Establishing a brand touchpoint is an integral part of creating a brand that thrives. It is used in marketing and promotion to make sure that a company’s target market has the best experience with the brand.
Whether you’re the head of the marketing department or the boss of the company, this article can help you learn what a brand touch point is and how you can choose the best one for your brand strategy.
What is a brand touchpoint?
A brand touchpoint is a moment where a potential customer is exposed to a particular brand. Also known as a “brand encounter,” it can come in the form of places, things, situations, or people that facilitate contact between the brand and your target market. Touchpoints can also connect people to your brand, either physically or intangibly.
For example, if you’re running a cruise line brand, an effective touchpoint you can use to reach out to people looking for a romantic partner is a singles’ cruise. For an art supply shop, sponsoring artists’ guild and art shows or conducting an art class with the help of a prominent artist are valuable touchpoints for your brand.
In essence, a touchpoint is a means of reaching out to your ideal customers through things as tangible as product packaging or as abstract as social conversations. When defining your brand’s touchpoint, you have to consider two things:
Your brand’s unique selling position (USP)
This is a marketing strategy that defines what unique propositions you can offer customers to persuade them to switch to your brand. It is a characteristic of your brand that describes the overlap of what you can do well, what your customers want, and what makes you different from competitors.
Characteristics and habits of your target audience
This describes the demographics of your target market, including their age, gender, race, location, and income. It also covers specific aspects of their lifestyle, such as employment status, mobility, hobbies, and preferences.
How to Choose Your Brand Touchpoints: 4 Expert Tips
Most businesses think that the only way to succeed in any industry is to improve customer purchase experience, but that only comprises a portion of what is needed.
The truth is, before you can make sure that they get the best purchase experience, you’ll need to use the best method to reach out to them first. On top of that, you also need to make sure that they are satisfied even after the purchase through after-sales.
This is where brand touchpoints come in. When cleverly placed and used in your branding strategy, touchpoints can ensure that customers have a worthwhile encounter during their entire ride down the conversion funnel. This is why you must select brand touchpoints that are best suited for your target market and your company goals.
Not sure how? Here are four tips from our experts at Yellow Branding that can help you do just that:
1. Determine all existing touchpoints
Companies can establish multiple touchpoints at a time, be it in the form of communication programs, public relations efforts, sponsorships, and customer-centered programs. They can also be external, run by third-parties, or controlled by retailers.
Below are some examples of modes of interaction a company can have with their customers:
- Word of mouth
- Peer observation and reviews
- Media (i.e., newspaper, television, radio)
- Online reviews
- Websites
- Marketing, point of sale, and thank you cards
2. Evaluate which touchpoints work and which ones don’t
After listing down your brand’s touchpoints, it is time to evaluate their value. This can be done through data analysis, following each step of the process beginning from the first point of contact to conversion and aftersales.
Here are some questions to guide you through this:
- What departments or units in your organization handle each touchpoint?
- What touchpoints have the most overwhelming presence?
- What touchpoints effectively advance clients through the sales funnel based on efficiency?
You can also conduct a survey to determine how well your touchpoint experiences are in terms of the competition, internal expectations, and external expectations. As much as possible, get your customers to answer the survey in their own words. This can help you appraise how effective your touchpoints are and identify what caused them to act and be loyal patrons of your brand.
Remember: Avoid leading their answers in your favor. Otherwise, you’ll just be faking the result of your analysis, rendering it useless for your brand marketing strategy.
3. Explore potentially efficient touchpoints
Aside from your existing touchpoints, you also need to open your mind to potentially efficient ones that are either readily available but unused or have yet to be explored by your company.
Essentially, what you need to create is a “customer journey map.” But instead of focusing only on the current experiences your target market gets from your company, expand into something broader. This should include points of contact that are available even if these aren’t presently in use.
Start with the pre-purchase experience like marketing and promotion. Then list down all the purchase experiences or point-of-sale until you reach post-purchase.
Don’t limit yourself to traditional touchpoints as newer innovations, like search engines, social media, email, and mobile, all have excellent potential in customer outreach. It would also do you more good to become an early adopter of new strategies. At the very least, try those that you believe present great promise in improving customer experience.
There’s just one caveat: Avoid following trends only for the sake of being trendy – it should still be based on what you think will work best for your target market.
4. Identify a goal for every touchpoint
Whether you decide to send out brand messaging through advertising or improving customer care, you must set a specific goal for each touchpoint. Then, gather all the data that proves how effective each of it is as aligned to that goal and make sure that all parties involved are accountable for the process.
From Advertising to After-sales
Brand touchpoints serve as a way for a company to establish a positive relationship with customers. Make sure your brand stands a chance amidst the competition by amping your touchpoints with this useful guide.
When in doubt, seek help from our branding professionals at Yellow Branding. Just send us a message so we can help.
