Your business’s brand is more important than you may think. It may seem like it’s only about creating elements, such as logos, fonts, and graphics, but your brand comprises the identity and personality of your business.
When it comes to the importance of branding, don’t just take our word for it. Listen to what the statistics have to say. For example, according to branding statistics, 46% of consumers would pay more to buy from brands they trust.
This is why it’s important to know the different types of branding, so you can make an informed decision about which one suits your business. This will allow you to reach your target audience and effectively convey your brand’s story.
Table of Contents
1. Personal Branding
Can a person have a brand? The answer is yes. When cultivating a brand for people, you’re creating a public persona that depicts their personality. Personal branding is a powerful tool in sales and marketing because consumers tend to trust individuals more over brands, specifically, 92% of consumers do, anyway.
Personal branding has become the norm on social media with the rise of influencers. Gone are the days when personal branding is only for famous people and celebrities. With influencer marketing, individuals who have built a strong brand can advocate for their favorite products and services and build trust among consumers.
How To Build a Personal Brand
Of the types of branding strategies, personal branding is one that anyone can cultivate and benefit from. You can work with a top branding agency to help establish your brand, but if you choose to do it yourself, here are a few tips on building a strong personal brand.
- Figure out your identity. This is where introspection is crucial. You need to understand your true nature and employ deep thinking in doing so, so you can create a clear image of who you are today.
- Think about what you want to be known for. Once you understand your current identity, it’ll be easier to figure out the person you want to be tomorrow.
- Identify your niche. If there’s anything the different types of branding will teach you, it’s that you can’t please everyone. You’ll waste your time and energy by trying. Instead, identify your niche and focus your efforts on capturing the attention of that audience.
- Build your social platforms. With a total of 3.96 billion users, social media is undeniably a powerful tool for creating a strong brand. If you’re a graphic designer, can build an online portfolio and share it on the various platforms you have.
- Network. This entails more than just creating a huge following. It’s more about creating meaningful connections and communicating with your audience.
2. Corporate Branding
Like other types of branding strategies, corporate branding puts together various elements to communicate a brand’s personality — this time, for a company instead of a person. Corporate branding includes logos, website designs, and graphics for ads.
However, it’s also about how a company treats its employees and communicates with its customers, what charities they associate with, and more. These things ultimately affect how the public sees your brand. For example, according to a study by PwC, 60% of consumers will cease doing business with a brand whose employees aren’t friendly.
Key Elements of Corporate Branding
Companies should be mindful of the various elements that make up a good corporate identity. Once you have a good grasp of these elements, global branding should be within your reach.
- Communication: Your company should have a strong culture of effective internal and external communication.
- Behavior: This includes your company’s social responsibility and code of conduct that brings out the company’s philosophy and core values.
- Design: Like other types of branding strategy, this goes beyond logos and typefaces. It entails product design that holds well against the company's goals and vision.
3. Product Branding
Like other types of branding, product branding involves public perception and standing out from the competition. It’s essentially the act of creating an identity for a product so you can market it effectively.
This involves coming up with a target audience and designing your product identity to ensure that the target audience hears about your product, visits your website and social media platforms, gathers information about it, and ultimately, makes a purchase.
Your product branding should:
- Improve the public’s perception of your product
- Include product packaging, such as name, logo, and colors
- Identify what makes your product unique
- Define how your product will bring value to your consumers
4. Service Branding
Unlike other types of branding, there is an additional challenge that comes with service branding because they’re not tangible. However, you simply need to be creative and think outside the box.
Service branding can come in the form of extra things you provide to your customers. For example, allowing customers to speak with human representatives rather than chatbots when they contact you. You must have something else to offer aside from the quick and efficient service you provide.
You must also be able to connect with your target audience on a deeper level. For example, you can use storytelling, which statistics show can increase conversion by up to 30%.
5. Online Branding
When we’re talking about what the different types of branding are, online branding is probably the most common and essential type. It pertains to all branding done online and is a broad category that encompasses other types of branding strategies.
It involves branding done on various social media platforms, running online ads, designing email newsletters, websites, and mobile apps, and coming up with auto-responses to customer inquiries. With the boom of eCommerce, online branding is the most crucial among other different types of branding and is a must-have in this day and age.
Even if you’re a brick-and-mortar retailer, your online presence will serve as an extension of your offline brand.
How To Build an Online Brand
Of all the types of branding, online branding is not one to miss out on. As any branding agency worth its salt will tell you, building a strong online brand will help you widen your reach and increase opportunities. Here are the additional steps to building a strong online brand:
- Build a user-friendly website. Your website will help build trust among your target audience and increase brand awareness. However, you should build a well-designed and intuitive one.
- Make use of various social media platforms. Statistics show that 74% of consumers turn to social media before making a purchase decision. Social media is more than just a social tool; it’s a vital source of information that many consumers rely on.
- Create an email list. A successful email marketing campaign can result in high conversion rates and more traffic. Building a strong email list is a great way to keep consumers updated about your brand.
- Engage with your target audience. This will help create genuine connections with your target audience and build brand loyalty.
6. Offline Branding
As the name implies, this type of branding strategy is the more traditional one and occurs offline. This includes the use of billboards, event banners, magazines, merchandise, and other offline outlets to increase awareness.
It may not seem like it in this digital age, but offline branding is still important. It helps build genuine connections through in-person interactions, strengthens your brand identity, induces repeated brand exposure to keep your brand top-of-mind among consumers, and enforces word-of-mouth marketing.
Types of Branding Strategies — Key Takeaways
Since there are quite a handful of different types of branding strategies, you might find it challenging to determine which one is right for your business. Although the type of branding you employ is relatively important, the key elements of branding remain to be authenticity and consistency. Additionally, regardless of the cost of branding, investing in it is essential for your business’s overall success.
