Have you heard of “awareness” in the marketing context, but aren’t quite sure what it means? This article will explain the concept of brand awareness and its crucial role in the sales funnel. We’ll explore why it’s essential for your company and how it can impact your brand’s success.
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What is Brand Awareness?
Let’s start by explaining the term itself. “Awareness” or “brand awareness” refers to how familiar the public is with your business, products, or services.
An awareness strategy aims to increase the number of people who recognise your brand as a market leader compared to competitors.
In other words, awareness is about increasing a brand’s reach within its niche. A good example of a brand working on its brand awareness is the Telstra Best of Business Awards, which celebrate small and medium-sized businesses shaping Australia.
Therefore, a good awareness strategy makes your brand widely recognised within the segment in which it operates and consequently increases its volume of demand. After all, the greater the demand, the greater the profit, right?
One of every company’s goals is to be better recognised in the market. It doesn’t matter if it’s a new company, an expanding business, or even an organisation that has changed its direction; the awareness strategy is and can be a great partner in this sense, making a larger portion of the public remember your brand when it comes to consuming or even making a recommendation to third parties.
READ MORE: What is a Sales Funnel? Stages and How to Build an Effective Sales Funnel
When should you use Brand Awareness strategies?
In today’s fiercely competitive market, implementing an awareness strategy can be a game-changer for your business. With widespread internet access and digital transformation, people are bombarded daily by content from various companies, including those in other niches and direct competitors.
So, how do you stand out and capture your audience’s attention? It all starts with brand recognition, or in other words, a brand awareness strategy.
In practice, the better your awareness is applied, the greater your audience’s familiarity with your brand, content, products, and/or services. All of this converges towards more sales and success.
While broad, the term refers explicitly to public knowledge about your business, including values, offerings, and brand recognition.
By focusing on awareness, your company can become better known and recognised as a reference in your industry, particularly compared to competitors.
However, something that should be clear to everyone who applies the strategy is that, unlike other marketing strategies, awareness is difficult to measure. This is because awareness work is done on several fronts, but always in an initial way, at the beginning of the target audience’s contact with your business.
When measuring your awareness strategy, consider these important aspects:
Market research with the public:
- Social media reach, shares, and social listening: How are your posts performing?
- Website traffic: Are visitor numbers increasing? How is your audience behaving on the site?
- Brand mentions: Who’s talking about you, and how?
- Satisfaction surveys and other direct audience feedback methods
And when should you implement an awareness strategy in your business?
Brand identity issues
You should apply the awareness strategy if your business does not have its own firm identity. This is because, through colours, elements, shapes, design, etc., your audience will identify your business much more easily. The strategy also helps to differentiate brands in the same segment, helping the public in decision-making.
Little presence in the market
Another factor that can be important when implementing an awareness strategy is expanding your market presence or expanding your communication channels with the aim of reaching a greater number of people.
Brand positioning
Brand positioning is increasingly important to the public, especially among younger generations. An awareness strategy can be precious when addressing controversial or social issues, helping to establish and communicate your brand’s stance.
Sales growth
Of course, increasing profits isn’t left out. An awareness strategy involves this aspect, as it, based on the expansion of brand awareness, attracts a new wave of customers into the sales funnel.
And all these steps converge to something very important: the awareness funnel.
All the stages of a sales funnel are already known. However, for your audience to begin their journey, it is important that they have their first contact with your company and recognise your brand. And that is where brand awareness comes in.
As we have said so far, the strategy aims to increase the number of people who recognise the brand. Thus, this is the first stage within the sales funnel, which corresponds to recognition.
READ MORE: Effective Sales Meeting Guide: 10 Steps with Agenda Template
An awareness strategy can also address various levels of customer understanding regarding their problems and potential solutions.
The first level is complete unawareness. At this stage, consumers have little to no recognition of their needs beyond their own identity and opinions. These often need to be connected to your brand, as mentioned earlier.
Therefore, the important thing is to focus on convincing the public about the problem to be solved. Content with this focus will help your brand in terms of awareness and is excellent for the beginning of the consumer journey.
As consumers progress through their journey and your awareness strategy advances, they reach the stage of problem awareness. Here, they recognise they have a problem but may need clarification on the solution.
Your content should focus on empathising with their situation and understanding their pain points without directly promoting your product or service. This approach strengthens awareness among this consumer segment.
The next stage involves consumers being aware of possible solutions. At this level, create a gateway to help them make decisions. Highlight your benefits and unique selling points, and use persuasion triggers that validate the target audience’s purchase decision.
The next awareness stage involves customers familiar with your product or service but unsure if it’s the best choice for them. Here, focus on building trust by demonstrating your capability to deliver on promises and showing how to effectively use your solution.
At the bottom of the awareness funnel are the most informed customers, who only need a compelling offer to convert. Keep a close eye on this group to capitalise on sales opportunities and gauge the overall success of your awareness strategy.
Monitoring Brand Awareness and Tips for Implementation
As we mentioned earlier, awareness monitoring is more complex. However, we have separated some tips for implementation and action that can help in this process.
Who are you?
Your brand needs to have a well-defined identity. We highlighted this point earlier, and it can be the key to your business’s success or failure. Always remember that a solid brand has a solid identity.
To make this definition, think about who your brand is within the market. Definitions such as colours, formats, and design within the spectrum of visual identity, for example, can help identify your business among so many others in the digital competition.
Where are you?
Market presence is another very important factor. Identify the channels where you have a presence and, more importantly, where your target audience is active.
To expand your brand reach, you need to meet your audience where they are, communicate directly, and offer the best solutions. Understanding your current presence and identifying potential new channels is essential for an effective awareness strategy.
How do you position yourself?
A solid brand positioning makes your brand values clear. This is reflected in the consumer and makes them approach you based on common interests. It is important that your customers identify with your business and see that you are aligned on various issues, such as combating prejudice, diversity, environmental preservation, and others.
How do you communicate?
Finally, your awareness strategy should focus on effectively communicating all previous points. Make sure your message is clear to your audience and provides valuable information to help them make informed decisions. This awareness process not only promotes brand recognition but also guides potential customers through the sales funnel.
READ MORE: How Customer Satisfaction Builds Better Brands
How to increase your brand recognition?
We’ve compiled essential tips to help you develop an effective awareness strategy for your business.
Digital influencers
They apply to any business and any niche. That’s why working with digital influencers is our first tip for an awareness strategy. It expands brand recognition by exposing it within the influencer’s community. This, in turn, must be an engaged base of followers aligned with the niche in which you operate.
Referral program or affiliate base
Many businesses thrive on customer referrals. This approach is similar to digital influencer marketing and leverages existing client relationships to promote your brand. For example, a car rental company could offer incentives to customers who bring in new clients through their recommendations.
Sponsorship of events and projects
Sponsoring events and projects aligned with your business can effectively boost awareness. For example, if you sell cereal bars, you could sponsor a local race. This would expand your brand’s visibility within the community drawn to the event.
SEO
Investing in SEO is crucial. Your target audience likely searches for topics within your area of expertise. To capitalise on this, focus on answering your audience’s key questions and optimising your content for better visibility in search results.
All of these practices help raise awareness of your business and create digital or offline campaigns aimed at brand recognition. In this sense, it is important to know that isolated actions do not always produce the necessary results and that a more comprehensive practice, accompanied by effective monitoring, combined with the use of a good CRM system, can be the key to your strategy.
Ready to start building your awareness strategy today?
We hope you found this information on brand awareness valuable. For more insights on CRM, marketing, and sales, check out our regularly updated blog and Resource Centre.
