As a new blogger or business owner it can be overwhelming. There is so much information out there and you are trying to differentiate what is right for you and what you are seeking to accomplish. The main goal is discovering who you are trying to reach and what is the best approach to getting them inspired.
This post is a guide on how to focus your branding and create a plan to create what you want your blog to be. Your brand is how you want others to perceive your blog/product. This includes your site design, content, colors, and who you are seeking as your target audience. Your brand is a process that creates a consistent theme to make you unique and stand out in your niche. Your niche is your main topic or topics you choose to discuss to a targeted audience on your blog.
The biggest focus should be on your target audience and how to best reach and help them. So, Let’s begin!
Why you need to brand your blog or business?
Branding is the overall look, appeal and face of your business/blog. By building your brand you are creating something that your target audience will recognize and immediately know as trustworthy and appealing. Your brand incorporates your business’ core values and overall purpose. By building your following or audience around a specific brand you know you are able to help a certain focused group of people. Another reason why branding is important is because it boosts SEO.
Brands tend to rank higher in search results for SEO purposes and are much less likely to receive a penalty from Google for violating its guidelines. Google ranks branded businesses higher because they are more likely to be recognized by the target audience. Recognition is the main key for building your brand! Proper use of SEO and branding techniques will produce a great positive outcome for your business/blog.
Purpose of having a brand?
The purpose of building your brand is to share your brand’s story and the core values of your blog. You should sit down and truly brainstorm:
● What you want your blog to be?
● Who your target audience is?
● What you want to discuss? (Niche)
● How is your content gonna be useful to them ?
● How are you going to connect with them?
Once you have developed your brand building purpose you can develop your content to engage your target audience effectively. Empathy will be a great tool to showing how you can resonate with your audience. Your content must have a message that solves a problem for your target audience and engages them to change something within themselves or their lives.
Initiate your Plan to build your brand
1. Choose a brandable domain name and design. Take your time in thinking of a unique name that will make your blog/business stand out from others. Try to also make your name SEO friendly so that it is easily picked up by Google Search.
Invest in your design–site, colors, logo. Keep you web design simple enough to function on mobile devices yet stand out with color and design. Color choices have a big effect on how it attracts people or makes them feel. Be unique and invest in your branding plan design. You can buy a great starter design at Creative Market, Pretty Darn Cute Designs or other design platforms.
2. Create amazing content that will be helpful to your audience. Your content should be detailed, in depth and solve a problem for your target audience. I prefer to write posts of at least 1500 words. I feel like at that amount I am able to complete give my audience great detail about the topic and explain things thoroughly enough for anyone to understand.
3. Content should be expressed in a way that is unique and specific to your audience. You should seek to write content for your target audience and answer questions they need solutions too. Gather as much info and demographics into your target audience as possible. Be open to email or social media questions and create content surrounding these questions. I also used family, friends, and Quora to find inspiration for content ideas.
4. Pictures, infographics, and data references make content look better and apply what you’re saying so your audience will understand. A detailed post is great but by adding images you create contrast and draw people in. Images liven up content and create better detail to the audience. I use Canva and Microsoft Word to create most of my graphics.
Promotion and Building Credibility
The best way to build credibility by borrowing credibility from other authority publications by guest posting. Backlinks are great traffic builders but not the only benefit. The biggest benefit is building your brand from being featured on another publication with higher authority and traffic. Guest posting helps to grow your influence and relevance. Focus on how many people in your target audience that your blog is reaching.
Grow your social media reach by joining groups and networking. Such as using Facebook groups and live sessions to build your network and generate leads. Promote your blog with facebook ads and even create your own facebook group.
The stronger the brand the better results you get. Make this your primary ideal and your brand will strengthen. You want to get creative and focus in on your target audience to discover what they are seeking and how you can create content that will draw them in to help them.
In conclusion, you need to decide what your overall outcome is: increase blog post views, increase social media followers and to make yourself more unique or different from other blogs. Focus your brand on your niche and target audience. Create a unique design that will attract people and differentiate you from others. Your brand is what you make it but make sure your blog content follows suit. Your content should solve problems and draw readers in to come back or subscribe.
Remember your target audience is who you want to help and your brand is your unique way of how you can help them.
Sasha Moore
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- Beginner’s Guide to Defining your Brand - May 9, 2017
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