Practical Approaches to Create Awareness for Your Product and Brand

The awareness phase of the customer decision journey is essential for long-term business success. It’s the moment potential customers recognize their challenges and begin looking for solutions. At this stage, it’s crucial to build both brand awareness and awareness of your technology’s problem-solving capabilities.

While market shaping focuses on creating new demand, building awareness ensures your solution is top of mind when customers identify their needs. Though both approaches are necessary, they differ in timelines and outcomes. This article will focus on creating awareness specifically for B2B and medtech solutions, offering practical steps to ensure your technology becomes the preferred choice. To learn more about market shaping click here.

What’s the starting point for creating awareness as a driver for business success?

Begin by engaging your existing customers. Many may not realize the full potential of their current investment in your technology. By demonstrating how they can achieve more with what they already have, you can generate additional business and turn them into brand advocates, helping create awareness of your product with a wider audience.

When launching a completely new product or technology, it's critical to generate buzz and create credibility through trials, proof of concept, and evidence of the technology’s real-world impact. Build a strong case for your solution early on to attract attention and credibility.

Define Your Value Proposition

Whether you’re expanding an existing product or launching something new, your value proposition must be strong, clear, and differentiated. It should align directly with customer needs, answering the crucial question: "Why choose us?" Take the time to refine your messaging to ensure it resonates and stands out in a crowded market. A well-defined value proposition lays the foundation for building awareness that leads to business success.

Moments of engagement during the awareness phase

Discovery Phase:

This is when potential customers are starting to identify their challenges but may not yet know what solutions exist. It's crucial to engage them with educational content that focuses on their pain points and high-level industry trends, not detailed product specs during this time.

Example content: Blog posts, whitepapers, and industry reports that discuss common problems and offer potential solutions, positioning your brand as a thought leader.

Initial Research:

At this stage, buyers are actively looking for information to understand their problem better. They are receptive to guides, tutorials, and introductory webinars that clarify challenges and offer insights into how to address them.

Example content: “How-to” guides, webinars, and explainer videos that help prospects understand key issues and potential solutions.

Casual Engagement:

Potential customers often stumble upon content during their normal digital routines—through social media, search results, or industry news. This engagement isn’t intentional but can still create lasting impressions if the content is relevant.

Example content: Infographics, social media posts, interactive polls, or participation in conversations on industry forums and LinkedIn groups.

Awareness Triggers:

Events like industry trade shows, webinars, or "World Days" (e.g., World Health Day) can trigger customer awareness. These moments offer opportunities to associate your brand with wider industry conversations.

Example content: Announcements, speaking engagements, and interactive event booths that showcase your brand’s alignment with important industry trends.

Ensure your content is consistent across all formats—whether written, visual, or interactive—to maintain a clear and impactful message throughout the customer’s journey. This sets the stage for building deeper connections with your audience as they continue their decision-making process.

How Does Awareness-Stage Content Differ from Preference-Building Content?

In the awareness stage, content should focus on highlighting customer challenges, not technical product specifics. Storytelling, such as “day in the life” scenarios, can effectively illustrate the pain points your audience faces, subtly introducing your solution as a remedy.

Once awareness is established, preference-building content can dive into the specifics of your product’s differentiators. However, it’s important to avoid overwhelming potential customers with too much detail during the awareness phase, as this may lead to disengagement.

Preferred channel for pushing content during awareness building stage

To push content effectively, use a mix of channels that target your audience where they naturally search for solutions. Optimize for search engines with SEO and paid ads focusing on challenges, not products. Social media, especially LinkedIn, is ideal for sharing thought leadership and engaging in industry conversations. Email marketing offers educational drip campaigns, while webinars and virtual events allow you to showcase expertise. Combine these with PR placements, content syndication, and influencer marketing to reach a broader audience. Use retargeting ads to stay visible and top of mind as prospects progress through their research.

Key Initiatives and Channels to Create Awareness for Your Brand and Technology

Now that you have a sense of where to meet your customers and the type of content they will be engaging with as they educate themselves on solutions that can help them reach their goals, let’s look at some practical approaches to creating awareness for your offerings.

1. Develop Buyer Personas

To effectively target your audience, you need to understand them. Map out your buyer personas—who they are, what their pain points are, and where they search for information. Use this insight to create communications materials and engagement plans that deliver the right messaging through the right channels. Tailor your approach to meet their specific needs and engage them where they already are.

2. Optimize for Search

Make sure your audience can find you when they’re looking for solutions to their challenges. Set up search strategies that focus on the problems your technology solves, rather than just the product itself. By targeting keywords related to their pain points, you'll be more likely to capture interest at the right moment in their decision-making process.

3. Brand Awareness Initiatives

Link your brand with relevant events and topics. Secure speaking slots at industry conferences, attend relevant trade shows, and develop campaigns around "World Days" like World Heart Day or World Nurses Day. By aligning your brand with recognized events, you not only build awareness but also establish credibility and relevance in the broader industry conversation.

4. Leverage Case Studies and Success Stories 

Use real-world stories to illustrate the impact of your technology. Share case studies that highlight your customers’ challenges and how your solutions helped them overcome these obstacles. Subtly position your technology as the hero without overwhelming the audience with technical jargon. People are more likely to resonate with and remember a compelling narrative than a dry list of features.

5. Creative Partnerships

Think outside the box when forming partnerships. Collaborate with industry leaders, or even organizations outside your field, to extend your reach. For instance, if you want to promote your technology’s impact on heart health, why not team up with a local food manufacturer to create healthy recipes? By linking your brand to something unexpected, you can capture new attention and differentiate yourself in a crowded market.

6. Influencer Marketing

Partner with advocates who are passionate about the topics you’re focusing on. Support them with social media content and engagement opportunities to help amplify your message. Influencers can add a layer of credibility and expand your reach into circles that may otherwise be hard to tap into.

7. Public Relations (PR)

Consider both specialized and general media opportunities. While targeted approaches are important, a mass awareness strategy through general media could provide a fast track to widespread recognition. PR efforts like media interviews, press releases, and feature articles can help connect your brand to specific value propositions, particularly when they align with timely topics or societal issues.

8. Educational Content

Position yourself as an authority by hosting webinars, events, or publishing positioning papers. Education is key to awareness, especially when introducing new technologies or complex solutions. By taking ownership of the educational process, you reinforce your value proposition and build credibility in your market.

9. Develop Thought Leadership

Invest in research and publish insights that highlight the problems your solution addresses. Make sure the content is vendor-neutral and as unbiased as possible to establish trust. Thought leadership positions your company as a forward-thinking and knowledgeable partner in the space, helping to build long-term credibility and trust with your audience.

10. Leverage Internal Teams

Your internal experts and managers are some of the most credible voices you have. Encourage them to deliver the message through company blogs, media interviews, and panel discussions. Customers value hearing directly from those who are building the technology, and it can be a powerful way to humanize your brand while sharing valuable insights.

11. Help Customers Uncover Challenges

Often, potential customers don’t even realize the full extent of their challenges. Offer audits, benchmarks, and problem-solving workshops to help them discover the untapped potential within their organization. By facilitating this process, you position yourself as a problem solver and partner, making it more likely they’ll turn to your solution.

Conclusion: Driving Business Success through Strategic Awareness

Creating awareness is more than just getting your brand recognized—it’s about positioning your product or service as the solution to your customers' challenges. As business leaders, understanding the various approaches to driving awareness is key to ensuring your solutions stay top of mind. From optimizing search strategies and developing thought leadership to leveraging creative partnerships and influencer marketing, each channel and tactic plays a vital role in influencing the customer decision journey.

By taking a strategic approach to awareness, you can not only engage potential customers at the right time but also lay the foundation for deeper connections that ultimately drive business success. To further understand the importance of focusing on awareness building read this article here.

At Unplain Jane, we specialize in helping businesses define and deploy effective awareness campaigns. Our services include customer journey mapping, developing tailored messaging, and defining and executing end-to-end campaigns that ensure your brand stands out. We guide you through the process of turning awareness into long-term business growth.

If you’re ready to unlock the potential of this phase of the customer decision journey, let Unplain Jane be your partner in shaping and deploying a plan that delivers results.