Are you paying enough attention to your brand?

In response to the current economic and social climate, businesses of all sizes have been forced to carefully consider how they define their brand values. We found this new research by printed.com that shows how the small business community has been faring, and what it could do better…

Value for money now ranks as number one brand value

In these economically challenging times, businesses are keen to offer good value as a way to pull in new customers. The printed.com study, which surveyed almost 1,000 creative professionals on their work with start-ups, found that ‘value for money’ is now classified as the top priority among new businesses when defining their brand. Reliability and trust also rank highly as brand values.

Scary mistakes!

Worryingly, however, the findings indicate that many new companies are still making some pretty basic mistakes when defining their brand. More than half (54%) of the creative professionals surveyed said that start-ups fail to consider their target customer!  52 per cent also said small businesses fail to formulate a brand for their company altogether.

Do you need to TM your brand Identity?

Many companies that are growing, particularly into foreign markets, are also failing to protect brand identity. The printed.com research found that two thirds (64%) of creative professionals say small businesses are not trade marking design assets such as company logos.

Give designers a chance, give them quality briefs

To get this thing right, it’s essential to give the creative pros you work with a succinct brief. However, more than a third of respondents said that they are not given a solid idea to work towards. As such, they feel they have little chance of delivering the creativity and quality you desire.

 

Are you looking at your brand at the moment? The results of this survey should give you some serious food for thought. Finally a word from Nicholas Green, the founder of printed.com who commissioned the research:  “In these turbulent economic times, small businesses must exemplify only the most appealing brand values which appeal to their target customer if they are achieve what they initially set out to do. The customer is clearly the first and foremost priority when developing those key brand values which will epitomise the business and ultimately help the company to flourish.”

 

Get more

 

  • For more info on printed.com Nicholas Green can be contacted via www.printed.com 

 

  • Don’t forget to visit the Marketing solutions section of our new site. Find advice on producing professional-looking materials,  managing customer relationships profitably and reaching your online audience