Building a brand for a new business on a small budget can be hard. With so much competition, so much noise, it can be difficult to stand out and get noticed.
That said, there are some simple, essential foundations that even the bigger companies require, which in addition to having a website, you'll need to focus on. Here's arguably the 5 main points to cover when trying to establish and build your brand on a small budget:
One of the most important and recognisable things about your company/brand is your logo. This should appear consistently in branding on your website, letterheads, business cards and more.
Your printed material and website content needs to be unique, well written and engaging. Don't just list a range of services you provide or products you sell. Be enthusiastic! Explain why you do what you do, and give people a reason to connect with you.
There's no escaping social media these days. It is a great way to connect with your customers on a personal level and break down the old style business of faceless companies. People like getting to know the person or team behind a brand. You can also use social media to run competitions, provide online support and request feedback.
This old-school approach of face-to-face networking still has value despite the increasingly online world of business. This is a great way of making new connections and gaining referrals through word of mouth. Just make sure you don't forget to take some business cards with you!
Okay so you have your fantastic logo, website and unique content, but what about your reputation? You need to inject personality and a positive attitude into your service. Ask customers to share their experiences with friends (over social media, word of mouth) and leave reviews on local listings and directories. Go that extra mile, making your excellent service one of your unique selling points. Don't just say it, do it!
We can assist you with almost any part of your business, such as:
To discuss your business, brand or next big project, get in touch with us today!
We have often found that many people try sending large file attachments via e-mail. The main problem with this is that e-mails often struggle with receiving files larger than roughly 5 or 6MB, which leads to high bandwidth usage that could potentially cause your website to exceed it's limit and go offline.
Why does exceeding bandwidth cause my website to go offline?
Each website on a server is assigned a limit of disk space and bandwidth. In order to maintain a high level of up-time service to all our clients, sites which exceed their limits are automatically put on hold in order to protect the other websites going down with it. Each site is given ample disk space and allowances, but if your website requires more on a regular basis, we can offer upgrades.
How do other companies offer unlimited hosting?
There are many low cost web hosting companies who claim to have "unlimited" web space and bandwidth. However, they often do have limits which are kept discreet under "fair usage" policies and other disclaimers. Their business model usually works by overselling space they have, assuming that their clients won't all be using the resources at the same time (similar to a Gym membership). The main disadvantage of this business model is that with the web, there often can be a huge influx of traffic (such as when a company chooses to run a promotion). This causes instability and often results in all of the websites going offline on a server, instead of one.
So how can I share large files with my customers online?
There are a few online services that specialise in online storage and sharing large files. Many of which offer free services with a limit of 500MB-2GB. We highly recommend using a service called DropBox. Their free service allows you to store and share files up to 2GB in total. Another service, called YouSendIt, allows you to upload files and send a link for your customers to visit and download.
If you have any questions, please post a comment below. Alternatively, if you would like to know more about our reliable web hosting services, please get in touch.
