How My 3 Year Old Taught Me About Brand Marketing
The other day I was running errands around town with my son.
For a snack, I drove through McDonald's to grab him some apple slices and tea
for myself. As we were at a stoplight, I hear him say "hey mommy, that's
from the apple juice!" I turned to see him pointing to the little happy
meal character on the front of the apple slices package. "He's silly on
T.V.! He sings and dances!" My son further connected the character to a
kids commercial where the happy meal boxes are singing a goofy song.
Now, why does this matter?
The brand consistency of McDonald's happy meal character was
so strong that my 3-year-old son could make the connection. He remembered
everywhere he saw that character and had remembered that the character was
silly and fun. This company successfully marketed to a preschooler. Luckily,
their message connected their healthy choices of apples, juice, and yogurt to a
fun, lovable character.
What is brand consistency?
Brand consistency is creating a unified image for your brand
throughout all of your promotional platforms. For large businesses such as
McDonald's, they can create brand consistency based on the different users of
their products, such as children and adults. However, as a blogger or small
business owner, it is best to start with a blanket message and image.
Large companies have a vast amount of promotional platforms
at their disposal and have the ability to target better their users. To reach
children, McDonald's uses commercials on children's T.V. channels and images on
their products. For adults, they can use coupons in the newspaper, billboards,
and radio commercials. Small businesses and bloggers don't have the funds to
use these traditional marketing methods. Therefore, it is best to start with a
message and image for your primary target reader/buyer. Once this brand
consistency is established, you can experiment with further segmenting your
audience and creating different messages targeted to different users.
Take-away
Create a brand that encompasses a feeling and message that
you want your audience to remember and reference. Brand consistency is crucial
so keep that message throughout all of your promotional platforms. If brand
consistency works on a preschooler, it will work with your readers and buyers.
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