When you founded your startup to realize your business idea, I’m sure one of your first questions was who should be your target audience. The question whether it is B2B, B2C or even D2C is usually answered quickly. Also, most startups are aware of the benefits their product will provide to the target audience and how it will improve their lives. Those are the basics. But in addition to the basics, there is a crucial point. People don’t just buy a product or service. They also don’t just buy a brand. They buy to express their own identity.
What does that mean for your target audioence?
If you already have customers, even know your product market fit, you are relevant to them and solve a problem or offer a benefit to your customers. You get confirmation that your business idea works and may even be scalable. Many startups and companies often leave it at this realization. This step is wasted potential, as there are many other opportunities, especially from a brand perspective. Of course, there are already many startups that place a lot of emphasis on their brand building at the beginning, but it is often just a matter of getting one’s own positioning out there and, as already mentioned, communicating the advantage of the product.
This is also a correct and important step that leads to the right target group of the respective start-up feeling addressed. But this is not what we mean when we talk about your target group wanting to express their own identity and the enormous advantages this can bring for your brand.
Your brand is created in the head
Your start-up, and thus your brand, is created in the mind of your target group. It doesn’t matter whether it’s your target customer group or your target employee group. It is even more important to be aware of the fact that brand simply happens. It happens because it happens in the mind. We therefore need to be aware of how we want to be perceived in order to consciously manage this perception through branding.
By making a brand what our target audience says it is, they also decide what your brand means to them. This meaning goes beyond benefits and features. Questions like: What does the brand do to me? What community will I join if I buy this brand? Who would I like to be. It’s the question of who you want to be, or how your target audience wishes to be perceived by others, that is becoming increasingly important. They want to belong to a certain group of people that reflects their own identity. They want to belong because that’s how they see themselves, and that’s why they buy brands that express that.
Create a community instead of just customers
Whether your startup is B2C or B2B, your goal should be to build a community. A community that is enthusiastic about your brand because it reflects its own identity. How such a community is built or how a loyal customer group is created, we have already described in this article using the brand ladder. By having a community behind your brand, you have people who will recommend your brand. They will defend your brand on social media as soon as someone publicly criticizes it. This community, these people are the basis for long-term success for your brand.
In the course of this, there are three very appropriate quotes by Marty Neumeierfrom his book THE BRAND FLIP that further illustrate this point: „Power has shifted from companies to customers.“, „The battle is no longer between companies, but tribes.“, „The company with the strongest tribe wins.“
Want to build a community?
If you are faced with the challenge of positioning your brand so that you have a loyal community behind it, we should get to know each other. With our Brand Strategy Sprint we are able to do just that, quickly focused and together with your target group. Book an appointment right here.
