What is Manufacturers Branding & How To Do It Right?

Do you want a Hermes bag, an iPhone, or a dress from Chanel?

Of course, the majority of people will say YES. Even some people dream of them every day and are willing to spend a huge amount of money (beyond their financial limit) to possess a product from luxury brands.

Why is it?

Besides the design and quality, a critical reason for this lies in the brand of the products: they are all successful in marketing their brands and have top statuses in the market. It helps them be familiar with the customers and get a great impression on their minds.

This is what merchants can gain when branding their manufacturers. According to Invesprco, the number of people who prefer to buy products from the familiar brands is approximately 59%. Therefore, if you conduct manufacturer branding successfully, there will be more people willing to buy from you.

This post will explore the concept of manufacturer branding, its advantages, and some tips to implement it effectively.

What is branding for manufacturers?

As we know, a brand is not just the company’s name; it is the term that contains everything attached with the brand or the point of view and experiences that customers have about the brand. Creating and developing a brand is not easy; there are a variety of things included in a successful brand. Entrepreneurs have to make their image in the customer’s mind. The clearer it is, the more likely they will think about them whenever shopping.

Branding for manufacturers is crucial, especially with enterprises selling products or services to their final customers with no intermediary. With these enterprises, the brands will play a vital role in the customer’s decision whether to select their products or not. So, manufacturer branding can be understood as all the efforts that a manufacturer puts in developing its brand’s values in the market.

With these four following tips, any merchants can figure out their business’ manufacturer branding.

• Have a clear understanding of your enterprise: Actually, this step is not as hard as people often think. Merchants tend to forget them when they are occupied with all the tasks they encounter every day. There is no need for complicated surveys or analysis, what you need to do is to ask yourself about the benefits that you can bring to your customers, the special points that make you outstanding in the market (or bring your customers back), and the biggest advantage your customers will gain from you. Answer all these questions; you will immediately have a deep understanding of your business. More than that, you can find out some fascinating facts that were ignored before.

• Understand fully about your business: It is not just listing out all the things your customer will receive when purchasing your products or services. Not many people are eager to read a long list of features of products and services. Moreover, some of the features, unfortunately, are unrelated to customers’ concerns. Therefore, your mission is to be aware of your products’ key points and make sure that it is sent to customers instantly To do that, you can think about the action that frequently be done without serving the core of your business, the common concern among customers, as well as the biggest values of your goods.

• Introduce a tagline: Compared to other methods, tagline is regarded as the simplest way to introduce and impress customers what you offer. An impressive tagline will help your customers remember your company in seconds. However, keep in mind that your tagline should be about how others think about you, not how you evaluate yourself.

• Pay attention to the visual side: Brand’s design is an important part of an enterprise since it can catch the attention of everyone, whether they are literal or not. Furthermore, it is also the first impression to people.Thus, selecting the elements like colors, fonts, layouts carefully and you will have a great brand’s design. However, it should be put near the end.

Examples of manufacturers branding

An outstanding case of manufacturers branding that we would like to introduce to you is Intel a multinational corporation and technology company based in the Sillicon Valley of the United States.

From the beginning to the present, Itel always works as an original equipment manufacturer (OEM) manufacturer that produces chips for computers and sells them to other manufacturers as a separate product from the beginning to the present. In the 80s, when computers were shown in public, people already used Intel’s chips and installed them as part of them. Consequently, it is not easy to build up brands for Intel.

Nevertheless, hard doesn’t mean impossible. Despite the fact that Intel sells products as a part of other products, it still gains a stable status in the market and becomes outstanding among thousands of products from its competitors. Nowadays, it can be easily identified, and almost all people acknowledge Intel and know its famous products.

Also, this case is not rare in the market, particularly with technology and eCommerce development. Manufacturer branding tends to be much more popular among the enterprise which produces products. Nowadays, manufacturers are aware of the importance of brands and start to brand their businesses. With their brands, they can sell the products at higher prices and directly sell them to their final customers.

Benefits of branding to the manufacturer and customers

Increase customer’s awareness

Of course, it is the first thing you will get with a strong brand. If you dream of a high status in the industry, a well-known brand is an inevitable element.

So, what is a strong or well-known brand? Let’s answer the following questions!

What is the first name that comes to your mind when thinking about luxury handbags? Toothpaste? Mobile phone? Or watches? Now, you know what is a strong brand, right?

This is exactly the power of brands: if it is strong enough, people will remember it first when thinking about the products they sell. By trusting your brand, people will be more likely to purchase your merchandise. More than that, your new launched items are also much easier to be accepted and used.

Create emotional connection with customers

With the development and competitiveness of the market, any brand of manufacturers nowadays is not just a kind of highlighting the visual of the enterprise to customers. It has to be a story to touch the targeted’s mind.

The reason for it is that the story or the message can connect manufacturers with customers, which create a stronger link between each other. By doing that, your customers will consider your business in a much more humanized manner, increasing the likelihood of purchasing your products.

More than that, the world nowadays has changed instantly, thousands of products are manufactured which can be cheaper and more beautiful to live up to the rapid speed of life. As a result, the connection in terms of feelings will maintain the product’s heat and status in customers’ minds. If there is no emotional link with customers, your products will easily be forgotten and become out of date

Maintain customers’ loyalty

It can’t be denied that loyalty plays a vital role in business. And, with the help of manufacturer branding, business can build up an emotional connection with customers as mentioned above. This is an ideal premise for maintaining customer loyalty.

The market is changeable day by day. Each day, a large range of products are produced and launched, and as normal, the new ones are modified to be better: lower price, prettier package, higher quality, and more. So, the allegiance of customers can partly assure the profits of the enterprise.

Not many people are willing to try out every new launched product. Consequently, if a product is their favourite option, they will immediately choose it which is a great advantage for a brand. Your customer will continue enjoying the product and you will continue earning profits.

Increase distribution capacity

When branding manufacturers, merchants will possess more means to connect with their customers and sell products to them. You will have more channels to get closer to them. However, ensure that the channels you select will be suitable for your targets.

With a famous brand, it is obvious that the distribution capacity also increases significantly. Distribution here doesn’t mean that you actually distribute goods to other partners or customers; it refers to the channels you can use to support your business. It will draw your customers’ attention much easier, and with a business, a popular channel will be an ideal way to introduce and advertise your merchandise.

Owning multiple well-known channels means that the cost spent on marketing will be cut. Instead, manufacturers can make use of these budgets for other necessary activities. Particularly when there is a newly launched product, these channels are perfect places to reach potential customers. Thanks to the existing fans on them, it will not take a long time to do marketing for this new merchandise.

By having multiple channels to sell products, it is likely that more people will be aware of your brand. The more people know about your enterprise, the more sales will be generated. More than that, regardless of volume of goods, the cost for transports often remains the same, so with a higher number of sales, merchants will get more money, but the cost is unchanged. And, of course, there will be an increase in revenue.

What’s more, a recognizable brand can attract other firms’ attention and bring entrepreneurs opportunities to cooperate with them. This, in fact, is a potential chance for them to consider the likelihood of expanding their business size.

Sell at higher price

As can be seen, products with well-known brands will be sold more expensive than the one with no name. This is also one of the advantages people will gain when branding manufacturers.

When comparing the same product from two different brands: one is a famous manufacturer, and the other is a private brand. While the recognizable business sells products at a higher price, the private offers customers similar products (with a slight decrease in quality) to the recognizable one.

However, it is not surprising that there are various people willing to purchase the one from the famous one. The reason for this is the trust and faith that the business has built-in customers’ minds. Its quality has already been demonstrated with plenty of its clients. Therefore, price is not a problem for them.

In reality, with the same product, different manufacturers will offer different prices. The root for this case is that each type of product all has its range of price, and all manufacturers set their price based on this range. With greater brand value or higher status on the market, manufacturers can find it simpler to increase their product’s price, which seems to be difficult for normal brands since they can lose customers.

And, thanks to a famous brand, it is completely possible for manufacturers to sell all their products at a high price. Apple is an example for this situation: although it sells similar products to other manufacturers, its price is usually the highest one in the market. This all comes from the fame and attention the company gets from the public.

How to conduct a manufacturer branding?

Generate helpful content

When providing customers with valuable content, a business can create a good impression on their mind, affecting the way they look at their brand later. When they find your content helpful, you will gain their trust with ease. Therefore, your products will also be prioritized when they are considering purchasing a product.

It is not too hard to create helpful content, which is necessary to dig deep into customers’ minds and find out their concerns. You can freely select the form of content for customers, which can be tips, guides, reviews, eBooks, tutorials, videos, and so on.

Build up a community for your business

The development of technology has faded the barrier between final customers and manufacturers. Nowadays, customers tend to purchase products directly from the producers due to the lower price and faster restock process. With several clicks on smart devices, they can get for themselves a product shipped directly from manufacturers.

As a result, creating a community for customers on social media will shorten the distance between producers and customers. It also helps people understand more about the products, use products, and handle their issues more efficiently. Besides, merchants are trying to be active, helpful, and humorous: answer customers’ queries quickly and generate interesting topics to engage more and more people with the community.

Highlight your special features

Ask yourself about the ability that you can do but others cannot. It is exactly what should be included in your marketing materials. By emphasizing on it, you can differentiate your enterprise from others and become more outstanding in the market.

But, how to know your uniqueness, the easiest way is to look at all the features available for your clients and then compare to your competitors, it will reveal the answer. Also, merchants are advised to seek for companies or individual customers who are looking for products with this features, they are your targeted customers.

There are various ways to show people’s unique features: People can tell about their journey from the beginning to the present, how they manufacture the products and the reason you choose it. Besides, keep in mind that emotion is a perfect means to connect you and your customers in the story.

Otherwise, they can concentrate on the merchandise: thoroughly explain its features, functions, and how to use it. From this information and figures, readers will have a deep understanding of your products and know when it is suitable to use them. Moreover, try to show that you are a leader in your industry, helping you build up trust in customers’ minds.

Pay attention to your business’ visual

Not only content but also the visual of your business should be paid more attention to if you want to implement manufacturer branding. Concentrating on such issues as logo, web design, graphics, typeface, color scheme, etc., to guarantee that they are all designed suitable for your strategy and work together in harmony.

However, this process requires a long journey; it is impossible to design all the elements in just a couple of days. There are multiple things that designers and merchants have to work together to choose the suitable ones, which can be named as logo, font, color scheme, and even your company’s tagline. These are not simple since unless you are careful, another company or even your competitors will be the name coming to people’s minds when seeing them.

It is normal that sometimes your business’ presence, particularly the logo, is unable to indicate your company or reflect it incorrectly. Don’t hesitate; it’s time to change your company’s image with a new and suitable one. It is not cheap to be able to conduct; entrepreneurs have to spend much time and money. Yet, you will realize that they all are worth it when you see them in the long run.

Expand targeted audience

To generate a well-known brand, manufacturers are required to do marketing proactively. It includes a beautiful presence, unique features, interesting and helpful content, and a large targeted audience. Instead of a group of customers, fans, and advocates, making valuable content for the public is a great idea.

The more people are reached, the higher number of sales will be. When your target audience is everyone, you clearly increase the number of potential customers and successful transactions. To do this, marketers always have to keep in mind that their readers can be anyone, so try to send them as simple content as possible. These content can be anything, from blogs, articles to testimonials or case studies, which are used for the sole purpose: highlighting the company’s main concern. Therefore, when your reader turns to prospects, they will immediately know where to find reliable information and what they are likely to acquire with your products

Concentrate on niche market

In contrast, to generate content for the public, another tip for manufacturers is to concentrate on a niche market. So, why is it?

Although nurturing the public at large can bring merchants higher rates to increase benefits from its huge audience, this advice cannot work well in every situation. Focusing on a niche segment means that you will have fewer competitors. This leads to higher rates to stand out and become the leader in the industry.

It seems like that on a niche market; targeted customers will decrease considerably. If you have the right strategy, your products can rank first in the list of similar products of your segment.

A simple way to conduct this tip is to look at your customer list recently. In case they all or the majority of them belong to the same business category, this category is exactly the segment you are advised to focus on. Yet, avoid using similar measures with all companies since each has its characteristics, and each field requires different ways to approach customers. Therefore, merchants must customize the strategy to be suited to their own business and targeted customers.

Care for all channels connecting with customers

In order to succeed in manufacturer branding, it is suggested that merchants communicate with their customers in all viable channels. By appearing in customers’ eyes frequently, your business will be easier recognized. Of course, this means that you will take responsibility for managing more channels, which increases the workload: different channels need different measures to approach audiences.

Before starting to do this, you should create a survey among the employees; the answer will surprise you. Perhaps the places you never think about is the one that your employees consider as a difficult challenge. Some of them can be named the way to message and respond to customers to support them, contract and problems relating to it, the structure of phone tree and recordings, frequent boilerplate in directories, at trade shows, etc.

It is not regarded as a problem in people’s minds since there is no strict rule but staff, especially the new one, will be delighted to be instructed carefully about the company’s messages. Besides that, merchants have to combine multiple marketing activities to get a clear brand; they can exploit search engine optimization, message marketing, email marketing, talk show, and so on.

Establish credibility

Manufacturer branding is not a strange concept in business but the fact indicates that not many enterprises can be successful. Why is it?

One of the most popular reasons for this is credibility; the business cannot get the trust of customers. No one can like a brand that provides products or services that don’t live up to what they advertise. More than that, people easily confuse the business by conducting unsuitable strategies for their core mission or history.

As a result, to become a strong brand, merchants need to build up a strategy with three main features: credible, constant, and consistent. Looking at your own business and evaluating whether it possesses all these characteristics.

Credible means that your claims have to be true, don’t tell lies to your customers since you will lose more things than acquiring. If it is viable, you can provide your audience with reliable evidence and statistics. They are stable proof to prove your claims as well as increase your credibility.

With constant, it indicates that your brand should appear in every part of your marketing strategy. In this competitive market, a short marketing campaign is unable to attract customers attention, not to mention building credibility in their mind. Therefore, a long-term marketing strategy is necessary to get a strong brand.

Consistent refers that your customers have to be served as what you promise or advertise. Moreover, their experiences in every store have to be the same. Customer evaluation comes from the smallest thing. Perhaps your service is not the best but there should be no differences in the way of nurturing customers, which present your profession.

In case your company is qualified with all these criteria, there is no reason for you to deny carrying out manufacturer branding. Otherwise, it’s time to make some changes in your business or seek for another strategy which is more appropriate.

Introduce your brand on your website

What do you often do when wanting to learn about a business?

The most common way is to search for it on Google. In a couple of seconds, there will be many results displayed on the screen, including your website. It is pretty hard to change information on other sites to match your goals, but it is perfectly feasible to showcase your brand according to your desire on your site.

You understand your business more than anyone so that you can use your knowledge to provide readers necessary information about your business, which can help them have a clearer understanding of your enterprise. Any posts written by a third party are based partially on your site’s data, so be careful with what is displayed and forget to put your tagline at the top of your site.

What’s more, your content on your website can show your goals, which allows prospects to know whether you can meet their demand or not.

Final words

In short, it is evident that manufacturer branding is an effective and innovative approach to do marketing. Instead of concentrating on products, merchants will create strategies to improve their own brands’ image in the public’s eyes.