5 Tips to Raise Brand Awareness
If you have ever considered starting a business, you would have heard of brand awareness and how instrumental it is to your business making money. And, the number one tip that you would have been told is to brand everything!
Brand awareness is self-explanatory, right? You make sure people are aware of your brand; but that’s just the tip of the iceberg. How do you go about measuring it? And what do you want your brand to be recognised for? We will dive deep into what brand awareness is and touch on 5 tips to help you create a great brand awareness strategy.
5 ways to improve brand awareness
- Build a brand that tells a story
- Create content that adds value
- Shareable content
- Freebies and Contests
- Run awareness ads
First, we will talk about brand awareness and why it is crucial to sales and having a successful business.
What is brand awareness?
Brand awareness refers to the extent that consumers are familiar with the values or image of a particular brand of products or services. Preferably, having a positive brand perception by consumers believing your brand is trustworthy and the quality of the service and the product is perfect. Helping differentiate the brand/products from its rivals.
Brand awareness is measured in how aware people are of your brand and its products. Since it is nearly impossible to set a single KPI (Key Performance Indicator) to measure brand awareness, a variety of KPIs are used for this purpose, ranging from mentions of your brand on social media to website traffic.
Why is brand awareness important?
Substantial brand awareness is vital as it builds trust, association and brand value. Meaning your brand is first to mind when people are thinking/talking about a product or service in your niche, leading to increased sales and LTV (Life Time Value) of customers.
Without it, the brand would appear as a stranger to the consumer reducing the chance of them following through with the purchase.
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1. Build a brand that tells a story
With this in mind here are some components of a recognisable brand:
Brand values
Just like everyone has their morals, your brand needs a set of its own. Having a clear set of brand values is essential when creating an easily perceived brand.
The first thought that usually comes to most people’s minds is charity work or pledging a percentage of sales. Although these are good values to have and can certainly be intertwined with your brand, this is more about the brand itself and what it stands for. These values should be evident in the way the brand interacts internally and externally along its path to fulfilling the purpose it is trying to achieve.
Another thing to note when choosing brand values is to keep in mind what values your target audience hold. You will want to make sure that their values overlap with yours so that your target audience gravitates towards your brand.
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Brand aesthetics
The brand aesthetic is like your fashion style. You may have a particular look you are trying to achieve when buying/wearing clothes. The same is true for your brand, with the only difference being clothes = content.
Multiple things can affect your brand aesthetic:
- Typography
- Brand colours
- How content is displayed on social platforms
When thinking of these, you may come up with a long list. When narrowing down, remember to think of your target audience and what would speak to them. For example, if your audience is adults, in most cases you wouldn’t want to use this font, as it appears childish. You would opt for something a bit more sophisticated like this.
Below are examples of the different brand aesthetics to match their audience. Note that these brands are all owned by the same company, but there are still vast differences between their aesthetics.
Brand voice
Are you loud or softly spoken? Are you straight to the point or waffle a bit? Similar to how people have different ways of saying the same thing, your brand needs to do that too. Don’t think that your brand’s voice has to be the same across all platforms. You should adjust it to suit its location. So when posting on social media, you may use a slightly more casual and witty tone compared to the tone you would use for ads. There may even be slight shifts in tone when communicating on different platforms.
One important thing is to make sure the language you use is consistent throughout, including the terms you use. Are they easy to understand? Avoid using jargon unless you are targeting a specific niche, so that when you are talking with customers or about your products it is easy to understand.
Logo and Tagline
Even though these fall under brand voice and aesthetics, they are key to making your brand instantly recognisable. Therefore warrant having their own section.
Arguably the best example has to be 
, just after seeing the logo, I bet you are already thinking of “Just Do it” and as soon as you see either of these, you know we are referring to Nike. This is what you are trying to achieve with your logo and tagline.
Some things to keep in mind when creating your tagline:
- Keep it simple
- Give it a meaning
- Clear-cut and concise
You should try to meet at least two of these points when crafting your tagline.
Telling a story
This part has already started building itself as you implemented the things we have already talked about. However, the roots need to go deeper than just your brand values and voice. It needs to tell everyone how the brand got to where it is.
If you are a small business or a one-person team, your story might be that you weren’t happy with the solution to your problems and found a better one.
If you are a big business, you may be able to lean on your history and the founder’s reasons for starting the business.
Regardless of the size, you try to incorporate your company’s mission and purpose into your story.
Here are some tips to think about when creating your brand story:
- Think about your why
- Be honest
- Intertwine your values
Lastly, like any good story, it should be easy to tell. Share it everywhere! It is crucial to your brand awareness that you showcase your story throughout your brand. Make sure all your content reflects this on your social media and website.
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2. Create content that adds value
A vital part of any relationship is value. To create long-standing brand awareness, you need to do the same. Providing value past your product will nurture the relationship between your brand and its consumers. The best way to achieve this is by producing content that can inform, educate or entertain.
The content can range from short videos to lengthy blogs sharing your expertise in the field. Some brands use YouTube to give insight into their company and educate them on what it takes to create their products. Others have created podcasts, sharing their knowledge and personal life. Making the consumers feel that they have a personal connection with the brand owner.
The aim isn’t about getting sales directly and pushing your product. Therefore, avoid creating content that relies on your product as the primary focus. Instead, focus on creating opportunities for your audience; so they get to know your brand.
For example, Tonal has created a series called Tonal Talk. They talk with guests about everything fitness and provide tips on how you can improve. Their product appears in the background, but they hardly mention it.
3. Shareable content
This part overlaps slightly with the creative part of the last point. The aim here is to optimise the chances of your content going viral. Whilst it is not always possible to know what will go viral, you can still take steps to make your content easily discoverable and shareable.
You need to follow the top practices for social media optimisation, like posting at the right time and with the right cadence.
It is crucial that the content you craft still aligns with what your audience wants to see and share. This blends in with the previous point of providing value and not just pushing a sale. Within the copy, try to add a call to action, such as tag a friend or send someone who needs this.
Also, when posting content on your blog or website, use social sharing buttons to help provide social proof.
As you can see in the example, Whoop has provided value with its content by educating its audience about the importance of a low resting heart rate and how they can achieve a lower one.
The only thing they have missed out on is including a call to action in their caption. If they used something along the lines of “tag a friend who has a high heart rate”, they would be able to reach more people.
4. Freebies and Contests
Freebies
Who doesn’t love something for free? Offering something for free can draw in loads of new eyes to your brand and also help tip those customers who are on the edge of trying your product.
You could offer a free sample, a free trial or even use a freemium pricing strategy. Whichever you choose, it will help get new customers and spread awareness of your brand.
If you have never heard of the term freemium, you may be a bit confused. A freemium pricing strategy is where you offer your basic version of your product, completely free for life but provide an option to add additional features for a charge.
You can combine this with a free trial option for the more advanced versions of your products; by offering the consumer the choice of the basic version for free and a trial of the premium version for a certain amount of days. The usual lengths of free trials are 7,14, or 30 days.
An example of a company that uses this strategy is Spotify. They offer a free plan that has very limited features and a 2-month free trial on their premium plan.
Contests
Without a doubt, social media contests with generous prizes gain the attention of your audience and even people outside your audience. Unlike freebies, this usually involves a raffle where contestants need to participate in a particular action for a chance to win.
There are a few types of entry models you can use that all have different benefits and drawbacks. The most common ones are:
- Tag a friend – Great for gaining followers
- Like/Share/Comment – Great for increasing engagement
- Hashtag Challenges – Great for engaging people with your brand whilst increasing brand awareness
There are many different models to explore, so don’t be shy to test a few out or even add your own twist to them.
5. Run awareness ads
Most social media platforms offer a paid advertising section for businesses to run campaigns. As they know that brand awareness is key to a successful business, they have specially created tools that allow the ads to focus on awareness.
The specific label for the campaign object will vary from platform to platform, but the objectives won’t. You should look out for objectives mentioning Reach, Brand awareness, Video views, etc.
Here is how TikTok describe the objectives of its awareness focused ad campaign: “Use the Awareness objectives when you want to grow awareness about your product and reach people who are most likely to view your ad and remember it.”
In comparison, this is how Linkedin describes it: “Get more people to know your brand through LinkedIn ad formats.” Followed by a selection of ad formats suited to the objective.
So there is a slight difference between the wording, but the objective is the same, making sure your ad budget is prioritised to get more eyes on your brand.
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