Often misconceived, a branding strategy is not the sum of your logo, color palette, or website; though these creative elements are integral to a successful branding strategy.

A branding strategy revolves around all the intangible elements that over time drive brand awareness, brand equity, and brand sentiment.

Let’s give an example here: if Nike would like to make a hotel, I guess we’ll all know what it’s gonna be like. We know how we would feel in it. But if Ibis hotels would like to make a shoe company, we don’t know what to expect. And that’s because Ibis has a logo, not a brand.

Why is brand awareness important in business

Brand awareness is a general term that describes how familiar (aware) consumers are with a brand or its products. Put simply, brand awareness is the measure of how memorable and recognizable a brand is to its target audience.

Establishing brand awareness is a powerful marketing strategy that leads consumers to develop an instinctive preference towards a brand and its products. Making a brand recognizable and memorable is at the heart of most marketing strategies because it is a major force behind brand trust, and ultimately, sales generation.

What is brand awareness and how do you build it?

You have your brand strategy, your brand identity system, you have your collateral, your website, now you’re at the point where you got a brand and you now need to put it on the map. And here is when brand awareness and brand strategy comes into plan.

It can be a bit of an enigma for business owners and entrepreneurs.

By the definition, Brand Awareness is the level of consumer awareness of a brand, its idea and offered value as a market provider.

Every potential customer that you might have is on a journey. They have different phases and when the time comes to decide what brand product or service they’re going to purchase they consider the brands that are out there, on the market place. And if your brand isn’t on their mind in the consideration phase, then it’s not going to be considered and you’re brand it’s not gonna grow within that space.

That’s why brand awareness is VERY important.

It’s about getting your message out there so more people know about your brand, so when it comes for them to make a decision, they have you in their mind.

Where do you start?

Is this branding, or is this marketing?

Well, when it comes to your brand awareness campaign, here is where the two meet.

You will have built your brand way long before your marketing strategy comes into play and this is about having the vehicle ready to go.

So your brand awareness tactics and your marketing strategy are one and the same thing, essentially your marketing is your frontlines of the branding but they share the same overarching goal and that is acquire and nurture customers to build the business.

Your audience is always the focus

Who is the audience?

If you’re thinking of that overarching goal, you’re trying to influence the mind of your audience. (here it is an awesome Personas Template to help you find who’s your audience)

So if you don’t have them at epicentre of what you’re doing, then your messaging or your strategy or your communication or your ads they’re not gonna be aligned to whom your audience is.

It’s imperative that there’s where you start.

The brand strategy will define who that audience is, where they are, where they hang out, where they go to for information around the problem that your brand solves.

And then it becomes about defining where the most open to a message from your brand about solving that problem.

And that’s what the marketing strategy  and the brand awareness strategy defines.

What your audience is and what messages are best suited to hit your audience where they are most likely to be open to your solution.

Brand Awareness Strategy needs to be based on value

You can throw your hook on Facebook Ads but if you don’t have some kind of bait representing value on that hook, people are not gonna bite.

You have to get your brand associated with some kind of value in the mind of your audience.

How to define the value of your Brand Awareness Strategy?

You do it in the Brand Strategy.

If you’re able to associate the value of the position that you want to own in the mind of your audience with your brand well then that’s the first seed you need to plant in the mind of your audience.

Wherever they go and being open to the solution that you bring, there’s where your brand needs to be.

We did so far a few brandings, so if you’re still finding everything too overwhelming to do it yourself or your team partners, give us a shout! 

The post Why is brand awareness important for your business appeared first on Visual Burst.

Video marketing works and will dominate the advertising world for at least the next decade.

Sales and marketing teams are using this tool more and more nowadays to promote their business.

Why is that?

It’s all about the easiness and efficiency that video marketing brings to the table.

We live in a fast era where nobody seems to have time for anything, and studies show that the attention span decreased over the years.

So, the marketers had to develop the solution to make anything they are trying to promote stand out from their competitors and make themselves memorable.

They found out that videos are the key is to help the audience to get the whole picture in a shorter time frame.

Videos deliver messages better with the audience, being straightforward, more animated, and easier to understand.

Easier to remember as you combine visual and audio, so you double the impact.

Video marketing has a great return of investment (ROI), especially when you have a marketing strategy on all social media platforms like YouTube, Linked In, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, Snapchat.

The target is to be visible to all your clients, so everyone can watch you closely and trust you more.

You can choose an explainer video for your product or service where you can show how it works, or highlight the benefits, or just a simple animated fun video does the job.

No matter what type of video you choose to promote your message, you win.

Second, what video marketing does?

Creative videos allow for face-to-face experiences between consumers and businesses.

By just telling your brand story in a live video, you are engaging the audience with transparency.

Therefore, you are building awareness, and what’s more important, you are building trustworthiness about your product or services.

If it stands out, the video not only increases website traffic but also, in a matter of days, ends up getting millions of views. And advertising at such a scale brings sales.

Why does it work?

Video advertising is like a diamond for SEO (Search Engine Optimization).

The key is to make it easy for Google and your business to become best friends in the future.

When people search for your stuff on Google, your video is more likely to be seen first.

Video marketing works very well because it’s also more shareable.

Whether your client is waiting in a queue, there’s always enough time to watch a video.
They’ll also have the time to share it with their friends if found useful.

If you don’t have a video marketing strategy yet, don’t hesitate to give us a shout!

The post Why video marketing works and why you should use it appeared first on Visual Burst.

But as handy as they are, it’s frustrating when your pictures don’t come out the way you wanted them to. If you feel the same way, then it might be a good idea to at least understand the basics of how your camera works and what you can adjust to get the desired results.

The 3 types of exposure settings

In this article we’re going to tackle the three main exposure settings. These are shutter speed, aperture and ISO. They are the same on any camera, whether you’re using a phone, a digital camera or even shooting on film. Before explaining how they work, we need to understand what exposure means.

Exposure is the amount of light your camera lets in when you take a picture or record a video. In photography, light is everything. If you let in too much light, then your image gets overexposed. Too little light and you end up underexposed.

But even though each of these 3 settings adjust exposure, it’s how they do it that’s important.

Shutter speed

Your camera shutter controls how much time your sensor is being exposed. Not only does this effect exposure, but having your sensor exposed for a certain amount of time means you’re capturing everything that’s happening within that timeframe.

You may have wondered why your images are coming out shaky and blurry off your phone. It’s because your phone is trying to properly expose your image by lowering your shutter speed which in turn captures all the movement that occurs within that time frame, even with steady hands.

So to get a clear crisp image, the faster the movement in the frame, the higher the shutter speed you need to have. You’re basically trying to freeze movement by narrowing the amount of time you expose. In the example above, the toy car is moving from right to left, but adjusting the shutter speed, freezes it in place.

Aperture

Without getting too technical, the aperture is an opening in the lens that dictates how much light goes in through it. Besides exposure, with aperture you can also control the depth of field in a frame. Depth of field is the distance between the nearest and furthest elements in a scene that are in focus.

As you can see, depth of field plays an important role in photography, giving you control of what’s in focus and what’s not.

It’s tempting to leave your aperture wide open, especially when dealing with low light. But this comes with drawbacks, like not having your entire subject in focus, vignetting and chromatic aberration, which we’ll cover another time.

ISO

ISO stands for the International Organization for Standardization, which standardized the sensor sensitivirty, along many other things. The ISO controls your camera’s sensitivity to light. In a low light scenario, when all else fails, this gives us yet another chance of getting our image properly exposed. But please be cautious, as a high ISO setting can leave you with a grainy image. This depends of your camera sensor as well. Usually the bigger the sensor, the less noise you’re going to get when cranking up the ISO.

Conclusion on exposure settings

I love how new technologies in photography are advancing and make it easier and more accessible for everyone. Just by understanding how these 3 settings work, the possibilities are endless. You will also be able to understand your camera’s shortcomings and what you’ll need to get for the type of photography you want to achieve later on.

If you’re trying to learn how to get better pictures for your social media campaigns and find all of this too overwhelming, give us a shout and we’ll help get you on the fast lane towards significant growth for your business.

The post Exposure settings: Shutter speed, Aperture and ISO appeared first on Visual Burst.

There are a lot of factors that can influence a promotional video’s price, from video length and production quality to even things like location, props, actors, video effects and much more.

That’s why today we’re going to talk about what goes into making a video and what are some price ranges for different services that may be included in one.

Additional costs

Competition is fierce out there, where everybody is working hard to get people’s attention in every way they can. So in order to stand out from the rest, we will need to get creative.

Music

Music plays a big role in how you engage with your customer, but this also comes with a price. Licensing music could range anywhere from 40 to 240 euro, depending on your video coverage. The bigger the audience, the higher the cost.

Online use tends to be cheaper, whereas TV could cost more, especially if it’s for international use. The same goes if using video for events. The higher the attendance, the higher the price.

Voice-overs

Another great way of keeping people interested in your video is the use of voice-overs.

Studies have proved that people pay better attention and stay engaged longer if they hear a soothing voice. A professional voice talent that can deliver your message with confidence and targets the audience can sell your product with ease.

Depending on video usage, prices can range from around 150 to 400 euro, and you can use different apps to have a voice-over done. 

Still, it’s best to hire a professional who can give you your brand familiarity and enhance the product with their expertise.

Visual effects

A simple animating logo can make your brand more memorable.

Also, an animated text comes in handy when you are trying to promote a more technical product. 

It can make the process more playful and a cheaper alternative when trying to get challenging shots.

We can see why it’s used by so many to promote their products. The cost of such services ranges from 300-1000 euro depending on the level of complexity.

Hiring actors and extras

Hiring the right actor or actress will make your promotional video stand out. Not only does it get the job done a lot faster but, it’s also easier to work with professionals.

The cost of hiring actors varies. It can be a bit more expensive due to different factors such as location, experience, demands.

But a good actor will deliver the message to the audience by creating a better engagement, using verbal and emotional skills.

Props

Depending on the type of production, props could be inexpensive or cost a fortune. 

Some examples of props are practical lighting, furniture, plants, costumes. The list goes on and on.

They focus the audience’s attention and interest and compliment your video’s message. It helps build a story you desire to promote. For example, a cozy living room will deliver a message of warmth, or darker lighting can suggest a more romantic tone. 

Props are most effective to give a visual and memorable sense of your video. 

Other expenses

This is the tricky part. Sometimes, depending on the project, other expenses may occur, such as transporting crew and equipment on location, location permits, stock footage, and images, or equipment rental.

If you feel the project can be more of a hassle, maybe you should consider hiring a video production company. A video production company comes in place with its expertise and enhances your promotional video quality.

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