Branding and Marketing Strategies for Your Vegan Business in 2026!
Use your website as a marketing tool.
Having an online presence will help your business grow, especially if you are a plant-based cafe, food truck, or any kind of vegan business that serves food because people are searching for your menu online before they even visit you in person.
You might be wondering if you should DIY or hire a designer. It’s really up to how much time and money you have. If you have more time than money, the DIY route might be best when you are first starting out.
Squarespace Templates are a great choice and after taking some time to learn the platform, you can get it set up and running pretty quickly.
If you have more money than time, hiring a Squarespace web designer is the way to go because a designer knows how to set up websites for success.
It’ll be good to go for many years to come and be off your plate so to speak and you’ll feel confident about your site.
If you go the DIY route, you’re most likely going to be making changes and tweaks along the way as you learn more and will have to put some time and energy into making sure it’s set up properly and working the best for your business.
If you spend the extra money to work with a designer, you can rest assured that your website will stand out.
There are millions of Squarespace users, so if most people are DIY-ing their website, there will be heaps of Squarespace websites that look very similar, so think about making it unique in some way.
Utilize Blogging.
Many people are asking if SEO is dead in 2023, from all the experts I have listened to, it is still a legit way to leverage and market your vegan business online.
It does take time commitment and know-how to increase your online traffic.
Some businesses are not seeing results until months down the road, so be prepared It isn’t an overnight strategy, but it does work if you put the time and energy into it.
Be sure to share your blog posts on social media, so your followers know what you’re up to.
Commitment, dedication, and strategy are needed for a successful blog to bloom. If you commit to putting a day aside every week to blog for your business, with at least 1300-2000 words, that should get you off to a good start.
The key to blogging is consistency and strategy, so commit to something that you can handle otherwise you’ll just fall off and won’t see results.
Learn about SEO, or hire someone who can teach you, so you are not wasting time blogging. There is a science to it, so take some time to learn how to write for SEO before you go all in.
If you are a vegan caterer, chef, or meal prepper blogging can be a great way to get your services known to the masses.
You can blog about certain topics that your clients might find helpful. For example, if you are a meal prepper and want to offer meal-prepping services you can write tips on meal prepping, the best healthy food, etc.
It really positions you as an expert in your field by answering and providing questions that people might have.
Maybe people want to transition away from meat and have more of a vegan diet. There are so many topics you can write about that’ll drive traffic back to your website, which will allow your ideal client to book your services.
YouTube videos
Youtube videos or vlogging is a great way to promote and market your vegan business.
People really enjoy watching videos these days, so if you are not into blogging then vlogging can be a great way to interact with your following and establish a rapport with them.
Vlogging is less competitive than blogging, so if you focus on creating videos it might be an easier way to stand out.
If you have a plant-based/vegan food truck business you can vlog about the offerings of the day.
People who are in your area will come down to your location and buy your food. It makes it easy for your customers to see what you are cooking up that day!
Vlogging puts a face to your business which is super helpful for your business because people like to see the person who is running the business. It makes it a more personable experience and drives traffic to your website and to your business.
Podcasting
If you are not comfortable shooting videos podcasting can be a behind-the-scenes way of marketing your vegan business.
It is another great way to build relationships with your audience because even though you’re not meeting them in person, they still feel like they know you from listening to you speak.
Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook, etc.
Pinterest is a great way to market your business.
Pinterest is essentially a search engine, so if you are putting your content on there it will direct people back to your website. Blogging and Pinterest go hand in hand.
When you’re creating blogging content, you can publish the same content on Pinterest to help direct traffic back to your site.
I know many vegan food businesses that market their business through Instagram and’ve had a lot of success.
It does work really well. Whenever I’m scrolling through Instagram and see the local vegan cafes showing the special of the day, the next thing I do is head over to their website and order it online!
Word-of-mouth marketing
Word-of-mouth marketing should not be overlooked.
Attending food shows, farmer’s markets, and festivals where you can show off your product works great! Conferences are a great way to network with people as well in your niche.
There are heaps of conferences/retreats that business people attend to network with others. Introduce yourself and say hi, and let them know what you do.
People might not be into hiring you to write away but they will remember you and will reach out when they need your service.
Cold Pitching
Email your target market directly and pitch your services works well.
Most people who are looking for a service would be happy if the answer to their problem landed right in their inbox.
It’s a numbers game and depending on your strategy it can really help your business. Your strategy has to be thought out well to be successful, so it does take a bit of timing to prepare email templates, etc.
Branding tips.
First, I will give you a little background on what branding is. According to Skillcrush an online tech school, there are two types of branding, personal and corporate.
Personal- Your brand personality is a combination of the traits and characteristics you want your audience to see in you as a professional.
Corporate branding- is all about building a reputation, personality, and message around a set of products or service offerings.
First, you want to identify who your target audience is and design in a way that will attract them. For example; if you are a guy and you are a wedding photographer, but you design your website and brand to match your style, your brand won’t appeal to brides. Find out who your target audience is and pick brand elements that will attract your audience.
Choosing the right color scheme for your vegan brand
Come up with some colors for your brand and pick three colors. People associate certain colors with feelings and personality traits, so be sure to pick the colors that represent the vibe you want.
Yellow, optimism
Orange, friendly
Red, excitement
Purple, creative
Blue, dependable, strength
Green, peaceful, growth, health
Grey, balance calm.
“Brands and colors are linked to the core! Colors influence the way we perceive a brand and can ignite subtle emotions about it. Chose a color that aligns with your brand’s personality, and use it to be the dominant color in your color scheme. Then pick out two more colors that are complementary to that color.” (Skillcrush). You don’t want the other colors to dominate your main color. You can use this color wheel to help you pick out colors. Adobe Color
Choosing the right typography for your brand.
It’s important that your typography conveys the image and message your brand is going for. There is a psychology behind type choices. Each font type conveys different emotions, so make sure you pick out the correct font that conveys those emotions.
There are different categories of typefaces, and each of those categories represents an emotion.
For example:
Serif fonts represent tradition, respect, reliability, and comfort.
Times New Roman gives off a traditional vibe.
Baskerville gives off a reliable vibe, etc.
Sans-serif fonts represent stability, clean, modern.
Helvetica, Calibri, or myriad italics fall into this category.
Script fonts are elegant classy and affectionate
Bickham script font or Edwardian script will set these tones.
Display fonts are friendly and expressive.
Cooper and Valencia would be good fonts to represent that vibe.
Modern fonts give off a strong and progressive chic vibe.
Futura gives off a strong vibe. ITC Avant-garde extra light gives off a progressive vibe and century gothic gives off a chic vibe.
I hope this is starting to make sense. The MOST important thing to remember is that your brand personality, colors, and typography all support each other, make sense, and tell a clear story.
This is the key to sending the right message about your brand and the way to create a connection with your audience!
Visual messaging like images, graphics, and illustrations.
Visually showing ideas (instead of just saying them) creates a stronger emotional connection with your audience and gives your brand more credibility.
Make sure your images complement each other and don’t clash. If you are using a bunch of different photos that are all over the place, your brand will suffer from it and won’t attract your target market.
Be sure to use high-quality images. Images taken by professional cameras or stock photography can be used.
If you have any friends who are good with a camera, I recommend doing a photo shoot for your brand, so you can have some nice images.
The photos are the main feature on your website, so it’s good to have nice photos that match in color and vibe.
If you are using graphics like icons be sure to use icons from the same family and use the same color.
If you use graphics that aren’t from the same family, your brand won’t have a holistic appeal. You are aiming for a holistic cohesive brand where all elements complement each other.
You can purchase graphics on Creative Market, I recommend using a design software called Canva to utilize the graphics you purchase.
It’s a really simple design platform to get you started as an alternative to more complicated programs like Photoshop etc.
Brand consistently across social media.
Designing across platforms is a way to show consistency which builds trust with your audience.
Make sure your social media imagery matches the rest of your brand identity. Use the same profile picture on all of your social media platforms.
Some side notes about marketing your vegan business, especially if you’re in the vegan food space:
Make sure your vegan food business is findable online! Most people who’re looking for you online are searching for your menu, so it’s important to put your menu up. People want to see what you offer before visiting in person.
Online presence is really important because you have to start building that trust before people even go to your physical location. Businesses that are online grow 40% faster than businesses that aren’t.
I know some business owners who rely on Facebook to be their site instead of getting a website. It’s better than nothing, but it means you're not as findable online and it’s not as user-friendly for your audience as an actual website is.
80% of customers search online before buying products or services, and they visit the store or shop because they had a positive online experience, so a web presence is essential.
Online reviews are huge as well. People trust these reviews as much as they trust a recommendation from a friend!
Most importantly understand that you don’t need to do all the marketing strategies to be successful.
You can exhale now. 😌
Pick one marketing strategy and do it well. Pick the marketing strategy that you like the best otherwise, you’ll not want to do it. If you hate blogging don’t blog.
If you would rather be behind the scenes than podcast instead. Whatever strategy you employ, stick with it and be determined.
In the beginning, when you don’t have much money you’ll most likely be doing most of these things yourself until you can afford to hire a marketing team who will be able to help you out.
Whether you are blogging, vlogging, or podcasting, it’s important to promote the content that you are creating and post it to social media like Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and LinkedIn.
The key is finding ways to promote your content to get visitors back to your website so they can find out more information about your business.
Check out these vegan business ideas, if you’re looking for different vegan niches to get into and some inspo!
Check out my web design services for vegan businesses if you are interested in working together.
