The Importance of Branding For Local Business

Branding Helps Your Business Grow from the Ground Up.

There’s an age-old debate about marketing… is it an art or a science?

At Above the Fold, we appreciate both the art side and the science side of marketing. However, we really focus on the science side of things to help our clients’ businesses grow. Marketing in this day and age has so many different components to it, and while it is important to keep both sides of marketing in mind, we find that using numbers and technical strategies really take businesses to the next level.

Marketing is Largely Driven by the Science

Interestingly, there are many aspects of marketing that people associate with the art side of marketing, that in fact, are largely driven by the science side of things. Let’s take branding and brand personality for example.

Branding or brand personality are terms that are thrown around a lot in the marketing world, but they basically refer to the consistent characteristics that are associated with a business. They are developed through all the things that potential customers see related to your business, for example, your logo, your social media, your website and your e-mails. Of course, all of these things have visual components that are immensely important with regards to brand development, but how you can use these tools as strategies to take your business to the next level is often overlooked. At Above the Fold, for example, we build e-campaigns, optimize social media usage, track visitors and interpret data about websites, monitor conversions from a variety of sources and more. All these approaches work with the technical side of marketing, but do wonders to develop businesses’ brands.

Branding is More than a ‘Nice to Do’

Why are branding and brand personality so important for your businesses. People often think that branding is a “nice to do” marketing strategy, but that it doesn’t actually do much other than look visually appealing. In fact, effective branding can actually help grow your business and make money. What’s not to love? Some of the best things that branding can do for businesses are making them more recognizable, and allowing potential customers to relate to them directly. This is especially important for local and small businesses trying to grow, as customers are more likely to engage with a business that they relate to. This goes along with the same logic as buying clothing, for example. If we look into a shop window, see an item of clothing and think “hey! That looks like something I would wear…” we are WAY more likely to buy that piece of clothing than if we had thought “hmm… not really my style.” We like to see a reflection of ourselves in the things that we buy. Basically, the better branding or brand personality a business has, the more it can relate to the correct consumer, establish its place in the market, and turn leads into paying customers.

This is all part of what we do at Above the Fold. We understand that all our clients have unique brands and goals for their businesses. Our process includes discussing the specific goals clients have for their businesses and then developing specific and dynamic strategies to achieve those goals together. We report results to you on a monthly basis in order to identify where progress is being made, and what adjustments or fine-tuning is needed.

We value open communication and commit to working with our clients every step of the way. We are also aware that goals and priorities shift as businesses grow, and we are constantly adapting our approaches and strategies as brands continue to mature.

Ultimately, our goal is to see your business ‘above the fold!’