Establishing a corporate or business identity is key for any brand to succeed.
How a company positions itself in the market not only resonates with its potential and existing customers, but also with investors, stakeholders, and others that have an impact on its business growth.
It’s a difficult thing to do but brands that can achieve this are known to see resounding success and huge business gains.
So, how do you position your brand to be a Nike, a McDonald's, or a Starbucks? A business whose brand identity is synonymous with recognition, trust, and its own offerings?
No worries, friend, we’re here to help.
Today’s blog is here to help you improve your corporate marketing game and guide you towards branding excellence! We’re bringing you 9 effective corporate marketing strategies designed to elevate your brand, captivate your audience, and establish a brand identity that sets you up for long-lasting success!
What is Corporate Marketing?
Corporate marketing, also known as B2B (business to business) marketing, is a specific type of marketing that focuses on promoting and building the brand image of a corporation or business entity.
So, unlike traditional marketing which might focus on promoting a specific product or service, corporate marketing’s objective is focused on promoting the entire brand itself as the product.
More of a big-picture idea, corporate marketing refers to all of the strategies and activities that are aimed at reaching other businesses, investors, stakeholders, and the broader market in order to achieve its goals.
Types of Corporate Marketing Systems
There are 4 types of corporate marketing systems that corporations use, and each offers unique approaches to achieving marketing goals.
They are as follows:
- Horizontal Marketing — Involves marketing products or services across different industries that share similar characteristics or customer bases. Example: A company producing office furniture and office supplies targeting businesses in various industries.
- Vertical Marketing — Focuses on a specific industry or market segment, providing a comprehensive range of products or services within that niche. Example: A company specializing in healthcare solutions, offering medical equipment, pharmaceuticals, and healthcare services.
- Hybrid Marketing — Combines elements of both horizontal and vertical marketing, allowing a company to diversify its product or service offerings while maintaining a specific industry focus. Example: A company in the technology sector offering software solutions (horizontal) and specializing in healthcare technology (vertical).
- Cooperative Marketing — Involves collaboration between two or more businesses to jointly market their products or services. Example: A partnership between a car manufacturer and a tire company to promote their products together in a bundled offering.
Effective Corporate Marketing Strategies to Elevate Your Brand
No matter what corporate marketing system your brand chooses to use, here are some winning marketing strategies to help you navigate the competitive landscape, effectively reach your target market, and elevate your brand!
1. Exceptional Customer Service
If you want your brand to have positive associations with your audience and draw in more potential customers, then exceptional customer service is an absolute must.
Customers want to know that they’ll be taken care of and that they can expect only positive experiences with your brand. Be sure that your team is trained and professional so that no matter what the encounter, they’re acting as a pleasant brand ambassador and providing that positive and memorable customer experience to each and every one of your customers.
Whether your customer is engaging you through social media, your website, over the phone, or whatever method you choose, be sure that when your customers reach out, you are prioritizing prompt and helpful responses to their inquiries and concerns.
You should also have dedicated platforms for your customers to leave you direct feedback. They'll be happy to let you know what they like and dislike, so use their feedback as an opportunity to continuously strive for improvement!
2. Define Your Brand Voice
Your brand voice and the way you speak to your audience is a golden opportunity to differentiate your brand from the rest of your competition.
Take a look at your target audience and create a brand voice that resonates with both them and your industry and effectively communicates your brand value and unique personality. Once you have your voice, be sure that it stays consistent through all brand communications and channels!
If you need some assistance coming up with an appropriate brand voice, hit up our brand guidelines service page! We’d love to help you find it.
3. Be Unique
And speaking of brand guidelines …
Your voice shouldn’t be the only thing unique about your brand. Take some time to identify the elements that set your brand apart from your competitors.
Do you have unique selling propositions?
A bold color palette or logo?
A very interesting brand story? A catchy slogan? Tech innovations that no one else in your industry is really using yet?
Whatever it is, lean on your individuality and innovate your products, services, or marketing approaches to stay distinctive and keep your brand top-of-mind for any potential customers.
4. Have a Social Media Presence
It’s 2024 and if your brand isn’t active on social media, then it’s time to get with the program!
If you don’t already have a presence, establish profiles on major social media platforms like Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, and X (Twitter) and regularly share engaging content like company and product/service updates, exciting visuals, relevant industry insights, and interactive tools like polls and quizzes to gather customer feedback.
Social media also gives you a great way to engage with your audience through your platform of choice’s comment features, messages, discussions, and more, as well as giving your followers a way to reshare and repost your content to reach a wider audience.
Be sure that you’re monitoring your social media analytics to assess how your strategies are doing and fine-tunetune accordingly to keep up with your customer’s trends and preferences!
5. SEO
Whatever product marketing strategies you’re choosing to use, the more visible your brand is online, the better chance of success you have.
Optimizing your website and content will improve your search engine rankings, making you more visible in Google searches and more likely that your potential customers will discover your brand when searching online for solutions to their pain points!
Here are some effective ways to improve your SEO:
- Use a tool like SEMrush or AHrefs to find trending and high-volume keywords and phrases related to your industry, products, and services. Choose keywords that you can realistically compete for.
- Optimize your website content with your keywords, including product and service descriptions, blogs, press releases, whitepapers, case studies, alt tags, and more.
- Use high-quality written and visual content that potential and existing customers will find value in. Search engines monitor how long an average user spends on your page, so valuable and useful content will result in longer visits as your users soak in the info and insights you have to offer!
- Build backlinks from reputable sources to improve your website’s authority. The more authority your site has, the higher it will rank.
- Regularly update and maintain your website content to align with SEO best practices.
- Use tools like Google Analytics to track your website performance and your overall SEO efforts. Fine-tune as needed!
6. Create a Lifestyle
The more your brand develops a certain lifestyle and culture around your messaging, products, and services, the more potential customers who fit the bill will come flocking to you (Stanley cups, anyone?)!
The trick is to build an emotional connection and sense of community with your audience.
Use storytelling to connect your products and services with your potential customers. Blog posts, testimonials, and visuals are great ways to build an emotional connection and encourage customer loyalty, as well as collaborating with influencers or other brand ambassadors who already embody the type of lifestyle you’re trying to convey.
Once you’ve got a narrative, run with it! Be consistent but also be sure that you continue watching your metrics to ensure that your vibe and culture are what your target audience is still looking for. Don’t be afraid to reinvent yourself as needed if you feel your audience is looking for something else! (Stanley cups, anyone?)
Pro Tip: Don’t be afraid to encourage your audience to send you user-generated content! UGC that aligns with your new vibe gives your community and its lifestyle an extra dose of realism and authenticity to draw in even more potential customers!
7. Alleviate Pain Points
Creating user personas is an excellent way to better understand your target audience and what solutions they’re looking for from your brand.
(If you need some assistance creating user personas, be sure to click there. We’d love to help you get started.)
User personas are extremely effective because they shed light on common challenges or issues that your target audience faces. This gives you the insights you need to tailor your products/services and messaging to directly address these pain points and position your brand as the ultimate solution to their needs!
Use your ads, messaging, blogs, and other content to highlight exactly how your brand provides the solutions your audience is looking for and is capable of making their lives easier and more enjoyable.
Remember that pain points are never set in stone. Be sure that you create platforms for customer feedback and monitor them closely to continuously refine and improve your brand’s offerings as your audience’s preferences evolve.
8. Content Marketing and Blogging
We’ve said it before; content is king.
In order to dominate the market and build up a positive brand reputation, you’ve got to develop a content marketing strategy that is not only consistent but offers real value to your audience.
Whether it’s through blog posts that offer insights, tips, and relevant information, custom infographics that break down complex concepts into easy-to-digest images, or engaging videos that showcase your products in the best light, the right content positions your brand as an authority and the ultimate source of information.
Blogging, in particular, is an extremely effective way to showcase your industry expertise through content like informative articles, how-to guides, and even thought pieces that establish you as not only an expert but a thought leader in your niche.
Create a content calendar and publish your valuable content on a consistent basis in the channels that work best for your target audience.
9. Specialized Advertising
In the world of digital marketing, your audience’s attention is a precious commodity.
This is why specialized advertising is an effective way to reach your target audience where they are and connect with them in a more personalized and nuanced way rather than a scattershot “one-size-fits-all” approach.
Use your user personas to identify specific platforms and channels where your target audience is most active.
Whether it’s Facebook, Reddit, your website, email, or any other platform your audience uses, be sure to craft targeted advertising campaigns tailored to that specific platform and your audience’s preferences.
Here are some ways to personalize your messaging and ads to better resonate and engage with your audience:
- Social Media Targeting — Use detailed audience targeting on platforms like Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and LinkedIn. Be sure to take advantage of demographic filters, interests, and behaviors to narrow down your audience.
- Search Engine Marketing (SEM) — Use targeted keywords relevant to your audience in your paid search campaigns and use location-based targeting to reach users searching for specific products or services in certain areas.
- Email Personalization — Segment your email list based on user behavior, preferences, or demographics and craft personalized email content that speaks directly to each segment.
- Native Advertising — Blend your ads seamlessly with the content of the platform, to provide a non-disruptive experience. Be sure that your native ads are tailored to match the visual and contextual style of the platform.
- Influencer Partnerships — Collaborate with influencers who align with your brand and have followers matching your target audience. Create authentic and tailored messages for influencers to share with their audience.
- Remarketing Campaigns — Target users who have previously interacted with your website or content and serve them up personalized ads to re-engage users and encourage them to complete desired actions.
- Platform-Specific Ad Formats — Customize your ad creatives based on the unique features and requirements of each platform. Explore carousel ads, story ads, and other format options offered by platforms.
- Location-Based Targeting — Use geotargeting to reach users in specific locations relevant to your business. Tailor messages based on the local context and preferences.
- Interactive Content — Create engaging and interactive ad content, such as polls, quizzes, or interactive videos. Encourage participation and boost audience engagement.
- A/B Testing — Experiment with variations of your ads to identify the most effective elements. Test out different headlines, visuals, and calls to action to optimize campaign performance and get the results you want.
Benefits of Effective Corporate Marketing
Mastering your corporate marketing strategies has many benefits for your brand.
Let’s take a look at some of those advantages now:
- Brand Building — Corporate marketing helps build and reinforce a company's brand image, creating a strong and recognizable identity in the market.
- Customer Engagement — Through various marketing channels, corporations can engage with their target audience, fostering relationships and understanding customer needs and preferences.
- Market Visibility — Effective marketing strategies increase a company's visibility in the market, ensuring that its products or services are known to the target audience.
- Competitive Advantage — Marketing allows companies to highlight their unique selling propositions and differentiate themselves from competitors, gaining a competitive edge.
- Revenue Generation — Successful marketing campaigns can drive sales and revenue by attracting new customers and encouraging repeat business from existing ones.
- Product Launch Success — Marketing plays a crucial role in the successful launch of new products or services, creating awareness and generating interest among potential customers.
- Global Reach — Through various marketing channels, corporations can extend their reach beyond local markets, tapping into regional, national, or even international audiences.
- Data-Driven Decision-Making — Marketing analytics provides valuable data and insights, enabling corporations to make informed decisions, optimize strategies, and measure the effectiveness of campaigns.
- Employee Morale — Strong corporate branding and positive public perception can contribute to high employee morale, as employees often feel proud to be associated with a well-regarded company.
- Long-Term Growth — Consistent and strategic corporate marketing lays the foundation for sustained growth, helping companies adapt to changing market dynamics and evolving customer behaviors and preferences.
- Community Impact — Corporate social responsibility initiatives, often part of marketing efforts, allow companies to make a positive impact on communities, contributing to a favorable public image.
<div class="c-blog_comp-cta cc-component-1"><div class="c-blog_comp-cta-left"><div class="c-blog_comp-cta-left-wrap"><img src="https://global-uploads.webflow.com/61cdf3c5e0b8155f19e0105b/6369722e59155470b6840033_Potential-clients.png" loading="lazy" alt="" class="c-blog_comp-cta-left-img"></div></div><div class="c-blog_comp-cta-right"><div class="c-blog_comp-content"><div class="c-text-wrapper cc-mb-32"><div class="c-title-4 cc-bold"><strong>Want to save money without sacrificing the quality?</strong></div></div><div class="c-text-wrapper"><div class="c-text-2">Say goodbye to traditional, expensive agencies and unreliable marketplaces. Say hello to Designity.<br></div></div></div><div class="c-blog_comp-wrapper"><a href="/pricing" target="_blank" class="c-button cc-primary cc-inverted w-button"><strong>Get Your 2-Week Trial</strong></a></div></div></div>
Ready to Boost Your Corporate Image in 2024?
If your corporate marketing team is ready and willing to start implementing the strategies listed above and start crushing its goals and building up a solid brand image in 2024, then we’re here for it!
And if you’re ready and willing, only you lack the manpower, creative talent, and the time to create the ads, blog posts, visuals, and design that will help you put these strategies in place …
Then we can still be here for you.
Why not partner with Designity?
Designity is made up of the top 3% of US-based creative talent, including all of the expert copywriters, graphic designers, social media experts, video production experts, and strategists you’ll need to create engaging content, get your corporate marketing campaign developed, and start reaching your goals.
And with a dedicated Creative Director to source and manage your talent, help you strategize and lay out your plans, and keep all of your projects organized and on schedule, you can get it all done more efficiently than you thought possible.
Sound like a partnership that’s too good to be true?
It’s not, we promise. Check out our portfolio to see if our style and services vibe with your brand, and when you’re ready, book a demo call.
Get started with your two-week, no-obligation trial and find out just how much Designity can help you reach your corporate goals.
We’re ready when you are.
