Tried and formerly-true advertising techniques have faded from practicality over the last decade. Advertisers have long relied on simple advertising strategies to get their product or service banners in front of users. Still, those strategies are increasingly being rendered into the category of tricks from a bygone marketing era. With ample ways to provide feedback or outright shut down the ability for pop-up ads using ad blockers, users no longer put up with any forced advertisements that they do not want to see. With it now being abundantly clear that advertisers need to update their strategies, new methods and approaches to advertising are certainly called for.
Brands that secure the trust of modern users can reflect the user’s backstory, ethical views, and values, a factor that has turned far more important than the products that the brand is offering. In that respect, brands can no longer focus on driving clicks as focusing on the intangibles provided by the brand must be the core focus of branding specialists to secure their stability.
While creating a community is now the golden goal for brands in terms of advertising appeal, it is essential to establish a brand first, a step often missed by brands that are hyper focused on social upbuilding. To stay correctly focused on building a brand, it is essential to work with the best brand strategy agencies specializing in leveraging the tools and techniques required to make a powerful and maximally impactful brand. In looking for such companies, brands are likely to find pricing all over the map, but the key is to remember that the money invested is not going to waste.
So just how does a brand build itself a solid foundation and ascend in this fast-paced, hypercompetitive world?
Community Consciousness
Anyone can pick up a handful of sales leads, but not every brand can achieve a long-standing advertising solution. A strong community fosters loyalty and respect, two imperative factors to a brand’s longevity that far outweigh those short-sighted goals for making sales and boosting profits quickly. A community of loyal brand followers far surpasses any other marketing technique or subscription. Consumers in a community begin to care about the brand, which translates to repeated brand engagement and bringing in long-term commitments to it. By fostering a community, brands secure customers for years to come, rather than just a few weeks or months.
Thinking about the definition of a community, one will recognize that it is all about human connection. That means the consumers do not feel like customers but like partners, co-creators, and contributors to the brand’s success. A brand cannot simply wield a wrong message to push its product or service onto the public domain; it must invite an audience eager to help it succeed. The internet has made the world a smaller place in the sales market, bringing together customers and brands from different parts of the globe in business connections. On the social end, however, there is a lot left to be desired. Therefore, customers appreciate the brands that visibly put in the effort to instill a sense of human connection with the consumer base.
Consumers feel recognized, heard, and valued by the brands they choose to support the brands more adamantly. These people become not only a loyal customer base but a reliable network of brand advocates. This will draw more business for the brand, but it will also transform how it approaches its marketing.
Consider why Apple is such a business juggernaut despite the high prices of their products for a moment. Why is it that customers wait in lines for the new development outside of stores at the early hours of dawn? Is the product they primarily sell just a phone… or is it something more that draws customers to the brand? Perhaps that solidly and expertly established sense of community. To be one with the brand is to ‘belong.”
What makes a community different from simply a loyal customer base that gets mailings for discounts and promotions for their former purchases is that a community is a group of willing members that genuinely identify with the brand, share its values, and feel like the brand wants to hear their opinion, genuinely taking their contributions seriously. Brands provide their customers with a platform to contribute their views, opinions, and feedback, respond to them readily and personally, and take the suggestions seriously, helping make the customers feel that they are invested in bettering the brand.
How Important is Word of Mouth?
One of the best avenues by which brands reach new customers has remained word of mouth. Studies have shown that about 84% of people who purchased from brands say they did so because they heard good things about them from trusted sources from friends and family. After all, prospective customers are far more likely to trust the opinions of loved ones than internet ads.
Once absorbed into the brand’s community, the customers cease to be just consumers. Still, rather members of a tribe, advocating on behalf of the brand, securing new customers, joining the community, and spreading the brand’s quality image. This is a prominent strategy that modern-day brands can no longer afford to have this community growth as a happy benefit. This is now a must-have feature.
Customers need to view a brand not just as an avenue of sale but also as a company aligned with their interests and values. That way, when the customers are exposed to the brand’s products, they feel a connection on a visceral level, having complete confidence that the brand sees, hears, and understands them, causing them to feel inherently connected to it.
But before any of those strategies can be applied, you must first have a brand established. This is where experienced design agencies come into the picture, helping you build your brand the right way. Once the company is built, it is essential to remember that your customers drive your existence, so it is imperative to focus on the customers’ needs and concerns.