Lockdowns in the UK have become something of a way of life for many. What would have once been thought to have been completely strange has become commonplace. Whether you are talking about wearing face coverings in public places, maintaining gaps of two metres while shopping or not being able to visit friends and family in groups of no more than six, it can all seem a little normal nowadays and not alien at all. However, as we emerge from lockdown and the social distancing rules become less stringent, we all need to take some degree of caution. This is certainly the case when getting out and about which is why a full taxi service should mean taking the right steps to ensure everyone’s safety.

Advance Bookings

To begin with, booking a taxi will be best completed online or over the phone. There shouldn’t be the need to turn up at a taxi firm’s office and wait for a driver to become available in the waiting room. All this requires is a little forethought on the customer’s part, after all. Professionally run taxi firms must play their part, too, however. This means adequately manned phones and a reliable web or app-based booking service.

Car Cleanliness

Booking in advance also means better planning on the part of drivers and their coordinators. Cleaning the interiors of taxis is a big part of professionalism in the industry. Few self-respecting cabbies want to drive around in cars with dirty upholstery, of course. However, in the post-lockdown world, customers will be right to expect immaculate taxi interiors. Wiping down surfaces and frequent vacuum cleaning should allay any residual fears customers might have, something that should be done between fares wherever possible which is why pre-booked services are so beneficial. Bear in mind, too, that clean cars is something that marks taxi firms out from most bus and train service providers where such frequent and thorough cleaning is much less viable.

Preventing Airborne Transmission

Expecting drivers to use face coverings is also something taxi firms ought to promote. Crucially, this should be the case even if the law allows for more relaxation. This is as much about self-protection as it is making customers feel more confident about booking taxi services once more. However, wearing a face mask is only one way to combat disease transmission. Aeration is the other. Therefore, wherever it is practical to do so, drivers should be encouraged to drive with their windows open. This does not mean they have to be fully wound down, especially in inclement weather conditions, but to ventilate the car enough to lower any potential transmissibility of the virus.

Hand Sanitisation

Although we know now that it is the airborne transmission of coronavirus that makes it so problematic, hand cleanliness is also a strong countermeasure that will help to prevent it from spreading. Therefore, anti-viral hand sanitisers should be made freely available to passengers. Both customers and drivers should use them routinely, especially when cash has been exchanged. In the main, however, contactless forms of payment will continue to be the preferred method for some time to come. With all these measures in place, it should be possible to operate a full taxi service in a way the public can trust regardless of where the country happens to be on its roadmap to recovery.

Startups aren’t as special as they used to be. There are just way too many of them out there, and funding seems to be all over the place. So, in order to create a successful startup that actually gets the attention and respect it deserves, branding and marketing are now playing a more important role in this process than ever before.

It’s no longer just about coming up with a concept and business model that can be pitched to an investor or audience, but instead being a full-service company that actually generates revenue.

With that said, today we are going to highlight five things that every startup must have in place to help brand themselves during the launch process.

Startup Brand and Logo Identity

Take a moment to think about any of the most popular and successful brands in the world today. What do they all have in common? Simple… an amazing logo and brand identity — and some of them are so well branded, that they don’t even need to have their names on their logos anymore.

One of the first things a startup should consider is putting in the creative time and research to come up with a logo design that represents the startup properly. And with financial resources always being of extreme importance for startups, there are now plenty of websites and tools online to help create a logo, while only having to pay a fraction of the cost a traditional designer would require.

This is one of the very first and most important things to accomplish, as it’s going to be used in the foundational stages of your business, while also helping it’s branding on a daily basis.

Building Your Online Presence

With the name of your startup and a logo now in place, it’s time to move onto the online presence part of the process. It’s not enough to simply “be online”, one must also have a way to be found.

In the most simple terms possible, this process would consist of securing a domain name (preferably a .com) and going live with a new website. There are plenty of drag and drop website builders out there to choose from, and many of them are quite cost effective. The most important thing is to make sure you have something professional up and running before moving ahead (even if it’s just your most basic company information).

Depending on what your startup is, and the service it provides, you may already have this in place. If not, it should be your main focus point before moving onto the next step.

Getting Active on Social Media

As important as a website or blog may have been in previous years for a startup, having a solid social media presence and following is quickly becoming a top priority. In fact, the majority of brands without a social media marketing strategy in place are quickly seeing themselves fall behind in comparison to those with one in place.

With more than three billion users spread across the likes of Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and other social platforms, these outlets will play a huge role in the branding and overall success of your startup.

When going live on each of these platforms, it’s important to try and secure your startup name as the ‘username’ for each social network. And with each of these new properties going live, you should also be using your startup logo that was previously created as well.

One of the most important things a startup can do when trying to improve their branding and customer loyalty, is using the same visual images (logo) and colors when building out multiple properties and social profiles. This all plays a big role in how users will remember your site and brand every time they see it.

Creating an Effective Content and Marketing Strategy

We’ve touched on the focus points of setting up a website and using social media to connect with audiences around the world. Now it’s time to consider your options for how you can actually create content and start reaching these audiences on a daily basis.

Through the use of your website (and a blog), a startup should be creating new content that provides value to audiences in different ways. This content can be on company information, products and services being offered or even on valuable information that your target audience might be looking for.

In addition to going live with new content on the site, every business should be sharing each article through social media as well. There are also plenty of ways to build new backlinks to your site content, which ultimately helps with SEO and ranking in the search results.

Video Content to Engage with YouTube and Mobile Users

The age of video content is here, and not only is it being created at lightning speeds, it’s also being consumed at even faster rates. In order for a business to survive in these extremely competitive markets, they must be taking advantage of video content creation as well.

Again, this type of content can be posted to your website and main social profiles, but video content is also going to work extremely well with mobile users who are viewing content through YouTube and TikTok.

With more audiences moving away from laptop and desktop computers and focusing solely on mobile devices, this is simply one of the best ways to brand your startup, while reaching audiences you likely wouldn’t.

How to Brand and Market Your Startup in 2021 and Beyond

As mentioned at the beginning of the article, with more startups in the world today than ever before, there is a lot more to launching a successful company than just going live. Now it’s all about making sure you have a solid brand in place, while also putting in the necessary time, work and effort to be active where your audiences are looking for content.

In addition to each of the recommended branding tips and marketing methods listed above, it’s also a good idea to follow all of your competitors on social media as well. This will allow you to see what they are currently doing to attract an audience, while also giving you an idea of what’s working best.