Every business needs to think about branding, and that includes small businesses! Here are three reasons why your small business needs branding:
1) Reach Your Target
Proper branding will draw in the clients you want (and maybe even repulse the ones you don’t want). Your branding should seek out your desired following and speak to them. Starbucks, Tim Hortons, and the little independent place down the street all sell coffee, but they each attract a different clientele. Someone who regularly purchases Independent Coffee may never walk into a Starbucks, and vice versa.
2) Stand Out
Your business will get lost in a sea of businesses doing “kind of the same thing” if you don’t differentiate yourself with distinctive branding. How do so many different coffee businesses survive when there is so much competition? Different brands promise different experiences. While you would expect the same experience from Tim Hortons’ various locations, you would expect something different at Starbucks and something even more unique at the Independent place.
3) Build a Reputation
Branding is essentially how you are perceived by the outside world; it is your reputation. And in business (small or otherwise) what could be more important than your reputation? You may have the greatest product or service in the world, but that will all go to waste if you don’t give off the right impression. If the Independent Coffee place boasts free trade, organic roast, it better use recycled paper and napkins to back up its philosophy.