Brands are verbs. What they do matters much more than what they say. So says these tips on brand marketing.
Is your business doing very well, but you are still wondering whether you should be making changes for continuous improvement?
Like improving effective brand marketing? We recently received that question from Grace at Fresh Books. It is a frequent question we receive from clients.
Check out our thoughts on creative marketing.
Related: How to Frame Marketing Messages for Optimum Engagement
First, a word about Freshbooks. They are a cloud-based accounting software service designed for owners of the types of small client-service businesses that send invoices to clients and get paid for their time and expertise.
From my research online, they appear to be doing incredibly well. And so I would conclude that their brand, branding, and brand marketing must be doing well also.
Let me point out that Freshbooks is not a client of ours. Grace simply asked me to take a look at their online presence and answer this question for them in the way of a blog that I post on my consultancy’s website.
This is what I agreed to do because I believe it is such a pertinent topic for many businesses. I will do this task by simply studying their online presence, with no further discussion with them.
What is branding in business?
But first, let’s first be sure we share a common understanding of brands and branding. There is a brand, and there is branding. One is a noun, and one is a verb.
But the funny thing is that when it comes to what defines a brand and what defines your branding, the noun and the verb are switched.
Branding is defined by things like a logo, the look and feel of website copy, and all the visual details that go into managing the brand. It sends out a vibe, and it’s made up of many things.
A brand, on the other hand, is defined by a company’s actions. How do you serve the customer? What interesting service do you offer?
How do you approach relationships with business partners and vendors? A brand is also by what you want to stand for.
The most important thing to remember, it’s not about you in the sense that you are in control. You are not. But you can influence.
Your brand represents a collection of your customers’ perceptions of how they see you, how they feel about you, and what they say about you. It communicates and influences every time it touches a customer.
In a world of abundant choice, such influence is crucial for business success. So despite Freshbooks’ brand marketing success, there are always ways to be better.
Let’s examine some ideas on this subject:
Tips on brand marketing … purpose
The objective here is to define the company’s existence above and beyond making money. What does Freshbooks stand for beyond being a successful software company?
None really visible. As they step up their game, now would be a great time to build and market this brand’s purpose.
Tips on brand marketing … compelling value propositions
Freshbooks does a very good job of defining several very good value propositions, such as a user-friendly interface, ease of use, and award-winning support team.
We suggest going deeper with these statements by validating details from customer users. A great way to do this would be to use customer stories to extend the value propositions beyond the products and services.
Become defined by what you make happen, focusing on the customer’s end state resulting metrics.
Make a difference
Making a difference builds on your value propositions. Strong value shows the difference that the customers see.
We recommend adding to your list of value propositions and supporting them with details of proof from customer results.
Tips on brand marketing … deliver on promises
Freshbooks uses many great customer testimonials and referrals. However, they could do a better job of pointing back to brand promises.
We believe Freshbooks could make explicit promises in their value propositions. Feature metrics and offer guarantees behind the promises.
They should use actual customer experience to find the best metrics.
Brand marketing strategy … engage customers
Great brands drive greater engagement by creating emotional responses. They make learning about their products and services fun.
Freshbooks offers free 30 day trials of their products, which is excellent.
They can make this more engaging by offering a customer support team to work with these potential new customers.
Customer trust
Customer trust in this world is everything, isn’t it? Freshbooks must be doing it pretty well.
We suggest Freshbooks take a page from the FedEx brand by becoming synonymous with “reliability.”
Define your reliability benefit to customers in the most straightforward terms possible.
Offer reliability in everything you do — from your products and services to your website and communications.
Make your promise peace of mind for your customers.
Help consumers help themselves
The best brands offer lots of help/advice …giving value in every interaction. You see this very often with online brand marketing and Freshbooks does this well also.
We believe our earlier idea of using customer support heavily in the free trial could be an excellent way to highlight the customer support team.
Highest quality customer service
We don’t have any results to examine here, but we recommend Freshbooks steal a page from the Zappos Brand.
There is no secret here. Zappos became Zappos because of the fanatical customer support it offered. That is the company’s brand.
As Tony Hsieh, the Zappos CEO, put it, back in 2003, we thought of ourselves as a shoe company that offered great service.
Today, we really think of the Zappos brand as about great service, and we just happen to sell shoes. Freshbooks could easily do the same to strengthen its brand marketing