Open Source Content Management

I think that many small business owners struggle to develop a strong, recognizable brand.

I'd like to get a discussion going on what your favourite South African brands are.

What makes these brands strong and recognizable?

What can small business owners learn from these brands and how can they develop their own identities?

One of the reasons small business owners struggle to setup a strong brand is that building a really strong consumer brand is generally very expensive.

I believe that for a small business often a track record of happy customers is much more important than a well know consumer brand. This is the primary drive behind my company www.ledula.com which helps small businesses build this track record by getting their customers to rate their services to build up a profile of customer feedback.

Hi I would have to agree with you on that. Small businesses and small business owners tend to have less capital to invest in branding and because they are under budget pressure need to see a direct line between spend and ROI. Unfortunately there are elements of branding with intangible value. My advice to start ups to find the investment value in the exercise rather than trying to focus on how they are going to make the money back and when - and draw a straight line from spend to return.
Your company sounds interesting- would like to have a look and see how you do this. Hopefully as more small business owners embrace technology they will start to see the value in having a strong brand presence.
Brands that have caught my attention- Nandos (of course) and FNB. I think the big lesson is "process" - branding isn't an overnight solution; it's ongoing and the companies that are committed to it have the best chances of being successful and growing. These two especially seem to have customer-oriented brand perspective which is useful, especially given the swing in favour of social media and credibility.

I agree, very few small businesses like to spend money without direct return. I suppose one reason is that if you aren't careful you can burn a lot of money on building a brand with no return.

What are the key things a small business needs to consider when building brand that make sense when your budget is limited?

the million dollar question...lateral thinking?

There are ways to do more with less. Trade exchanges and barters are a good way to get your brand out there. But I would say any money that gets spent needs to be done so with intent and based on informed decisions. And, even if you can't draw a straight line from output to return it needs to offer some degree of value or measurability.

We should ask ourselves, how can we really brand our business effectively? What "ingredients" do we need to build such, how much would it cost? Are there other cheaper means if the initial costing is expensive?

I believe there are other options that small businesses can use in branding the business effectively.

I for example spent a lot revamping our retail store and website to give it a unique look, this i believe is a major ingredient but there is still a lot that still needs to be done.

Can we at least share major ingredients the big brands such as FNB, Nandos etc have used and we have noticed? This will allow small business owners seek for something similar but much cheaper.