Four Keys To Startup Brand Success

By David Eedle |

A reader contacted me the other day after reading my post ‘7 Ways to Spot an Internet Marketing Scam’ and kindly asked my advice ‘How would you start out branding a new startup company from scratch’. I took a few minutes to think back to some of our startups and came up with four key overview issues that we now live by whenever we embark on something new.

1. Don’t spread yourself too thin. We’ve tried multi-pronged marketing strategies and diluted the end result. For example, stop thinking about selling to the world. Pick a distinct geographic niche: not sure where you are located but an easy example would be, if you are in California, aim to own the state – or even just your city. Pick a demographic – 18-25 year olds. Unless you are Coca Cola with a marketing budget in the hundreds of millions you cannot hope to compete.

2. Pick one blindingly simple, easily understood, cut through idea. And plug the hell out of it. Brands per se are over done, what matters is the idea. It’s no use if everyone’s heard your brand name, but doesn’t have a clue what it does, or fails to engage.

3. Don’t be suckered by the ‘expert’ consultants, agencies etc. We once burnt through $50,000 of Google Ads in 3 months courtesy of a bunch of ‘experts’ at a digital media agency. Almost zero effect. We were blinded by vast spreadsheets of ad groups, statistics and analysis. Barely sold a thing. Go with your heart, take all advice (including mine!) with a grain of salt mixed with your own gut reactions. It’s your brand, your product, and you must have faith in it and yourself.

4. Twitter, Facebook and all the social networks offer opportunity. But don’t get blindsided by the hype. If you are selling T-Shirts then plenty of people have started out selling at their local markets, handing out samples in nightclubs, giving them to friends to wear, working to get stocked by a couple of super cool stores and so on. You need to capture the mavens, the people who lead the trends.

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