You’ve worked hard to define your brand personality and even harder to be consistent and engage with your audience so that they can really get to know your brand. Branding is a marathon, not a sprint, and this is one area where that is painfully true. The reward for perfectly-positioned brand personality is customer loyalty. Just like with any relationship, it takes time to get to know someone and feel any sort of bond. But small, consistent steps go a long way to show your audience that you are a brand that they want to support.
If your product or service is superior, then why does this even matter? Won’t your customers be loyal anyway? Maybe. But to solidify that bond, you need to make sure your brand personality is on point and consistent. If they always know what they are getting from your personality, that feeling of certainty will extend to your products and services as well.
Consumers buy with their hearts, not their heads. And buying from a brand that you feel like really gets you is an easy decision to make. In the end, if a competitor is truly better, they will usually still win out. After all, you’ve gotta have the chops to back up what you are selling. But when there is a fine line separating one competitor from another, the one that’s formed the emotional bond almost always closes the sale.
It should be obvious at this point how important your brand personality is to your business, but if you still need some convincing, here are a few examples of how it can elevate customer loyalty. And if you feel like you need to back up a second, read about how to define your brand personality and how to differentiate between you and your brand.
returning buyers
It’s no secret that keeping current customers happy is a thousand times easier than finding new ones. That’s why the whole experience of working with or buying from your brand should be streamlined and pleasant. But personality plays a big part in this as well. When your audience feels a connection, they don’t waste their time shopping around for something better. They respect the values of your business and enjoy the experience, so you have a leg up on the competition from the get-go. Everyone appreciates knowing exactly what they will get form an experience, and most would prefer that certainty over jumping into the unknown with a competitor.
you aren’t competing on price
Some small businesses spend all of their time in a constant race to the bottom with their competition. Whoever can slash the biggest discount makes the most sales. But that’s assuming that consumers are only using their heads to buy and leaving their hearts out of it. When all else is equal, of course it’s an easy decision to buy from the cheapest option. But when you introduce emotion into the equation, the whole balance is thrown off. It’s no longer an apples to apples comparison between the features and prices of two products or services. People are willing to pay a little more for how a brand makes them feel. Maybe they know that you support a certain charity with your profits, maybe your witty personality and style just makes them feel cool when they are associated with your product or service or maybe it’s a reason they can’t even quite put their finger on. That’s the power of a brand personality.
less time spent selling
All small business owners are different, but I know a lot of us aren’t big fans of sales and marketing. For one, it’s uncomfortably difficult and panic-inducing. And at least for me, I want to spend my time doing what I love, not talking about it and trying to convince people to buy. It’s an essential tool of entrepreneurship, but anything that can make this easier is welcome. And brand personality is a big helper in this department.
When your audience is connected enough with your brand to become loyal fans, they do your selling for you. More influential than any ad you can run is the referral from a friend. A genuine shout out on Facebook goes farther than whatever budget you have set for Facebook ads. People trust other people, and when your fans are loyal enough to rave about you, that says a lot. So instead of spending time honing your marketing skills, spend a little of that time getting to know your audience and finding ways to connect with them. Show them what you have in common and then leverage that knowledge in everything you do.
easy introduction of new offerings
There is always a lot involved in introducing new products and services into the market. Will it be as popular as what you’ve done in the past? How much more will you have to spend to market it? And how will it look if it flops?
If you have a loyal brand following, introducing new offerings is so much easier. Their emotional connection makes them much more willing to try new things from you. Once that bond is solidified, they feel like they know what to expect from you and trust the source, so it’s that much easier to take a chance on something new.
Ever wondered how other businesses manage to pre-sell offerings before they’ve even been created? It’s not usually because it’s something that’s never been done before. It’s because their audience knows what to expect from them and is happy to continue to invest in them.
Investing time and resources to make sure your brand personality is strategically crafted and continually infused to your overall experience produces a return on your investment again and again. So do your homework, and make those deeper relationships flourish that will continue to help build your brand presence.
