How Social Media and Content Marketing Changed Branding

7 Brand Elements You Need in a Social Media – Content Marketing World

Brands must project the values and importance of the products and companies they represent. In today’s connected world filled with social media and content marketing, brands require more than a logo and a tagline.

If your brand standards haven’t been updated since the rise of social media, chances are you’re leaving branding opportunities to chance.

While most marketers get the need for consistent use of colors, logos and design, they’ve never think about their brands from the 360 degree, real life perspective that social media and content marketing require. (Here’s some branding tips to help you develop your brand.) In other words, how do you represent your brand in video, photographic, audio and live formats?

If your organization hasn’t considered how to present your brand using these social media and content marketing formats, you should. It’s important to reassess and redefine your brand for presentation in these media. Here are seven points to consider.

1. What does your brand sound like? Brands like Microsoft and Intel are recognizable by their sounds. Are there any sounds associated with your brand? Are noises needed? Also consider music such as jingles. These can be integrated in your audio, video and product (For example, Microsoft users hear its tones when they turn their computers on.)
2. What language does your brand speak? This brand element applies to text, audio, video and live events. Remember that your language should sound like something that comes from a real person, not corporate gibberish. Who does your brand talk like? Is it a hipster or professional?
3. What type of audio ticks does your brand have? Is it male or female? Does it have a regional accent or dialect? Or does it have a foreign accent like Geico’s gecko? The Moviephone guy, by example, is broadly recognizable.
4. What visual cues and/or context does your brand need? For many brands, this is often incorporated into their store signage and conference booth.  Think of the white look of Apple stores. For social media and content marketing, this translates to how do you present your brand on photographs and video. What type of background and other elements do you need? Does it matter where people are engaging with your brand?
5. Who is your brand spokesperson? Is it a special person like the Old Spice man or is it a member of your senior management team? How do they dress and what special quirks do they have? Is it a real person or a character like Flo from Progressive?
6. Who is your brand mascot? It is a real person, a cartoon or an animal? What makes them stand out in a way that’s identifiable with your organization?
7. How do you brand your employees? While this sounds funny, many companies do it without thinking about it. What type of clothes do they wear? Remember you must think of the type of clothes? Are they dressy or casual? For example, Trader Joe’s employees, known as crew members wear, Hawaiian shirts while Home Depot employees wear orange aprons?

As a marketer, you need to consider how you want your brand to be represented in video, photographs, audio and live events. With expanded use of social media and content marketing, this is increasingly important to provide effective branding for your products and organization.

Are there any other brand elements you think should be added to this list? If so, what are they and how should organizations use them?

Happy marketing,
Heidi Cohen

Here are some related articles you may be interested in.

1. How to make your brand stand out
2. How to do branding without a budget.
3. 31 Design Mistakes & How to Fix Them  (Focus is on blogs but applies to all content.)

Photo credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/oskay/254588221/