How to prep your brand and marketing for 2021, Part 1

I’m going to make an assumption here that we’re all TOTALLY PUMPED to leave 2020 behind us. And even though a future that includes hugs, handshakes, and standing too close to someone in the Starbucks line still seems far away, there are at least some actions you can take to make 2021 a strong year for your brand and marketing efforts. 

But before we can dig in to branding and marketing to anyone outside of your business, we need to start a couple steps ahead inside your business. 

Step 1: Get your house in order

For businesses that have been around for a while: Are your operations running smoothly? Is your customer service where it needs to be? Are your products and services delivering what you say they will?

When you put effort into branding and marketing a business, product, or service that has major flaws, you are doing yourself a huge disservice. Your brand makes a promise to customers. It tells them they’ll experience great service or eat delicious food or lose twenty pounds by next Tuesday. When you can’t deliver on these promises, you will lose trust, credibility, and business. 

For businesses in the really early stages: Are you clear about what you’re actually selling? For reasons similar to the above, putting a brand and marketing efforts around a product or service that’s vague will get you vague results. 

Step 2: Streamline business

Take a look at everything you offer and everything you do. Is all of it really necessary? What’s costing you a lot and not delivering much return? Are there services no one buys? Products no one cares about? Things you deliver that are outside your core business —or worse — that you hate delivering? Get rid of all that stuff. 

Not only will it make your business easier to run, it will allow you to focus your brand and marketing efforts. And that will make them much more powerful.

Step 3: Know what you stand for

When other things are equal, customers will make buying choices based on a company’s beliefs and values. For many customers, this is true even when things aren’t equal. 

In other words, people are looking for companies whose values align with their own. This means you need to both understand what your values are and actually demonstrate them.

Do you already have your brand values defined and documented? And along with that, do you have a mission and a vision that are more than corporate jargon? Great! Now examine your business from top to bottom to check that you (and your employees) are living them every day. If your mission, vision, and values aren’t lining up to what you’re doing, address it. Do your business activities need to shift to better align? Or are your mission, vision, values dated and need an update? Adjust accordingly.

Important note: Do not just make up some values-ish stuff based on the current social trends. Customers will see through this immediately and no one will take you seriously. Pin down real values that are true for you — ones that genuinely get you excited. You need to be [sorry for saying this out loud] AUTHENTIC. Authenticity has become a cliched word in branding, I know. But that doesn’t mean it’s not still relevant. In fact, it’s more important than any other element of your brand right now in a world where people are baring their souls online and expecting brands to do the same.

Check part 2, where we explore how to plan for successful branding and marketing once your internal work is done.