by Nnadozie Egeonu

Customer will always want to know what is in for him; what extra benefits can he derive from patronizing you; why should he go for you instead of others?

Consulting for small and medium sized businesses is such an awesome experience, quite touching too when you find a lot of young and promising entrepreneurs build businesses, set out to make it a brand of sort and overnight kill it with sheer ignorance of some technicalities or avoidable mistakes. Here I have highlighted how you can kill your brand without knowing it.

• Thinking that your product is your brand:
• Putting what you want ahead of what the customer wants.
• Failing to deliver on your promise. Deliver on every marketing word you tell. Trust is a stimulant for loyalty.
• Allowing customers to be always ahead of you. Don’t wait for them to ask of a related service or product. Have all of them in your checklist. If you don’t have it, say you can always arrange for that.
•  Not rendering any extended value to the customer or target market. Customer will always want to know what is in for him; what extra benefits can he derive from patronizing you; why should he go for you instead of others?
• Not being dynamic: Being a step back of recent trends is dangerous. Always be in the future before your target market.
• Not empowering your team or treating them poorly. Yes, in return they will care less about the brand.
• Doing the ‘ME TOO’ thing. Stand out so your market can identify you.
• Thinking that branding will help you make up for bad quality service and product: Good Content + Branding = Great Brand.
• Treating customers as if they are ATMs or some sort of burden and disturbances. Understand that customers as human beings and try to connect with them on a personal level. They are the reason why you are still in the market, you are not doing them a favor.
• Customers not experiencing you: Brands are built and destroyed through experience, one customer at a time.
• Always giving reason why things go wrong.
• Delay in delivery time; never keep a customer waiting.
• Waiting to do marketing until you are ready to launch. Great brands commence branding long before they open their doors for customers.

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Nnadozie Egeonu is a Brand Analyst, who helps Small & medium Scale Entrepreneurs and start up businesses develop competitive brands, create alluring corporate images, and effectively project their products to their target markets. He blogs about Branding on www. brandigest.wordpress.com

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