Brand strategy is a tool you use to grow your business, increase visibility and build brand equity. One of the ways to build a winning strategy is to align your marketing with how you're already getting and doing business. To do that it's best to understand your sales cycle.

Leverage the Power of Your Data
When it comes to reviewing data, time is your friend. It takes time to gather enough data to observe patterns caused by your sales cycle. If you are constantly adjusting your messaging or operating without a strategy, your audience won’t develop with enough consistency to deliver measurable results. They need a clear long-term strategy and consistent messaging to build a relationship with your brand.

Change with the Seasons
Here in Pennsylvania, we have 4 robust seasons. Seasons mean weather, and drastic changes in weather can greatly affect people’s habits which in turn affects your sales cycle. We also see fluctuations around holidays, graduations, weddings, and other life events.

Indentify Irregularities
As you review your marketing each quarter, take note of each of the factors that could be contributing to your data. A dip in engagement and/or sales may not mean that your audience doesn’t like your brand or messaging. It may just mean they were busy planning for a vacation. Likewise, an increase could mean you capitalized on a unique seasonal opportunity or lucked out being able to provide a product or service that met a particular need. You’ll want to consider if these factors are one-offs or if they will persist year over year then make adjustments to your sales and marketing strategy accordingly.

Know Where Your Customers Are in Relationship to Your Process
You’ll also want to understand where your customers are in relationship to your sales process. In any sales process, there are phases your customers go through — beginning with the customer who knows nothing about you, then the customer who kind of knows about you but isn’t really engaged, followed by the customer who knows about you and is interested but isn’t quite ready to make a purchase, and finally the customer who is ready to take action, and the customer you’ve already converted into business. Each of your customers will also navigate through your sales process at different rates. So it’s important to adjust your strategy to offer unique support and messages to individuals throughout each phase of the process.

Create a Branding & Communications Strategy that Aligns with Your Process
The goal of branding and marketing is to leverage your messaging, visual assets, and data to shorten your sales cycle and increase your rate of conversion, thus maximizing your time, and resources. Ideally, you’ll want to begin communicating with your audience at phase 1 and continue the conversation so that you are already top of mind when they are ready to take action. Strategies that see the most effective results target the person who is pre-decision, so you gain their business the second they decide to shift into action.

Do you need help understanding how to align your brand strategy with your sales cycle? At Intelativity, we offer full-service brand strategy. Schedule a complimentary consultation with one of our Strategists to get started.