It’s hard to get your business off the ground when nobody knows it exists.
That’s precisely why the first step in your entrepreneurial journey needs to focus on understanding your target market and the path to position your brand in it. Among the essential steps to start your new business venture, you want to place market research and business plan on top of your to-do list. Your business plan acts as a map to get you to market, using the data you’ve gathered from market analysis and the specific requirements of your company. Even if you have great products and an outstanding brand, you still need to be able to spread the word about your brand in order to build loyal customers who will be with you from the beginning until the end of your career as a business owner.
Building visibility for your business is primordial to exist in a competitive environment. Yet, visibility is a lot more than launching your business formation and placing your name in the local commerce directory. Visibility is about building brand awareness so that you can have a voice in the local market. Also, using a reliable paystub maker can contribute to your business’s visibility showcasing your commitment to transparency and professionalism, which can positively influence your brand’s reputation in the local business community.
But how do you make customers aware of your brand when you are the new kid on the block?
SEO as a pillar for brand awareness
Saying that Search Engine Optimization and brand awareness go hand in hand is no exaggeration. While SEO tackles search terms via the use of keywords to generate organic traffic, it can also be beneficial for the overall brand visibility. Indeed, high-ranking positions on Google’s and Bing’s first pages promote beneficial brand positioning. It helps establish your brand as one of the experts for the topic users were searching for.
As a result, the SEO strategy becomes integral in defining the areas and elements you wish your brand to be recognized for. For example, a business can expand its reach by increasing its keyword focus and addressing new terms. Additionally, by creating relevant content, you can also increase brand exposure. So, it is important to consider the correlation between brand awareness and SEO. While many businesses think of SEO in terms of:
- Organic traffic
- Organic conversions
It can also provide a unique competitive edge for new brands through the following:
- SEO-optimized link building with the brand name as an anchor text
- Optimized keyword phrases that also display the brand
- Branded search terms
- Local SEO for brand visibility in the local range
Google Maps: Your brand here and now
Google Maps can be a great way to increase visibility for your brand. First of all, Google Maps belongs to the complex Google marketing suite, which means that it interacts with the search engine for SEO purposes and with advertising via Google Ads.
What is Google Maps for? Essentially, Google Maps places your business on the map, promoting your visibility in local searches. Additionally, businesses can build a huge presence by inputting valuable information into their Google My business profile. This could include opening hours, Q&As, and adding photos.
For example, if you have a restaurant and want to show off your beautiful outdoor seating area, you can upload images of it to Google Maps. The pictures will be displayed on the map as well as in search results. If someone is looking for an outdoor place to eat, they may come across your establishment and decide to visit. Just make sure that when you take the photos, you include your logo or signage with the appropriate contact information so people who live near your business know how to get in touch with you.
Google Ads: See me now
Google Ads is a great way to start boosting brand visibility, even for new businesses that have a limited budget. Indeed, Google Ads puts the advertiser in control of the budget, ensuring you can set a daily budget limit to make the most of every single dollar. You can advertise on Google’s search results pages, YouTube videos, and ads that show up in Google Maps.
Google Ads interacts with Google Maps, which means you can populate your ads with additional Google Maps information, such as a phone number or an address. Google Ads also reacts to your SEO presence, which means that effective SEO can decrease the cost of bidding.
But how do you use ads for brand visibility? Essentially, even if a user chooses not to click on the ad, the brand is exposed to more viewers. Depending on the type of ad campaign chosen, you could only be paying per click, which means the brand receives views at no cost. Even in the event of paying per impression or per timed impressions, such as for YouTube ads, the process ensures the brand can reach out to a broader audience group based on your selected criteria.
Cross format content creation: Content for everyone
One of the most important parts of any new business is building a brand. To build a brand, you have to create content in different formats. Videos are an excellent way to show what your company does and how it does it, but don’t underestimate the power of text-based content too. Text-based content can provide valuable information about what your company is all about without making people watch a video that might not be suited for them. Plus, with cross-format content creation, you’re able to reach more people in different ways!
Unsure of the pros and cons of each? We explain how they benefit your brand:
- Video content: highly digestible and highly shareable
- Text content: Improves SEO presence and establishes your expertise
- Visual content such as infographics: Highly shareable and reusable, often relinked by other websites, therefore great for expert positioning
- Photos and other image content: Ideal for social media reach and can be sponsored to a broader audience group
- One format can be repurposed to create content in different formats, such as turning an infographic into a blog article
Ultimately, bringing a new brand to the market can be challenging. It takes time to build momentum and create a loyal pool of customers. That’s precisely where smart brand visibility tactics can bring your business to the next level in the shortest amount of time.
