BRANDING, BRAND BUILDING

Branding & Building Brands on Social Media Platforms

Branding or building a brand on Social Media is all about knowing your audience, building communities, creating relevant content, and posts.

When Klarna launched its consumer brand in 2019, the Company had already been in business for five years as a B2B brand. Klarna had a dire need to be known for shopping, as they had a new product that positioned them in that way, which was a deviation from what they were known for.

They had to do this while also acknowledging their past services and B2B history. They decided to incorporate “Pop Culture” into their branding and marketing strategies, which helped differentiate Klarna from other FinTech brands.

A brilliant strategy that they incorporated into their branding, or instead, their rebranding and marketing strategy, was to build partnerships with small communities and brand ambassadors to enter the fast fashion market.

They temporarily monopolized established channels and content creators on various platforms, such as YouTube and Reddit, to enable Klarna to share and promote its content by partnering with them. This helped Klarna save ample time, as they didn’t have to start from scratch.

They even took the riskier route with their logo to match the image of their already established partners. While the entire FinTech industry was a buzz with blue logos, Klarna opted for the color pink during its launch.

This strategy not only helped Klarna generate Brand Awareness but also built credibility and established trust. This helped Klara build 300,000 users within just one month after their rebranding process.

Jon Chang, Head of Growth, US, at Klarna, and an adjunct faculty member at New York University, specializing in Social Media and Web Analytics, suggests using Social Media platforms to target micro-communities to establish a brand. Jon recommends that brands create all their content and approach it in a lifestyle-driven manner to attract the right audiences, including small and micro communities.

Taking Klarna as an example, the key here is to understand the lifestyles of your users. Otherwise, campaigns would seem simply disjointed. Finding your community is the key. You don’t want to target those whose lifestyles and goals don't align with yours.

It’s easier to start with micro communities that align with your products, message, goals, and lifestyle, build from there, and expand to broader audiences than to start from scratch, to save time and resources.

Building a brand on Social Media is all about knowing your audience, creating relevant content and posts, and utilizing the appropriate platforms for their intended purpose.

One of the key aspects of branding on Social Media and Social Media Management is cross-channel management, which involves utilizing multiple platforms to achieve marketing goals.

Infographic on social media cross-channel management.

The key considerations to keep in mind here are:

• Strengths and weaknesses of each platform

• The type of content appropriate for each platform

• Verticals that are affected by it

• Algorithms to be mindful of, especially for visibility of time-sensitive posts, announcements, and content

• Demographics of each platform

Building brands on Social Media is also about understanding upper-funnel tactics, including research on hashtags and competitors, as well as two-way communication with your consumers. It is all about investing time rather than money.

While popular opinion states that Social Media marketing is all about fluff and chaos, the key here is to approach it in a disciplined and methodical way. Almost all platforms and marketing channels are interrelated in some way, despite their varying uses and demographics.

The fluff idea stems from the fact that the primary KPIs, namely impressions and engagement, cannot be quantified in monetary terms. However, we must acknowledge that when appropriately used in conjunction with other channels, they have an indirect and significant impact on customer acquisition costs and revenue.

It’s all about creating incremental impact in small increments rather than telling your whole story to the audience at once. It’s all about “Buzz vs Control” and generating curiosity and homophily.

Overall, it can be difficult for some brands to pinpoint their ideal audiences or communities. They should focus on building their communities with a balanced mix of organic posts and targeted advertising through sponsored content, gradually adopting a “lifestyle” approach if appropriate.

Although it might seem controversial, this approach may not suit brands that are rapidly growing or heavily influenced by trends and demographic shifts. Frequent rebranding could harm their image, especially when shifting themes. Thus, a curated, flexible, and organic strategy for aesthetics and initial advertising often works better for social media marketing.

In our globalized world, many consumers are shaped by multiple cultures, making a strict "lifestyle" approach potentially restrictive for brands and consumers who value variety and exploration. For such brands, investing in a larger social media management team to oversee multiple communities and accounts across platforms may be necessary, provided resources allow.

Disclaimer: The brands and mentions, Klarna, Affirm, etc, in our blogs are for illustrative purposes only and do not imply endorsement, affiliation, or advertising. We maintain a global, contemporary, and non-political perspective.