Brand Building vs. Performance Marketing
As a business owner, you may have heard the terms "brand building" and "performance marketing" thrown around in marketing circles. While both strategies are important for achieving marketing success, they serve different purposes and require different approaches. In this post, we'll explain the difference between brand building and performance marketing and why hiring a consultant like the Felice Agency is important for businesses.
In a recent article in the Harvard Business Review, authors Jim Stengel, Cait Lamberton and Ken Favaro discuss the power of brand building and performance marketing working together. Marketers often worry that performance marketing and its focus on short term sales is crowding out brand-building activities aimed at enhancing customer perceptions of their brand and is sometimes working against brand strategy. One CEO of a giant B2C/B2B tech company stated: "We are great at performance marketing but our brand sucks."
What is Brand Building?
Even before the internet pushed the boundaries of performance marketing, there was tension between granular advertising that touted functional features of a product and more abstract marketing activities that sought to appeal to consumer's identities. For example, offering cars as an expression of lifestyle rather than a transportation choice driven by specifications and mileage.
Brand building is the process of creating a strong, recognizable brand identity that resonates with your target audience in the places where that audience lives, works and plays. It involves developing a brand strategy that defines your brand's values, personality, and messaging, and creating visual elements such as a logo and color palette that represent your brand. Brand building is focused on creating a lasting impression in the minds of your target audience and establishing a strong emotional connection with them. A key ROI measurement is often taken for granted in brand-building and that is how a strong brand, with emotional ties, can potentially insulate the company from harm, criticism or mistakes. However, if one's sole focus is driving short term sales and not establishing a long history of an emotional connection with the customer, no performance marketing will help in times of crisis, downturns, or unexpected challenges. Think of it as building equity of "good will" that you can draw upon in times of trouble. Conversely, no coupons or calls to action may help a company survive in such situations. Yet clearly, this kind of ROI is not often taken into consideration, especially in boardrooms where the focus is often on marketing as an expense rather than marketing as an investment.
The goal of brand building is to create a strong brand identity that sets you apart from your competitors and establishes your business as a trusted, credible authority in your industry. It's a long-term strategy that requires ongoing effort and investment to maintain and grow.
What is Performance Marketing?
Performance marketing is the process of driving targeted traffic and conversions through measurable, data-driven tactics such as search engine marketing (SEM), pay-per-click (PPC) advertising, and social media advertising. Performance marketing is focused on achieving specific, measurable goals such as increasing website traffic, generating leads, and driving sales.
The goal of performance marketing is to deliver tangible, measurable results that directly impact your business's bottom line. It's a short-term strategy that requires careful planning and execution to maximize your return on investment (ROI).
Why Hiring a Consultant is Important
Both brand building and performance marketing are important for achieving marketing success, but they require different skill sets and approaches. Hiring a consultant like FeliceAgency.com can help ensure that you have the expertise and resources you need to succeed in both areas.
A consultant like the Felice Agency can help you develop a comprehensive brand strategy that defines your brand's values, personality, and messaging, and creates visual elements that represent your brand. They can also help you develop a content marketing strategy that aligns with your brand and resonates with your target audience.
In addition, a consultant like the Felice Agency can help you develop and execute a performance marketing strategy that drives targeted traffic and conversions to your website. We can help you identify the most effective channels and tactics for reaching your target audience, and optimize your campaigns for maximum ROI.
Overall, hiring a consultant like the Felice Agency can help you achieve marketing success by providing the expertise and resources you need to succeed in both brand building and performance marketing. With their help, you can establish a strong, recognizable brand identity that resonates with your target audience, and drive targeted traffic and conversions that directly impact your business's bottom line.