So you’ve got a successful brand. You’re recognized, you have a good customer base, and you feel confident that people relate positively to your business.

A word of advice: don’t rest on your branding laurels.

 

With the increasing number of brand channels, especially online, it’s vital to pay close attention to your brand and how your customers are reacting to it. It’s equally important to keep your brand ever-evolving to stay relevant with changes in the economy, social behaviors, global issues, and/or other factors that effect your customer base or your product.

Here are five ways to keep your brand working hard, and to stay ahead of the curve.

 

1. Be social.

There’s no getting around it. Social media is a vital part of brand relevancy. From Instagram to Facebook, you need a dedicated social media practice. The online space is oversaturated, and attention spans are at an all-time low. So if you go out of sight, you go out of mind. But this isn’t just about placement in social media spheres; this is about quality content that is on brand, and of interest. Your social media presence needs to breathe life into your brand, and it needs to create response. If you’re not experiencing engagement (comments, shares, likes) on your social media platforms, you’re likely not providing interesting content to your customers. 

 

2. Follow the tracks.

Are you tracking your customers’ online actions? If not, you should be. Tracking email opens, click-throughs, social media interaction, website activity—they are all big parts of a successful brand. Data gives you solid learnings that allow you to tweak, refine, and continue to improve your brand.

 

3. Know your competition.

You want a unique voice for your brand, but you want to be doing it better than the others. That means awareness of your competition, and observing what they’re doing right and wrong. Competition keeps your brand on its toes. Just stay authentic, and don’t try to be something your brand isn’t.

 

4. Engage your customers.

A successful brand knows the pitfalls of one-sided conversations. Simply sharing pics or posting isn’t enough. You need to actively engage with them via smart, brand-centric methods like contests, sharing customer photos with products, and generation of discussions. For instance, if your company sells camping hammocks, then you should be encouraging your customers to share their camping photos. It’s free publicity for your product, and it encourages new customers.Offering an incentive for people to share their photos is a great way to encourage engagement—and to build excitement around your brand. Beyond the social and online platforms, engage your customers at special events and expos with an interactive tradeshow booth, a raffle, and promotional give-aways worth keeping.

 

5. Speak up (and speak well).

Keeping your brand voice fresh and relevant is an important part of brand evolution. From blog posts to email newsletters, every communication is a chance to show your thought leadership and expertise, and to keep your brand on top of its game. That’s why having a content strategy is so important to any brand. You must constantly be assessing what you’re communicating, how you’re communicating and to whom. And then you must be willing to create content that engages, intrigues, and excites your customers.

 

If you’ve got your brand on cruise control, it might be time for a shake-up. The branding experts at Think Baseline would love to help you out. If you’d like to have a conversation about keeping your brand in the evolutionary lane, get in touch.