Attracting customers to your business isn’t so different from courting a romantic partner.
“Marketing is asking someone on a date. Branding is the reason they say yes.”
— Ren Jones
An endearing smile or a thoughtful opening line might get your foot in the door, leading to a first date – that's marketing. You've caught their attention, and they’re interested in learning more.
It’s your personality – your humour, charisma, and values – that forms the bond. Nobody ties the knot based on a smile alone, after all. Marketing is the same – it's your brand strategy that allows you to form meaningful connections with your audience and develop a lasting relationship rather than allowing that brief spark to fizzle out after a fleeting encounter.
Brand strategy is often misunderstood. In fact, we’ve published a blog specifically dedicated to dispelling those common branding myths. The truth is that brand strategy, marketing, and sales are all intertwined, and it takes all three working together to have your audience falling head-over-heels.
Brand Strategy and the Sales Funnel
The sales funnel represents the journey potential customers take to make a purchase. In each stage of the process, brand strategy is your secret to success.
Stage 1: Awareness
Before they can buy from you, they must know you exist. Simple, right?
Establishing your brand in a recognizable, consistent manner is essential. While branding is much more than just visuals, those aesthetic choices are still crucial in catching the eye of potential buyers and making a lasting impression.
For example, colour improves brand recognition by up to 80%. Strategically implementing colour and a thoughtful logo design can make all the difference in impacting your target audience and propelling your brand awareness.
And it’s not just about catching their attention once – it's about becoming recognizable and putting your best foot forward each and every time. Research shows that 71% of consumers are more likely to make a purchase from a name they recognize.
Stage 2: Interest
If the awareness stage is your first interaction with a potential sweetheart, the next section of the sales funnel can be represented by the “talking stage” in today’s dating culture.
During this stage, you test each other’s interests, getting to know one another on the surface. Maybe you’ll scroll through their social media profiles and ask around for opinions amongst your friends. Consumers exhibit the same courting behaviour with the brands they are interested in, and as a brand, this is where you can begin to show your personality and develop credibility in the eyes of the buyer.
Making a positive impression and gaining that interest is all about your brand storytelling, values, and trustworthiness. 64% of consumers cite shared values as the driving force behind their brand relationships, so authenticity and transparency are essential (check out our deep dive into the 4Vs of branding if you haven’t already). Plus, you can build trust with your buyers through on-brand content, community involvement, and positive customer testimonials.
Stage 3: Desire
After interest comes desire. In dating, this desire generally begins once you move past the “what’s your favourite colour” stage and start really tapping into your emotions. With brand strategy and sales, it’s the same!
Emotional connection is a very powerful tool for the success of a business. Fostering this connection through methods like brand archetypes and benefit-led copy yields impressive sales results, with fully “emotionally connected” customers holding 52% more value to a business than customers who are just “highly satisfied,” according to the Harvard Business Review.
Stage 4: Action
Finally, it’s time to act. In our dating analogy, this represents the moment when you and your new partner decide to seal the deal and start using the “boyfriend/girlfriend” terminology; you might even make it Facebook official (is that still a thing?).
In the sales funnel, this is the point where the customer commits to making a purchase. And once again, brand strategy plays an important role in the process.
First, analyzing your target audience and showcasing your shared priorities in your brand strategy allows you to successfully sell at a higher price point, resulting in more revenue for your business. For instance, 13% of customers report a willingness to pay between 31-50% more for a brand’s products and services if they felt they were making a positive impact in the world.
It goes even further. Branding, combined with a positive customer experience, results in customer loyalty and repeat business for years to come. Why settle for a one-off purchase when you can leverage brand strategy to earn recurring customers? A report by Edelman shows that 67% of consumers agree with the statement, “A good reputation may get me to try a product, but unless I come to trust the company behind the product, I will soon stop buying it.”
Strengthen Your Sales Funnel with Brand Strategy
Brand strategy is the key to a successful customer relationship. It’s how you grab their attention, pique their interest, and ultimately form a meaningful relationship. By carefully curating your brand image, thoughtfully communicating your vision and values, and developing trust and credibility with your audience, you can strengthen your sales funnel from top to bottom.
Are you ready to write a romance with your audience that would even put The Notebook to shame? Think of The Brand Brew’s Brand Development Experience as Cupid’s arrow. Book a call today and allow us to brew a brand that simplifies the sales process and contributes to your business’s financial growth.