A regular brand health check will ensure that your brand stays fresh, vibrant and attractive to your target audience. Let’s take a closer look at three key criteria you can use to easily check your brand health:

1. Brand identity: What does it mean to have a robust brand identity?
2. Brand positioning: Is your brand top of mind for your target audience?
3. Brand experience: Do you make it easy for your customers to love you?

Taking a holistic view of your brand’s performance across these three key criteria will reveal any areas that require attention and enable you to improve your brand health. 

Brand identity: What does it mean to have a robust brand identity?

Your brand identity sets your business apart from its competitors. It is vital that this identity is distinctive, easily recognisable, engaging and relevant to your target audience.

To create a truly robust brand identity that will stand the test of time, you need to decide on your brand’s personality and values. Start with the basics: is your brand serious or playful, slick and modern or classic and traditional? Then drill right down to the core values that lie at the heart of your brand. These may be causes such as environmental protection, poverty, and human rights, or simpler values such as originality, honesty and inclusivity.

Don’t forget to consider your target audience—who are they, what are their values, and what causes/ideas do you have in common? These shared values should form the foundation for your brand identity.

Everything about your brand, including all graphic design elements, website design, UX/UI design, digital marketing and social media designs as well as all your content, should clearly communicate your brand identity in a way that will resonate with your target audience.

Brand positioning: Is your brand top of mind for your target audience?

In order to stand out in a crowded marketplace, you need an attractive and meaningful brand design paired with clear messaging that highlights your unique selling points, the benefits you offer to your customers, and the values you share with your target audience.

Your message must be conveyed consistently across your graphic design, copywriting, website design, UX/UI design and throughout your social media and digital marketing assets. In short, wherever your prospects interact with your brand, whether through real life or digital experiences, they should be hearing, reading, seeing, experiencing the same, consistent and highly relevant message.

Brand experience: Do you make it easy for your customers to love you?

While brand identity and shared values are crucial to attracting customers to your brand, its brand experience that keeps them coming back. 

In a world where brand reputation and recommendation are key driving factors in the purchasing decision, you simply cannot afford to provide anything less than an exceptional brand experience. Give them a good brand experience and your customers will tell the world how much they love you and recommend your business to their networks.  

The way to achieve this is simply to provide nothing less than first-rate customer service. At the very least, show your prospects and clients that you care, help them in an efficient and friendly manner and be quick to respond to customer queries. Give them plenty of opportunities to interact with your brand, take note of their feedback and respond accordingly.

Keep a close eye on brand experience metrics, which may be collected by traditional means such as customer feedback forms and surveys as well as by digital marketing analytics and through monitoring comments and responses on social media. This data will help you to stay up to date on customer expectations, and the changing needs of your customer-base as well as providing early warning of pain points that you may be able to address, giving your brand the upper hand over the competition.