Why Branding Is Important for Small Businesses
Often small businesses fall into two traps around branding – that they can’t manage it because they are small and that it is primarily about products anyway. While branding does feature the products or services that a business offers, this is only a small part of it. And branding is something that can benefit businesses of all sizes as well as being accessible to everyone. Here are a few reasons to seriously consider working on your company branding.What is Branding?Branding is about creating a unique identity for your business that means even when you sell the same products or services as someone else, you can stand out from the crowd and attract customer attention. Small business branding can often be seen as difficult to do as you can’t compete with the big company in terms of resources or manpower. And while this might be the case with resources, it doesn’t mean your branding can’t work for you just as well as theirs.People relate better to companies that have strong branding and an identity. They vote for which branding works for them with their shop visits, clicks or purchases. By having strong, cohesive branding, your company can be the one that they notice, feel a connection with and therefore purchase from. It can also create brand loyalty and those crucial returning customers.Recognition Leads to TrustOne thing studies have shown is that recognition of a brand builds trust and people are more likely to buy from a company if they feel they can trust them. Therefore, trust and reputation are key to business success and branding plays a big part in this.By having that strong, identifiable brand, even the smallest company can begin to build trust with customers. This leads to customer loyalty – 48% of customers say they are more likely to become loyal to the brand during their first experience or purchase with them.There are lots of ways to create that brand to build trust with everything from catchy slogans and memorable names to attractive and eye-catching colour schemes being used. But the most effective brands combine something of everything. They work on the principle that we retain only around one-tenth of the information that we see when we read something.But if you include visuals with that information, this rate of retention rises up to almost two thirds. Therefore, having that catchy slogan paired with great graphics, a clear colour palette, brand voice and other elements means you have a better chance of people remembering what you do. That’s why visuals are so popular on social media and almost three-quarters of marketers use them ahead of even video.Brand ReputationAs you attract attention for your brand and build trust, then you start to create a reputation, be it online or in the physical world. Reputation is crucial for business – it covers everything from customer interactions, product standard, feedback and even how you reward your customers.That strong, positive reputation can even convince people to buy. 91% of shoppers asked in one study said they were more likely to buy from a brand that they viewed as ‘authentic’ than one that they didn’t. So building that brand reputation can gain you customers in a big way.Using marketing teams to manage your reputation may seem like something that a small company cannot manage but this isn’t the case. By having external experts who take on tasks such as checking customer feedback, managing social media and creating the right content, you can quickly build and enhance your business reputation.Making SalesA strong brand increases the number of leads that you will generate and this, in turn, means making more sales. However, you need to maintain your reputation and standards when generating these leads or the work done by the brand can vanish. Response times, voice and even the actual content you use to handle leads all needs to be consistent with the brand.Following through on your promises also helps build that reputation. Have a clear customer process with times outlined so customers know what to expect and make sure you follow it – that way people are impressed with what you do and more likely to tell others.Business GrowthThat strong, cohesive brand is crucial for other areas of the business growth. Staff morale, for example, can be a problem. If staff are demotivated, don’t know what the company stands for or feel unimportant, then this can lead to bad customer service. This damages the brand.So by having a clear brand that employees can get behind, you can offer a better service to your customers. Staff feel proud to talk about what the company does or the services that it offers. And they learn to talk with the brand’s voice, ensuring all of their communications with customers offers consistency. This makes the company seem more friendly and approachable and this is another reason that customers become loyal to the brand.Branding also stands out to potential investors in the business. According to a study by Reuters, some 82% of investors said that the strength of a company’s brand and name recognition were important factors in a decision to get involved with a business.
What this shows is that from all aspects of the business, branding is crucial. You need to have a presence that is recognisable from your social media profiles and website through to your physical store if you have one. The brand rules how you talk to customers and ensures staff can believe in it.There are lots of ways that branding can help with business growth and success. This means that having a strong brand and optimised strategy to use it is vital to the long-term success and profitability of your company.
Tips for Recruiting and Training Pharmaceutical Representatives
Is Biopharma Missing the Mark on Recruiting and Training Sales Representatives?In 2011 81% of physicians surveyed said they wanted Higher Quality Sales Representatives. Higher Quality means sales representatives who were better educated and trained, more experienced and consultative and competent when discussing clinical studies. This issue will focus on two things you can do to improve the perception doctors have of pharmaceutical and medical sales representatives, Recruiting and Training.Recruiting
Over the past decade biopharma has been focused on recruitment of new sales representatives with the objective of winning the “share of voice” or “arms” race. Many people believe we have sacrificed quality for quantity. Years ago we used to hire nurses, pharmacists and nutritionists as sales representatives who had extensive clinical backgrounds.Now that the “Arms” race is over, it is time to begin to hire representatives with more clinical expertise. There are a lot of reps with prior pharma experience to choose from now so make sure you determine during the interview if the candidate possesses a knowledge of understanding and presenting clinical data and discussing evidence based medicine.A good way to do this is to ask the candidate to speak extensively on their previous product and look for depth of disease state knowledge. Determine if they understand treatments other than their own and if they can discuss clinical data.Training
While the biopharma industry is known for rigorous training, our current methods are lacking. Physicians are willing and eager to see representatives who provide value by expanding their focus beyond product to include disease state knowledge and clinical research.It can be as simple as understanding clinical problems your products can solve and discovering which problems the doctor is experiencing. The percent of doctors wanting more discussion of clinical studies has risen from 80% in 2005 to 89% in 2011.This leads us to believe that the industry has not improved on this measurement, rather we are getting worse. I suggest a return to the basics of presenting clinical studies the way they are set up in the study abstract. Each study abstract is organized according to the SOAP communication format.Biopharma may be missing the mark on recruiting and training sales representatives who are competent at discussing clinical studies and evidenced based medicine, but this can be reversed by improving the way we recruit and train new sales professionals we hire into this industry. It is up to us to give doctors what they want and need in industry representatives.
Education and the Unemployment Rate
I read a couple of interesting statistics the other day in an article about the widening talent shortage among many American companies. The first was a citing about a study done by ManpowerGroup, a Milwaukee-based workforce consultant, showing that 52 % of employers can’t recruit skilled workers for their open positions. The other stat, this time by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, showed that of the 9.2% of American currently unemployed, 78% have only a high school education or less.These numbers are surprising and they tell me a couple of things worth noting regarding our stubbornly high unemployment rate. One is that the rate might not be so high if Americans would get educated and trained in areas of shortage and need. The other is that thinking you are going to get ahead in the 21st century with just a high school education is not preparation for the future.The public and their proxy the media love to play the blame game for the high unemployment rate. It’s the Democrats fault or the Republicans fault. It’s greedy Wall Street or lazy Europeans and so on and so on. Instead of finding fault, perhaps we need to hold up a mirror and look into it. We could lower the unemployment rate and all of the misery associated with it significantly if we would further our education in strategic ways. Education is one of the best ways out of this mess.I rarely hear or read the mainstream media report about this lurking education gap as being a contributor to the unemployment rate and I pay attention to a lot of news. Why do you think that is? Why is the national anchorperson hesitant to say that too many of the unemployed are lacking in the right kinds of education? Perhaps there is a concern that to say so might be perceived as elitist or that someone’s feelings may be hurt. There is an elephant in the unemployment room that is being ignored and not fully discussed. And we as a country do ourselves no favors to avoid it.We should address this issue head on. If we could be delivered news we could really use such as where the human resource shortages are and what is involved in preparing to fill them we could be much better informed. Let’s hear more reports about the skills deficit for a change instead of this constant obsession about budget deficits. Let’s agree that without a vigorous push for high quality education at all levels, then our chances of competing in the world marketplace are greatly diminished.School districts and universities need to be more engaged in this conversation as well. Of course their mission is to provide a broad range of learning opportunities to the greatest number of people. But by not identifying and shifting resources to address critical shortage areas of the economy they are denying our workforce significant solutions needed now. Academic advisors and counselors need to work more aggressively aligning emerging talent with areas of employment need.And let’s try harder to see education as the benefit that it is. There is too much of an attitude that views education more as a cost than as an investment. Education can provide individuals with practical skills, a critical thinking ability, and confidence to succeed. It’s among the best self-help techniques society can do for itself.We can do more to reduce unemployment than to just wait for banks, corporations, or government to release more money. We can be smarter about creating a congruence between hiring gaps and workforce development.