Keys to Creating a Cohesive Real Estate Brand Identity

Many home builders and developers may believe that the work of differentiating themselves from the competition starts and ends with creating a strong real estate brand. However, this is only the beginning.

Beyond establishing an initial real estate brand concept, it’s crucial to ensure that this identity is well-expressed and easily recognizable among homebuyers. The truth is that brand consistency can truly make or break the value of your real estate branding. Cohesive branding is the ultimate key to enhancing brand awareness, building greater recognition and inspiring trust among your target audience.

Consistent brand presentation across all platforms has been shown to increase revenue up to 23%. This tells us that prioritizing a unified image for your real estate brand can drive substantial benefits for your company.

Below, we’ll discuss the first steps of forming the basis for your brand, the benefits of using that foundation to create a consistent identity and the keys to creating a cohesive real estate brand identity.

Forming Your Brand

Building a real estate brand with a lasting competitive advantage is the first step to forming a unified representation that can be shared throughout everything your company does. Creating that foundation comes down to asking key questions that provide information on the who, what, how, why, and where of your company. This sets a precedent for what the business does, how it conducts itself, and how it delivers messages to the target audience.

What Makes Your Company Unique?

Identifying what makes your company distinctive is about examining the company’s purpose, short-term and long-term goals and defining its unique real estate value proposition. What is your company’s fundamental purpose? How do you fulfill that purpose differently than your competitors? What does your company value? What value does your business provide to homebuyers?

Digging into these questions is the best way to discover your real estate brand identity and gain a thorough understanding of your distinctive brand assets. All of this information should go into producing a brand that compellingly communicates your appeal and value to homebuyers and captures attention.

Who is Your Intended Audience?

Understanding your target audience is incredibly important for developing an effective real estate brand, as your brand identity should strongly focus on meeting homebuyer expectations. Your audience should be defined by what they think, how they feel, how they behave, what they do, etc.

What do your homebuyers desire to find in a new home or community, and how can your brand address those needs? Learning what your audience is looking for is the best way to create a brand that truly appeals to the ideal target audience. That’s why it’s crucial to examine the real estate buyer personas that match your homebuyers to develop branding that continues to attract the right buyers to your business.

Branding is a multifaceted process, and these questions are merely the start to uncovering your intended brand identity. Discover more on how to create a distinctive brand by taking a look at our real estate branding guide to differentiating.

After forming a strong real estate brand identity, your work is not complete. Creating a memorable brand is only effective if that identity is represented well and consistently. Next, your brand identity must be expressed coherently and cohesively throughout all touchpoints and interactions.

What is Cohesive Branding and Why Does it Matter?

Cohesive branding means that your real estate brand shares a consistent representation across every medium where your audience encounters it. Whether they discover your brand through social media, your website, signage, collateral or advertisements, they should notice a recognizable identity that provides the same impression no matter where they come across your business.

To unite all branding efforts, you must assess all aspects of your marketing strategy including visual design, writing style, communication and more. The more unified your branding is, the stronger your real estate brand identity will appear to your target audience – a valuable achievement that leads to high payoffs. Here are some of the most important benefits of prioritizing brand consistency:

Builds Brand Recognition

The world of real estate is a crowded market, and this means differentiating your company couldn’t be more important for success. Cohesive branding is all about building an identity that buyers can easily recognize and distinguish from other organizations. Through unique visual elements, messaging and engagement, consistent branding enables home builders and developers to form a reliable, unified identity that produces recognition and greater trust among your audience.

Establishes Credibility

Not only does consistent branding distinguish your company, but it also offers your business greater credibility in the real estate market. Your brand identity plays a critical role in developing a compelling reputation for your business, and the more aligned it appears directly translates to a greater appearance of authority and reliability.

Inspires Trusting Brand Advocates

As your brand generates instant recognition and effective credibility, it will also trigger a consistent impression among homebuyers – the effects of that impression are determined by the quality of your branding. If your real estate brand identity is disjointed and has an inconsistent presence, your audience is less likely to be confident in the company. When a real estate brand demonstrates consistency across all marketing tactics, it evokes a greater sense of trust and encourages homebuyers to think of the brand positively. This is critical for forming solid brand-buyer relationships.

By building excellent brand recognition and gaining trust from homebuyers, more individuals will trust the company enough to become brand advocates. There is no greater source of advertisement than your customers as word-of-mouth recommendations from friends or family have a powerful influence on buyers.

Attracts the Right Buyers

Using cohesive branding throughout your marketing efforts requires great attention to detail and a deep understanding of the brand’s intended purpose. This entails making constant assessments and observations to ensure that the brand is accurately represented through visual elements and messaging. Remaining mindful of the brand’s identity reinforces the brand’s overarching vision and ultimately attracts more leads that fit your company’s ideal buyer persona.

Establishing a Well-Defined Brand Identity

Ensuring your brand identity is cohesive extends further than visual elements, it’s about consistently shaping everything the brand produces or shares. Consider your own personal identity. Is your character tied solely to your appearance? Of course not, it’s expressed through your words, attitudes, actions, behaviors, etc. The same is true for exceptional real estate brands.

Every point of expression, from your real estate brand website to social media, advertisements, customer experience, print materials and more, plays a significant role in shaping brand identity. Each of these elements must be consistent with the overarching real estate brand identity you’ve created to build cohesion and inspire trust among your target audience.

Remember the Vision

Think back to the initial foundation used to form your brand – what makes your brand unique and how it fits the expectations of your target audience. This insight should continue to guide everything about your branding from the visuals down to the content the brand shares and how it communicates with homebuyers.

Build Brand Guidelines

Each employee is an extension of your real estate brand identity, which means it’s critical to ensure that everyone on your team shares a solid understanding of the brand. Form thorough internal knowledge of your brand identity throughout the company by creating brand guidelines that inform each team member of how the brand should ideally be represented through various elements including visual aesthetic, imagery, writing style, taglines and more. This guide should be a helpful source that answers any questions posed by team members as to how company branding should be used, as well as details about the intended brand voice. Every employee should also be able to access the company logos, fonts and branded templates that they can use throughout their professional activity.

Select Consistent Visual Elements

As mentioned previously, one of the most important ways to convey a consistent impression is to possess a similar look throughout all platforms. Studies show that using signature colors to identify your brand increases brand recognition by 80%. Real estate brands should take advantage of this opportunity to build powerful brand recognition by selecting a palette of identifying colors, complimentary fonts and other design elements to create a unified visual aesthetic that is easily recognizable. Creating a distinct design style and aesthetic enhances your real estate brand identity and strengthens your presentation.

Create a Unique Voice

All messaging that comes from the brand, including website copy, blogs, advertising text, buyer communication, represents your brand’s voice and personality. As this is a key element that embodies the brand’s character, each form of messaging should be thoughtfully written with the same tone or style to reflect an intentional brand image. Although different members of your team may be writing each element, it’s important to confirm that each material delivers a consistent voice, tone and style to maintain a cohesive brand representation.

Maintain a Content Calendar

Keeping a content calendar is a fantastic way to share branding efforts on a reliable schedule and offers you complete control and awareness of how brand content is delivered to your audience. This planning tool also provides a regular opportunity to consistently assess your content and ensure that the distributed visuals and messaging always align with your brand vision. By thoughtfully planning out content ahead of time, you continue to cultivate the intended brand image and share an identity that homebuyers can trust.

Select the Right Agency to Develop a Consistent Real Estate Brand

Strong real estate brand presentation goes a long way in increasing brand recognition, gaining buyer trust, building credibility and differentiating your business from the competition. Guarantee your real estate branding is distinctive, memorable and cohesive by partnering with a successful branding agency – Milesbrand is at your service!

For over three decades, we have focused on real estate branding and marketing, which has led us to achieve unmatched industry expertise and success. Let us take your real estate brand to the next level! Contact us today to learn more about how we can bring your brand to life cohesively.