While an innovative product or unique story will help your business stand out, brand loyalty is what will keep your customers coming back. And to create loyalty, you first need to establish a consistent brand.

If you are struggling to retain customers, your brand’s messaging may be inconsistent or confusing to your audience. Here’s how you can develop a consistent brand and ensure the efforts you put into strategic marketing will pay off.

Know Your Target Audience

Before you can develop a voice and speak to your audience, you need to define who your target audience is. Think about demographic qualities such as gender, age, income, and location. Then, dig deeper by considering psychographic qualities, such as values, beliefs, and lifestyle. Where do they shop? What are their favorite activities? You may choose to conduct market research to learn more about the people you want to target.

Be as specific as possible when creating your audience. “Middle-aged women” is a good start, but adding details like location and age (Example: “40- to 55-year-old mothers living in Columbus, Ohio”), will make your messaging stronger.

If you need help defining your target audience, read this article for more tips.

It’s likely that you’ll have more than one audience to target. However, that doesn’t mean your messaging should be completely different when talking to one audience versus another. Once you have established your audiences, you should determine one unifying voice to communicate effectively with them.

Establish Your Voice

Developing a consistent, authentic voice is key in creating familiarity with your customers. When deciding what tone to use, think about how your audience would like to be spoken to. Targeting high school student athletes? Don’t speak in medical jargon they won’t understand. Targeting a senior executive? They probably wouldn’t appreciate being spoken to like a child.

You should also consider your industry when deciding what voice to use. For example, it makes sense for a fast food restaurant like Wendy’s or Taco Bell to use simple, fun language in their marketing strategy. However, a health insurance company might choose a professional tone over a playful one.

Keep Your Messaging Consistent

Being consistent in all of your messaging is the most important factor in establishing familiarity and brand loyalty. Besides keeping your voice consistent, here are more ways you can be recognizable to your customers.

Logo

The easiest way customers should be able to identify your business (besides the company name) is your logo. Create one logo and place it on your website, social media accounts, storefront, and all other marketing materials.

Colors and Font

Choose a color palette and a couple fonts that complement your logo. Use the colors and fonts on your website and other marketing materials for a consistent look.

Create a Style Guide

Every thing with your company’s name on it should have a cohesive look and feel. Furthermore, all employees (even those not in marketing) should be familiar with the voice of your brand. To organize all of your branding rules and educate your employees, you should create a brand style guide.

A style guide is a document that ensures consistency across the company by providing detailed information about the company’s branding. Style guides can include everything from logo placement to photography style. Read this article to learn more about creating a style guide for your company.

Now that you’ve created guidelines for your brand, put them into action by making sure your website, social media, and advertising are consistent moving forward.

Creative Spot is a full-service marketing and advertising agency in Columbus, Ohio. If you would like to learn more about how we can help your organization with consistent branding, contact us.