From Side Hustle to Small Business – How to Build a Professional Brand Identity
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A brand identity is the personality, attributes, and values. It’s what makes a business stand out from competitors. A strong brand identity can be a game-changer for small businesses in growth and profitability. A professional brand identity is a must-have for any small business. It can help you grow your side hustle to a small business and more!
What Is A Small Business?
Before we kick into describing ways and steps on how to build a professional brand identity to turn your side hustle into a small business, it is important to know what a small business comprises.
There are many types of small businesses: sole proprietorships, partnerships, corporations, and limited liability companies. The most common type is a sole proprietorship which one person or a family runs with usually no distinction between business and personal assets.
A small business might be a family-owned restaurant to an online store that sells handmade jewelry to an accounting firm specializing in tax preparation for other small businesses.
Designing your small business brand identity has become relatively easy these days compared to when the printing press didn’t exist and no one thought about creating on computers. At the time, you either had to rely on word-of-mouth or hire someone to draw/paint on your storefront.
With advancements in technology, designing has become a rather piece of cake although this is an exaggeration because choices can often confuse people. If you search online, “how to brand my small business” you will get millions of links in search results leading to all types of solutions.
The key to making an executive-level brand identity for your small business is to pick a brand designer that can truly change the game for you at this stage of business growth.
Explore: How to Identify and Hire the Right Creative Logo Designer for Your Business Brand?
Once you’re through the process of finding a designer for your brand identity, it’s time to figure out what kind of business model needs what kind of branding. In this case, when you’re growing into a small business, you need a unique logo design and a kickass website design.
So what are we waiting for? Nothing more than on a journey to give our small business branding a pro look!
How to Build Professional Brand Identity
Before we kick into describing ways and steps on how to build a professional brand identity to turn your side hustle into a small business, it is important to know what a small business comprises.
STEP 1 Build Your Brand By Defining Yourself
The first step in building your business brand is to define yourself. You need to have a clear understanding of your business.
- Who are you?
- What are your values?
- What do you want people to know about you?
- What do you want people to think about when they think of your company?
Once you have identified these things, it will be easier to create a cohesive message that reflects your values and personality.
STEP 2 Brand Building By Knowing Your Audience
The second step to small business branding is understanding the audience you are targeting.
- Who is your target customer?
- What does your potential customer want?
- What does your target market need?
- What are your target audience’s preferences?
Along with answering these questions, you need to figure out your target market’s demographics, psychographics, and buying habits to reach them successfully and convince them.
STEP 3 Building Brand Identity With Graphic Visuals
The third step is to create an identity for your small business. This includes creating a professional logo design, slogan, color palette, and website design. Think about the following.
- If I get a logo made, what should it look like?
- Should I include the slogan in the design?
- What kind of colors will suit my business?
- Should I dictate the design or let the designers work their charm?
- What should I include on my website?
STEP 4 Allocate Budget To Build Brand Identity
The fourth step is to set a budget aside for expenses such as branding and marketing so that you don’t overspend or underspend.
- How much should I initially invest in branding?
- How much of my profit should I spend on marketing designs per month?
- How can I reduce the cost and keep the design quality high?
- Will tax affect my brand design budget?
These are just a few questions that come to mind when taking the giant leap of turning your side-hustle into a full-fledged small business.
STEP 5 Figure It All Out Before Designing It All
Before starting a brand identity design contest, figure everything out. The last thing you want in the process of branding is to be clueless about yourself, your competitors, and your audience. Once you know as much as you possibly can, it’ll be easier to write a creative brief.
STEP 6 Start It Off With A Winning Logo Design
No brand can survive an ocean of options today if they lack a distinctive brand identity. Whether or not people believe in the power of a logo, it is an essential element needed to design all the branding and marketing items of a small business brand.
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STEP 7 Develop A Strong Brand Story
To stand tall in today’s competitive market, brands need a compelling brand story that will help them create a cohesive brand identity. Your small business branding will be scattered everywhere without a story, so try to work on it with professional copywriters or content writers who can give you a narrative.
STEP 8 Design An Attractive Website Design
Well, designing a beautiful website is only one part of this step. When designers make websites for small businesses, they need to make sure it is user-friendly by making accessible navigation for one thing.
Explore: Website Design Trends – Navigation Bar Styles In Focus
STEP 9 Create The Main Social Media Accounts
Being everywhere is silly. With data analytics, find out where your target audience surfs and shops. Start analyzing the behavioral patterns of your audience. One thing that’ll help you observe where your competitors are successful.
Explore: Paid Vs. Free Social Media Marketing Tools For Online Visuals
Once this is sorted, design the social media accounts of your small business. Ideally, place your brand logo as a profile image, design an attractive page banner, and fill your feed with customized posts about your business and its products.
STEP 10 Start Your Marketing Efforts
Once you’ve set the foundations of your small business brand, it is time to place the building blocks to establish brand position, image, and personality. You can do this by marketing the brand via a business card, display ads, marketing design, brochure design, and other miscellaneous branding items.
Small Business Design Inspirations
Here are some small business branding inspirations to feast your eyes.
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At every step of the way, small businesses need continuous efforts from entrepreneurs, designers, and marketers to keep reminding the brand’s target market. When a brochure about new products is printed, it must have the logo. Update the website with search engine optimization upgrades and the latest and relevant UI and UX design sensibilities.
What step towards branding your small business will you take first?
