as your products and services, designed to capture attention and hold it, reaching out and engaging customers, and solidifying long-term relationships.
A unique and differentiated brand is the beginning and end of a lasting relationship with each and every customer. A relationship that your customers can not easily find anywhere else, with a brand experience that is entertaining, engaging, and meaningful. Those relationships grow into loyal followings and into communities.
Great visualization and brand story telling are the foundation of your brand. It lifts a brand with a common message, to a stable level of engagement and the beginnings of a unique position. It catapults a good brand into greatness – to excellence and beyond.
Part of it is not to get comfortable with the the same story – the same old song and dance. The same clothes. The same hair-dew. It’s easy to do. It’s comfortable. You want to stay with what works, and you should. To a point. But what works now is not what will work later. That, you can be sure of.
Getting into the habit of constantly reinventing your story and how your brand is visualized is essential. It’s and ongoing process calibrating and aligning it around your products and services as they evolve, as well as the ebbing and flowing of the marketspace.
You can also be sure that as soon as your competitors see your success, your brand will be mimicked in whole or in part. Latch-on brands are everywhere. Like barnacles. A constantly reinvigorated and reinvented brand story keeps the hull clean and the ship sailing smoothly.
The bottom line is that it’s not enough anymore to say you are different. You have to be different, look different, and be experienced differently by the way you differently engage your customers across channels. It’s a constant work in progress.
Otherwise you are just one more of same. The common. The average.
Beauty is not just skin-deep when it comes to your brand.
Why not choose a partner that understands the importance of your brand story and how it looks, and feels, and sounds. We think we know one.