How to Build a Stronger Brand By Understanding Generations

One of the essential elements to building a strong brand for your business is to understand the unique characteristics of your ideal client. In order to truly understand what your ideal clients value and what their concerns are, you must conduct some in-depth research into what they like, what they look for in a brand, how they make buying decisions, and much more. Understanding the different generations, how they think and what concerns them is a great place to start. It can help you find creative ways to communicate with your ideal clients on a personal and emotional level.

When you know the attributes of your ideal clients, you are better able to find them, reach out to them on their level, and provide them with quality services and desirable products.

The following provides you with a start to understanding the different generations:

Generation Baby Boomer
Baby boomers were born approximately between 1946 and 1964. This is a generation of hard workers and they believe that hard work pays off. Baby boomers lived through the women’s rights and civil rights movements, and they were determined to live the “American Dream.” They have a different mentality than generation X and generation Y, which at times frustrates them because baby boomers think differently and have had more years lived and lessons learned. Because baby boomers received much of their identity from praise and most of the praise came from work, it is important for them to be acknowledged for their hard work and where they are today.

Generation X
Generation Xers were born approximately between 1965 and 1978. They saw all of the mistakes that the baby boomers made and they are determined to fix them and not make the same mistakes. They are the generation known as the latchkey kids; they were left home alone to take care of themselves because both of their parents (or their single parent) were forced to work and make money for the family. They contemplate family life wisely and with caution due to growing up in a society of high divorce rates. They desire a healthy balance of work and life.

Generation Y
Generation Yers were born approximately between 1979 and 2001. These are the children of the young baby boomers. This generation behaves much more grown up at their young age than previous generations. They are often thought of as the generation with high self esteem with no experience to back it up. With guidance, this generation has the potential to make a powerful and positive impact on the world. They believe in giving and finding better ways to live one’s life.

As you can see, each generation thinks and values things differently. By understanding how your ideal clients think, feel, and what they value will make a significant difference when it comes to building and developing your brand.



Copyright 2009 Lisa Hromada lhcreativeidstudio.com - All Rights Reserved

The Power of Balance in Work, Life, and Design

Balance in Work and Life

For most women entrepreneurs, juggling the demands of career, family and personal life is their number one challenge. Often feelings of overwhelm arise when trying to strike a balance. To avoid these feelings, it is best to prioritize the activities that are the most important to you.

Here are some ideas and methods that have helped me and can help you find balance:

1. Keep a log. In an effort to avoid overwhelm, I began to track everything I do for one week, both work-related and family-related. I then decided what is necessary and what I can eliminate to have more time for more things that satisfy me.
   
2. Separate work time from personal time. Though it may not always be easy in today’s technologically driven community, turn off your work-related cell phone and any other devices when you make time to spend with your family, yourself, or your friends. Give yourself (and others) a break from being obligated to immediately respond on your ‘off-hours.’ 
   

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Balance in Design

Having balance in life makes us feel good. It is the same for design. When designers incorporate different elements on a page in evenly balanced layouts, it makes the viewer feel more comfortable, at ease, and less confused. All designs have specific basic elements to convey a certain message beyond the individual words and graphics that are placed on the page. How these elements are placed on the page determines how our eye moves around the page as well as how immediately we get and understand the intended message.

Balance in design works throughout all kinds of brand materials:

Logos

Business cards

Letterhead

Advertisements

Fact Sheets

Brochures

Books

Newsletters

Press Releases

Websites

and more...

First, What is Balance in Design?

Visual balance comes from arranging elements on a page with the purpose of not having any one section of the page be too heavy visually. At times, designers intentionally place elements on a page to create a visual imbalance to express a certain mood or emotion.

Basic principles of balance in design encompass 4 main principles:

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Copyright 2009 - Lisa Hromada - ID Studio - All Rights Reserved

3 Simple Steps to Create A Total Brand Experience

Branding is not just about creating a logo or using the same colors on your marketing materials; branding also includes the experience that your clients and the public have with your brand. Create a total brand experience inside and out. Keep in mind that you are not just marketing a product or service, but also the experience of using the product and doing business with you. From the way that you decorate your store or office to how you present your products and services, creating a brand experience that appeals and tickles the senses can have a powerful impact on your clients and it can be a determining factor in whether they choose to buy from or do business with you.

A total brand experience is increasingly important to developing an emotional connection with your ideal audience. The ways in which you connect emotionally to your audience is by relating the benefits of your business to the ‘quality of life’ concepts important to people. Stress relief and convenience are two good ones that come to mind though there can be many others of benefit to your specific audience. A total brand experience is one that engages all five senses; this can greatly affect your clients’ overall acceptance of your products and services as well as get them talking about it.

People tend to remember things better when more of their senses are engaged when experiencing something. When creating a new product or decorating your office or store, set a goal to create a user experience that will engage your visitors in new and creative ways. You can use words, visuals, sounds and smells to stimulate the client’s overall experiences and imagination. When a potential client is not able to experience your products first-hand—let’s say when you are selling a product on your website—you must be able to use words to stimulate the viewers senses and allow them to imagine the experience of using your products and in what ways that they can benefit from using your products. Words can be powerful tools when advertising and marketing your business. Finding the ‘right’ words can allow the client to subconsciously taste, smell, touch, see, and hear a product just the way you want them to, as if they were actually experiencing that product first-hand.

A total brand experience begins with taking action! So, here are three steps to take to begin creating a total brand experience:

1. Step One: Take out a piece of paper and write down these categories: smell, taste, touch, sound, and sight.

2. Step Two: Choose a product or service that you want to advertise.

3. Step Three: For each one of the categories, write down what the user experience might be like when using your product or doing business with you. Take one sense at a time. Tip: Be creative! Just because your service may be cleaning bathrooms, doesn’t mean that you can’t provide a more creative ‘sensory experience’ in describing your services. After you have cleaned someone’s bathroom, what is the result? For example, “After Mary’s Cleaning Service is finished with the job, you’ll feel like you’re frolicking through fields of daffodils each time you flush the toilet.” Immediately upon hearing this description, I picture a huge field of flowers. I can imagine smelling the freshness of the flowers and imagine how they might feel against my legs as I frolicked through them. I may even imagine hearing them rustle as I make my way through the field. This is a much more pleasant and rich experience than just talking about the features of Mary’s Cleaning Service services. Good luck and have fun.

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Copyright 2009 Lisa Hromada lhcreativeidstudio.com - All Rights Reserved