Your brand is your company’s most important asset. It’s more than just words on a page or images on a screen ⏤ it’s how you communicate with and attract your audience. From your logo to every customer interaction, it’s the identity of your organization.  

To stand out in a competitive market, consumers need to easily understand who your company is and what you provide. Brand consistency helps consumers feel confident in their decision to become a customer because they know exactly what to expect from you with every interaction.

So, how do you ensure a consistent experience that builds brand loyalty? Develop strong brand guidelines.

In about 15 years social media has gone from an entirely new concept to an integral part of everyday life. Now, any marketing mix that doesn’t include social media is unusual. With nearly 80% of Americans possessing a profile on a social networking platform, marketing through social media is one of the best ways to reach members of your target audience — no matter who they are. Plus, almost all prominent social platforms have paid advertising options that brands can leverage to increase exposure to relevant audiences. If you want to reach potential customers and key stakeholders, you need to be using social media.

But that doesn’t mean that social media marketing is easy, or even altogether straightforward! You and your team have probably struggled with how to create the right kind of content to engage the right people, and how to best measure success online. Don’t worry, you’re not alone — social media is a difficult and confusing tool for many marketing teams. A great step toward demystifying social media marketing is to streamline your social media workflow.

The work of a marketer is never done. In addition to tackling what’s already on your long to-do list, you’re constantly fielding new ideas to get more customers, faster. It’d be great if you could just hire more people, but that’s not always possible. And sometimes, it feels like even if you had 1,000 people on your marketing team, you could still find work for 1,001.

Intentional or not, your social media presence impacts your brand perception. Wendy's uses witty, well-crafted Tweets to support their brand image. Their Twitter bio reads, "We like our tweets the same way we like to make hamburgers: better than anyone expects from a fast food joint." On the other hand... a Facebook page that hasn’t been updated or monitored in five years also says a lot about a brand.

“Everything’s fast now and it’s totally unreasonable,” says comedian John Mulaney. “The world is run by computers. The world is run by robots. And sometimes they ask us if we’re a robot just because we’re trying to log in and look at our own stuff!”

Marketing teams face the opportunities (and temptations) of more channels, more content, and more technology. And thinking about how it all works together to deliver a consistent, effective customer experience can lead to more headaches.

This blog is a guest post from Chris Yuhasz, President of POV Solution, and a result of a collaboration with Widen.

Marketing is about delivering the right message, at the right time, to the right person. No matter what your business is, you can’t run a successful marketing campaign without creating high-quality marketing collateral first.

Which trends are marketing-driven organizations focused on? Inquiring minds want to know! If you said artificial intelligence, actionable data, customer experience, and building the right technology mix, you’re spot on. Connecting digital asset management (DAM) to these trends needs to be a priority for all marketing teams who want to maximize content value, create deeper emotional connections with their audiences, and improve the overall customer experience.

What is a brand? Let me illustrate with a brand I'm partial to: New Balance. I used to think of New Balance as the maker of all white, extra wide “Dad” shoes. Now, as the proud owner of a dozen different pairs, I think of New Balance as a hipster modern shoe that goes with my jeans and shorts. I can wear them to church or to walk five miles. I can wear them anywhere!

There’s a lot of talk these days about how important it is for brands to give their customers an omnichannel experience. And, it’s true. Your buyers demand more. They expect that no matter where or how they interact with your brand, that you’ll provide one, connected experience. They anticipate that as they move between both your online and offline channels that they’ll encounter the same seamless, on-brand experience across each and every touchpoint.