As app marketers look to the future, one of the most important aspects of success for their app’s growth is developing effective branding strategies. As we drive head-on into 2023, this becomes ever more true as the landscape continues to become especially competitive. To make sure your app stands out and remains competitive, you must have a clear branding plan. This is AppSamurai’s 2023 guide to growing your app’s brand which will see its growth soar to new heights.
What does an App Brand Mean?
An app brand is a name, logo, and other elements that represent an app or mobile product. This includes the way the app looks, the way it functions, and the experience it provides. It also includes the messaging used to describe the product and the tone used to communicate with customers. Creating a brand identity for your app is a surefire way to improve the awareness, recollection and recognition of your app amongst users and a powerful tool in any marketer’s arsenal.
Key Tips for Creating your App Brand Strategy
Branding your app is more than just coming up with a clever logo and catchy tagline. It’s about creating an image and identity that will resonate with your target audience. Here are some key things to consider when creating your branding strategy for 2023.
Understand Your Target Audience
You need to know who your target audience is and what they’re looking for in an app. Do some research to get a better understanding of their needs and preferences. This will help you create a brand that resonates with them; a brand identity can NOT be created without taking your target audience’s values into consideration, otherwise, your brand strategy is bound to fail as your users will not resonate with it.
Define Your App Brand Identity
Once you have identified your target audience, you need to create a brand identity that speaks to them. This includes defining your brand’s values, mission, and aesthetic. Your brand identity should be unique, memorable, and easily recognizable. Consider the values, beliefs and needs of your target audience to tailor your brand such that you can communicate clearly to it.
Establish Your Brand Voice
A brand voice represents the tone and style used in all communications from the app to its intended users. It is based on the app brand’s personality and typically includes elements such as language, tonality, and style. The brand voice helps to create a consistent image and message across all platforms, which can help you to build trust and loyalty amongst your target users.
Develop a Comprehensive Marketing Plan
You need to create a comprehensive marketing plan that outlines how you’ll promote your app. This should include digital marketing tactics like performance-based user acquisition creatives, content marketing, ASO, and influencer marketing, as well as traditional marketing methods like physical billboards and print ads.
Focus on User Experience
The user experience should be at the core of your app’s branding strategy. This differentiates app branding strategies from contemporary branding strategies. Given that user experience is pivotal to the survival and growth of an app, it is of paramount importance that your app is easy to use, addresses your users’ needs and provides a pleasant experience. An app with a bad UX/UI will create negative impressions which can damage your brand identity and relationship with your target audience.
Primary Elements to Create an App Brand Identity
Primary elements are the building blocks of an app’s brand. They help build particular styles and themes, which then go on to create the aesthetic element of the brand which helps users understand your brand identity. The primary elements of your app include colors, shapes, typefaces, sounds (background music, jingles and/or voiceovers), and textures. These elements include your app’s layout, in-app content, icon as well as marketing materials.
Colors
Colors can help to identify your app based on the different hue or shading combinations you use, and can also help create app sub-categories. The Deliveroo app in the UK uses a light green colored platform for its standard users and a velvet colored background (and app icon) for its premium users (users that buy the Deliveroo Plus subscription service).
Shapes
Shapes are excellent at creating a global identity for your app because they transcend written language. It is worth incorporating shapes in your app especially if you are attempting a global strategy. Different dimensions can have different associations amongst your users. On Android devices, app launcher icons are generally 96×96, 72×72, 48×48, or 36×36 pixels (depending on the device), however Android recommends your starting artboard size should be 864×864 pixels to allow for easier tweaking.
Typefaces
A typeface is composed of shape, color & material, and adds representational qualities directly to words which already convey meaning through content. Consider the fonts, sizes and combinations of different designs for your typography based on the associations you wish to create. Capital letters represent a strong daring stance, for instance.
Sounds
Sounds are especially powerful in aiding in brand recognition and recollection. Consider the native notification sounds of different apps like Snapchat, and Facebook (Messenger) as well as OEM’s notification sounds (Samsung, iPhone, etc.); they are easily distinguishable from one another. If your app can design a catchy audio tonality, it will improve its recognition amongst users.
Textures
While not tangible, you can design digital textures to provide a certain sense of ambiance, attitudes, and mood settings by amplifying the visuals within your app. This also helps with promoting your brand’s integrated marketing communications; for instance, the PlayStation Companion App mimics the textures of the PlayStation 5’s interface in order to give users a unified experience exclusive to the Playstation brand.
Monitor Your Brand’s Performance
It is important to track your brand’s performance and make tweaks as needed. This can help you stay on top of trends and ensure your app remains competitive. Measuring brand identity is not as simple as looking at a metric on your attribution tool, unfortunately. You can run surveys to measure your app brand’s clarity, distinctiveness, relevance and consistency based on the users’ mindset, market performance outcomes and investor sentiment (where applicable). Here are some key terms to consider when monitoring your brand’s performance:
Customer Mindset
Brand Awareness
Extent & ease of recall & recognition of your app’s brand.
Brand Associations
Strength, favorability & uniqueness of your app’s brand attributes & benefits as perceived by your target audience.
Brand Attitudes
Brand evaluations in terms of quality and satisfaction.
Brand Attachment
User loyalty and resistance to change.
Brand Activity
Do users download your app, talk about your brand and actively seek out and share information?
Market Performance Outcomes
Price Premiums
How much extra are customers willing to pay for your app or in-app purchases because of its brand?
Price Elasticities
How much does demand increase or decrease when the prices of your app or in-app purchases change?
The ability of your user acquisition and other marketing campaigns to drive revenue generating users.
Brand Expansion
Can your app’s brand support line and category extensions? For instance, Uber’s ability to expand from being just a transportation app to a grocery delivery app.
Cost Structure
Ability to reduce user acquisition expenditures because of prevailing customer mindset.
Profitability
All five outcomes combined define profitability.
Investor Sentiment
In the scenario where your app is sponsored by investors, investor sentiment should be factored in whilst measuring brand performance.
Market Dynamics
Whether the dynamics of financial markets and competitive landscape are opportune or risky.
Growth Potential
The growth potential and prospects for the brand; can be done via the PESTEL analysis for instance.
Risk Profile
How vulnerable is the brand to the marketplace and other external factors?
Brand Contribution
How important is the app’s brand within the company’s overall portfolio?
Conclusion
Branding your app is essential for success in the competitive app market of 2023. By following the steps outlined above, you can create an effective branding strategy that will help your app stand out from the crowd and promote awareness, recognition and recollection. AppSamurai is an industry leading mobile growth platform that can help apps achieve their full growth potential; in order to learn more about how to grow your app, visit AppSamurai for more information.