Refresh, Renew, Reassess Your Brand

It’s a new year and by now you’ve likely got your green juice on tap, yoga membership paid in full and are well on your way to those elusive six pack abs (yeah right!). Now that you’ve got your mind and body squared away, it’s time to focus on the health of your growing business.

The marketplace is constantly changing and your audience expects you to keep up. If your target consumer is evolving (and chances are it is), it’s important to transform with them maintaining their interest, and more importantly their business.

Refresh Your Photography

Photography is essential when bringing your story to life. It is a visual representation of your brand, bridging the gap between your logo and actual brand message. In a world where the life of a popstar is measured in weeks, it is important to stay relevant and communicate with your audience through visual storytelling.

Wondering if you need to revive your photography?

• Have your images been featured in multiple publications, seen on your favorite blogs or spotted on your best friend’s instagram feed?
• Have you added products, services or employees since your last photo shoot?
• Did you change locations or recently revamp your packaging?

Chances are you answered yes to at least one of these so get cracking on that shot list! 

Renew Your Bio

The bio page serves as a unique opportunity to communicate your value proposition and set you apart from your competition. Successful brands achieve this by crafting a story that builds an emotional connection to the consumers they are targeting.

It is easy to get lost between releasing new products and running day-to-day operations and forget about yourself, you are a small business owner after all. Assess your brand drivers and emotional benefits:

• Is the messaging representative of who you are today and where you foresee the future brand?
• What has changed from last year? Have you joined a new organization, become a board member or been a featured speaker?

At leapfrog, we review and renew our client cards (above you’ll see an example with OTB Fine Art) at least 2X a year to make sure the media are getting all of the latest info.

 Reassess Your Time

Reflect on your initiatives from last year, what worked and what did not work? Time management is crucial to keeping you sane while growing your business. Reassess your efforts and decide where your time is best spent:

• Listen to your consumers. Did you move forward with a campaign or collaboration that received little traction? If so, ditch it and refocus based on the feedback.
• Are you seeing a return on your investment in advertising, social media giveaways?
• What is driving sales the most? Traditional media? Social media? Blogger partnerships? Events?

This exercise will look slightly different for everyone but the end result will be a jumpstart on 2015.

 Keep your brand fresh. Your business depends on it.

– Hannah