Have you ever wondered how brands like Apple, Starbucks, and Netflix manage to achieve worldwide recognition and success? The secret lies in their global strategy.
Are you setting up a company that operates in the technology industry, and you do not know anything about branding? Maybe you have only an idea that you would like to organize and put to work? We have prepared a set of tips to help you create an effective technology branding strategy for your business.
Business in the technology industry – does it have a chance to develop?
New technologies have always been a hot topic. This should not come as a surprise since they enable the whole world to develop, make life easier and promise amazing changes. In the future, tech companies will therefore be very profitable. Technological brands that surprise customers with something new every now and then are, for example, Apple, Microsoft and Samsung. You do not have to be such a giant to achieve success in the industry. The most important thing is that you offer innovative, valuable and life-enhancing products to your customers, such as those in the field of virtual reality or artificial intelligence. However, it is worth observing the strategies implemented by the industry leaders and using them as inspiration.
What is technology branding?
Let’s start with a brief definition of branding. It is a process of building the company’s image in the eyes of potential customers, as well as competition. It is a continuous activity that never ends. The world market, competition and customer needs are constantly changing – every technology company has to keep up with them to stay relevant. Good branding is necessary for both large companies that have been operating on the market for years as well as newly emerging Silicon Valley startups.
The most important elements in technology branding strategies are:
● company name
● brand mission and vision that establish the core of the business
● marketing strategy
● brand archetype
● website
● storytelling and communication
● logo design and visual identity
● quality of products and services
● advertising
By making sure all of these elements are well-crafted, you have a much better chance of succeeding with your tech brand than if you act spontaneously and fail to develop them properly while remaining confident that your innovative product will speak for itself.
10 steps to create a technology branding strategy
Let’s now move on to how to plan a branding strategy for a tech brand to get the results you want. Remember that a company’s technology branding is not just about changing the appearance of a logo design or advertising banner in the traditional marketing channels. It is a much more complicated action aimed at conveying the company’s mission, value and culture to consumers. Here are 10 steps that will surely help you succeed.
Conduct market research – the basis of technology branding
The first step is to perform a broad research analysis. Before you enter the market with a service or product, you need to be sure that there will be a demand for it. Sometimes we think that certain solutions are a total innovation, that they are unique and will surely appeal to a wide group of people, meanwhile, the reality shows that our idea does not fit the general needs at all.
Tech companies research – how to conduct it?
The best tech brand research is based on a range of inputs that include not only the employees’ and customers’ viewpoints but also internal and external stakeholders’ perspective. Research should include specialists’ expertise, trends in the technology industry, and an in-depth analysis of competitors in the market. The results should include quantitative data that allows you to identify some statistics and compare them, as well as qualitative data, for example from interviews, which will provide a broader perspective.
Define your place in the industry
Properly defining your place in the tech industry will help you create an effective brand strategy. You must, among other things, answer such questions about the company as:
● What exactly does it do?
● What niche does it fit into?
● How is it different from other companies in this sector?
● What is its mission?
● What promise can it make to customers?
● What are its core values?
In addition, a tech brand should focus on its own tech knowledge and hone it to perfection, then find a way to tell the story in a way that competing companies cannot steal the idea, but clients can see some unique factor in your brand’s proposals. This is a very important part of startup branding. Let’s take McDonalds for example. They patented the method of serving sandwiches by fast food restaurants in such a way that each station serves only one function, e.g. frying meat. And that is what they talked about in the later stages of their marketing, when more and more companies started to implement these types of production strategies in their restaurants.
Refine your product
Even the best technology branding strategy will not work in the long term if what you are selling will not meet consumer expectations. If you prepare a good marketing message, it will make clients interested and some of them will buy the product. However, if they are disappointed with their purchase, they will certainly not come back and decide to spend their money elsewhere. Therefore, take into account all the information that comes from market research, and constantly test what you want to release to make sure that the product or service you sell is actually noteworthy and better than what other brands have to offer. Otherwise, you will basically give your customers to competitors without even putting up a fight.
Do not forget about continuous development. You will never reach the status quo in the tech industry because it is one of the fastest growing areas and every brand has to keep up with it.
Find a name, define an identity and develop a brand story
The brand name is important because it helps clients recognize companies’ information. Contrary to some beliefs, the name does not have to be as simple and literal as possible, although such an approach is also valid. For example, SAP stands for Systems, Applications and Products in data processing, which makes it much easier to understand what such an entity actually does. However, one of the leaders in the tech industry, Google, has a completely made-up name that is nonetheless recognizable. Why? Because everyone can interpret it however they want, it is easy to remember and catchy. In addition to the name, the storytelling behind the brand is also extremely important. Sharing an engaging story about the product’s creation or the company’s history, along with presenting the overall identity of the business, can help establish a connection with potential customers and spark their interest by evoking emotions. All this, along with the logotype, selected colors and other design elements, make up the brand identity.
Develop a visual identity for the brand
If you want to create a successful technology brand strategy, you cannot forget about the visuals. Contrary to appearances, it is very important how the key visual of your tech brand will look like. This is, of course, the logo design, but also the colors, fonts, icons and other elements that come together to create a complete visual identity. How should you approach this topic? It is worth familiarizing yourself with the psychology of color because most of them have distinct meanings and features that can subconsciously or consciously impact potential clients. Most often, companies in the technology industry choose black or white. Why? Well, black brings to mind luxury, elegance, intelligence, prestige and high quality. White, on the other hand, is a particularly good option for modern brands because it is associated with cleanliness and simplicity.
Describe your target client
While technology is beneficial to everyone, and its development makes the world more efficient, it cannot be assumed that the target audience for a particular service or product encompasses every person in the world. It is necessary to define personas, i.e. ideal customers for your business. This will help you build a meaningful brand communication and branding strategy. Why? Imagine that you are developing an application that is supposed to help you get rid of things you no longer use. Who is in your target group? Among others, there are people who know how to use a phone and Internet, want to earn some money, and at the same time are concerned with ecology. If you start talking to these people in a rigid, corporate language, you can be sure that your technology will not seem appealing to them. On the other hand, using simple, specific, and emotionally charged messages can increase the likelihood that users will use your application. Remember that in the case of companies that are already operating on the market and come up with a rebranding initiative, it is often necessary to define new target groups as well.
Determine personas
Establishing a persona is one of the most important elements of technology branding. Why is that the case? A persona is the reflection of your ideal customer who would definitely buy your product and be satisfied with it. Thanks to its appropriate definition, you will be able to prepare precise marketing activities and communication adequate to the needs of a certain audience. What is more, one technology brand can have more than one persona, so it is not worth limiting yourself to just one. However, it is important to prepare separate advertising messages and all other activities included in the brand strategy when creating several personas. Here are the questions you need to answer first:
● Who is my potential client?
● What is their gender?
● Where do they live?
● How old are they?
● What is their marital status?
● What are their personal and professional goals?
● What are their features?
● What frustrates them?
● What makes them happy?
● What tools do they lack to develop their competences or to make their life easier?
● What are their needs?
● What brand promise do they need?
● What financial resources do they have?
Define way of communication
Do you know what is one of the most common mistakes people make when it comes to tech brand’s communication? Well, many owners of such companies use inappropriate language when communicating information about products, mission, identity or brand story. We are talking about corporate or technical jargon that regular people, who do not have a deep understanding of a given subject, will not understand. Due to this mismatch of messages, many people decide not to use the products or services of a given brand because they do not understand how they work. So it is a good idea to define how you will speak to your audience. Brand archetypes can help simplify this process. Remember, good communication with customers should always be the core of your business.
Focus on the technical background
Even if your technology classifies as innovation, you will not sell it if the resulting customer experience from interacting with your offer is not of high quality. You need to focus on ensuring that your employees working in chat rooms, brick-and-mortar stores (if you have any) and on the hotline can communicate in the language of benefits, translate all issues regarding products and services, respond to customers on messaging platforms according to the prepared guidelines and dispel all customers’ doubts.
Furthermore, it is important for your website or online store to be well-designed, intuitive to use, dynamic, and to contain all the necessary information about your products, the company’s story, its identity, and provide an easy way for customers to place orders. The last point is especially important. It is worth presenting customers with a unique selling proposition, which, for example, will enable them to purchase a service using the EyePay method. Your services should be accessible from mobile devices. These are all important factors that make up the tools that allow customers to get to know your company better. It is also worth paying attention to the presentation of the brand in social media. Profiles should not only be perfect from the technical point of view, but also regularly maintained. Every message from a customer must be prioritized, every comment must be answered, and posts or stories must be substantive and interesting. It is definitely a must have when it comes to product marketing on social media.
Create and follow marketing strategy
Now that you have covered all the basic points, it is time to move on to defining a specific marketing strategy. Branding technology companies is not only about appearing at seminars or conferences, advertising on radio or television. Nowadays, every technology brand should do everything to be as close as possible to the audience, which members can turn into potential customers, so it is worth using the Internet for promotional activities. Social media websites are a good place for companies to present their products and services, as well as tell a little more about the mission, identity or company story.
Remember to choose communication channels that are used by your target audience. If you want to reach teenagers, TikTok or YouTube are likely to be the most effective. On the other hand, for older age groups, a good starting point could be Instagram and Facebook.
Keep in mind that in today’s digital era, technology branding goes beyond the usual channels, and e-commerce branding plays a crucial role in creating a powerful online presence for businesses involved in online shopping.
Branding strategies objectives
It is very important to set specific goals when executing a marketing and branding strategy for a tech brand. There are typically five types of goals:
● strategic – they define how the organization, products and future of the entire brand should look like;
● long-term – they most often cover a period of several years and are the most important for tech companies;
● medium-term – usually annual goals, e.g. the company’s turnover will be X;
● short-term – quarterly goals, e.g. I will release X ads in Google Ads;
● current – goals covering a given week or month, by far the least demanding, but not the least important, e.g. I will answer all messages from social media.
By dividing your goals in this way, you will be able to define a specific scope of tasks for a specific period of time, allowing you to tick off task after task. Development requires patience, so it is worth taking small steps that will bring you closer to your goal.
How to set goals?
When setting goals, it is worth using the SMART concept. It says that each goal set in front of you should have specific features, more precisely, it has to be:
● Specific – easy to understand and unambiguous;
● Measurable – expressible in numbers;
● Achievable – possible to accomplish by a given entity;
● Relevant – important from the point of view of the entire company;
● Time-bound – having a specific execution date.
This means that your tech brand goal should be phrased for example like this:
● By the end of 2023, I will publish 5 advertising campaigns in Google Ads, the goal of which will be to generate a conversion rate of X.
● By the end of July, I will describe the brand story in such a way that it is readable for the audience and publish it on the website.
Product life cycle
When planning a technology brand strategy and setting goals, you need to keep the product life cycle in mind. Remember that there are 4 phases:
● introduction;
● growth;
● maturity;
● decline.
Each of these phases requires different strategic actions. For example during the introduction phase, most of the activities should be focused on marketing and technology branding. In the case of the decline phase, on the other hand, it is necessary to develop a strategy to exit the market.
Implementation of successful technology brand strategy
After you have already created a strategy for a technology company and built a brand identity, it is time to start implementing all of your technology branding activities so that they actually deliver the expected result. How do you start this process? It is worth dividing the company into departments and selecting project managers who will deal with individual segments of the brand strategy. This will make it easier for you to check the effects of actions and hold specific entities accountable for individual work and created solutions. It is also worth not to mix tasks in structures. Designers should only deal with visual identification, customer service specialists should focus on customer messaging, and content managers should create content. This will make work easier not only for you, but also for your employees. Remember, however, that you, as the brand owner, must be the binder that makes the final decisions. If you work alone, think about what you can delegate to others and which tasks should be outsourced to specialists. This way you will gain time for analysis and conceptual activities – these two elements are very important and most often overlooked. You can generate branding RFP document, i.e. a formal inquiry sent to various entities in order to obtain their offer.
Summary
Don’t underestimate the power of a strong technology brand. Mastering technology branding can be a game-changer for your business. Our article offers a wealth of knowledge to help you unlock your brand’s potential. Creating a strategy for a tech brand should no longer be a mystery to you! And if you’re seeking professional assistance tailored to your unique goals, our branding services are just a click away. If you need help creating key visual elements, be sure to use our brand identity design services. We also offer help with issues such as creating a brand identity and building websites.
