One thing we get asked a lot when we meet up with local business owners or even our own clients is 1) coming up with a strategy that works for them and 2) how to stay consistent online. Coming up with a strategy is personalized to each business individually but there are tons of tips and tricks you can do to stay consistent online, so that’s what we’re tackling today!
Showing up online is one thing but staying consistent with your brand is a whole other struggle. Especially if you’re a service-based business, it can be hard to come up with new content that keeps your audience engaged – we feel you!
We’re here to share 6 tips to help you stay consistent online with your brand:
Define your why
When you’re running a business, it’s easy to get caught up in the day-to-day needs. You are wearing all the hats when it comes to being an entrepreneur and the expectations from yourself, your team and your market is high.
When we struggle to stay consistent online, take a step back and reflect on your why. Go back to the day when you had the idea to start the business that you have now and remind yourself why you wanted to start it in the first place. Once you have a ‘refreshed’ understanding of why and how your business came to life, you can get creative with the brand you were trying to create.
Be specific! Why did you want to start? What was your original colour theme? Who did you picture purchasing your service or product? How did you envision your packages or online space? Go back to your why so you can get clear on your branding.
Make a brand kit
This can be as in depth as you’d like it to be but put together a folder that houses all your brands identity – the fonts, your primary colours, photos you’ve used, logos, tone of voice and whatever else you have associated with the brand.
Once you can see it all in one place (like a Google Doc), it’s easier to get creative and build a cohesive brand strategy. You should be using everything in your brand kit consistently when creating new content. The moment you steer away from what you’ve already put in place, is the moment your brand starts to become inconsistent online.
It’s okay to switch things up as your business evolves and grows, however, if you’re changing your brands identity – it should be a full package redesign versus tweaking little things here and there.
Know your audience
Take a deep dive into your analytics and understand your audience. Who is buying from you? What type of person is following you on Social Media? Where are they from? What is the age range? Any information you gather will paint a picture of your target audience. Once you have a better understanding of your market, you can create a brand that attracts that type of person.
If you realize that you cater to an older generation and your content speaks primarily to millennials, you won’t get the engagement you’re looking for as you aren’t tapping into the right market.
Use content planning apps
This is a huge help when it comes to planning content and staying consistent with your brand. There are tons of apps out there that can help you, so choose the one that meets your needs. One app we use is Planoly – you can do quite a bit in the app, but one thing we love it for is planning out our feed.
When we start to realize we aren’t consistent online it’s usually at a point of no return – pre-planning your posts in the app will give you a future look into your feed and if you like the consistency of the brand. You can tweak, add or delete as needed before anything goes live and it helps you to plan out your content on a larger scale.
Gather photos
If you are a product based business, you have the luxury of snapping pics of your product. Gather as many photos as you can and add them to a folder. When you edit your photos, make sure you are sticking with the same theme and you’ll start the see the consistency online.
If you are a serviced based business, it’s hard to get a lot of photos to stay consistent. One thing you can do is use an app like Canva to create posts that reflect your brand – incorporate your fonts, colours, quotes, about your services or anything else that relates to your brand. You can also incorporate pictures of yourself as the business owner and if you really want – there are tons of free stock image websites to help build your feed and presence online.
The biggest thing is to keep creating and gathering images so you are ahead in planning versus scrambling at the last minute to find good images.
Get some inspo
Now this doesn’t mean you should copy someone else’s branding, but we all have our own style when it comes to our brand and how we showcase ourselves online. A big help is to look at other accounts that you follow and love their feed – whether it’s because of their messaging, their colours or the theme they’ve put in place. Once you’ve gathered some inspo, you can visually see what type of branding suits you and why. Incorporate your favourite pieces from each one to build your own brand that you love!
Building a brand and staying consistent is a daily struggle for many – you are not alone! A big part of the consistency factor is planning your content and visually seeing what you are creating. Work in a proactive manner not a reactive one and you’ll be on your way to staying consistent and showing up online!
We are always happy to help with building your brand and bringing you vision to life! Send us a DM or email us at hello@mintandpoppy.com
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