Consistency in any practice makes perfection.
For the same reason most successful global brands have not only pitched the same promise but made it louder over the years.
Innovation should be a locomotive for brand supremacy when it is done without diluting the voice, focus and intention of the brand as it has been in its inception (which was set by the visionaries).
Going forward, we should therefore appreciate that there is another part of our brand(s) excellence, which needs us to go beyond the norm, but remaining with consistency that talks legacy.
That is through maintaining the same brand colours that have been used over the years, designs, logos and so forth.
Of course, sometimes we are forced to rebrand, but it should be done carefully as it might result in a face-off rather than uplifting the brand.
We brand products or services and business for identity or visibility.
If we keep on changing our brand elements, including logos and colours, we will lose it all to our competitors.
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Think of the Coca-Cola brand that has been for long identified by its red and white colours even in the advent of various spectrums that could have tempted invitation of new colours or designs.
That’s what consistency should do for our entrepreneurial brands.
Real innovative branding goes beyond to bring value for the current customers/stakeholders yet maintaining originality for the future generations.
There is a gap in brand sustainability by most of our practising entrepreneurs especially as they adjust/change without considering consistency.
In this edition we therefore go beyond brand consistency as we try to improve marketing of our entrepreneurial businesses. This goes beyond any single type of business or sector as the discussions affect all in this era of enterprising.
To start with, our brands should now and going forward exist in compliance with the digital configuration.
There is a need for our entrepreneurs to be creative in their digital performance for modern brand adaptation.
Whereby customer experience or satisfaction of the brand is informed by data.
The behaviour of our markets in terms of product or service uptake, referring to other new users, repeat buying and overall satisfaction should be measurable.
Through digitalisation, our entrepreneurs are now able to calculate and compare all these that used to be qualitative so as to make real informed decisions.
This is creativity digital brands performance which follows other traditional consistency measures.
The good thing with digital brand performance is that entrepreneurs can work with any variables for measurement.
Rather than restricting to brand elements consistency can be seen from digital graphical presentation of levels of satisfaction, repeat buying and any other. It is high time we make tangible those intangible brand matters which improves our measurement for brand consistency.
A product or service is what we take to the markets as entrepreneurs but a brand(s) is what the customers look, consume and refer to others.
As we go beyond brand consistency, we should consider the customer before we craft, adjust or make an overhaul.
It takes two to tango here: the customer and the entrepreneur.
Let’s take a look at the search engines that are used by our customers. We should have our presence in various popular and specialised domains.
That is the reason why in any search of an automobile Mercedes Benz brand will intelligently position itself from the rest.
We can do the same in any trade/sector we are existing in. Here the entrepreneurial business should be linked to all networks that provide any information about the customer and its brand in real time for decision making by both parties as aforementioned.
Most of our entrepreneurs are yet to configure such but this is a digital inspired global village if you snooze you lose.
Going further towards brand consistency, there is a need for us not only to connect with the customers but also be able to convert.
Our main thrust is to improve the bottom-line of the business through connection.
It is no longer only about a rational connection with the customer but a neurological advancement.
This has been discovered in various studies that most individuals make their purchasing or consumption decisions subconsciously.
As innovative entrepreneurs we should develop our branding strategies for awareness infusing emotional factors that can cause our targeted markets to subconsciously connect and consume.
Given that we will be able to give the customer a maximum satisfaction in this first phase our brand will then become part of his or her living.
Brand advertisements and any other related activities should be emotional for entrepreneurial business growth with consistency.
Beyond brand consistency there is technological advancement; this is food for thought as we move further as thriving entrepreneurs in our various businesses.
- Dr Farai Chigora is a businessman and academic. He is the head of management and entrepreneurship at the Africa University’s College of Business, Peace, Leadership and Governance. His doctoral research focused on business administration (destination marketing and branding major, Ukzn, SA). He is into agribusiness and consults for many companies in Zimbabwe and Africa. He writes in his personal capacity and can be contacted for feedback and business at [email protected], www.fachip.co.zw, WhatsApp mobile: +263772886871
