Reach vs Brand Awareness Strategies for CPG Brands

What’s the difference between reach vs brand awareness? Does it even matter? 

Ultimately yes, or I wouldn’t be writing this blog post. There are different parts of your posts, content, and strategy that will support increased reach and increased brand awareness, when paired together. Without certain parts, you’ll just have more reach. And without others, you’ll just have brand awareness among a very small group of people. 

What is Reach?

Reach is the amount of unique people who’ve seen your content. 

When I’m creating analytics reports for my social media marketing clients, I look at their total Instagram reach to determine whether or not their content is getting them in front of more people. I also look at the top 3-5 Instagram posts of the month, sorted by reach, to determine what posts are driving that visibility growth. 

Reach is a measurement. And it has its limitations; it’s hard to add the reach of multiple social media channels together because the same person could follow and view your content on 2+ channels. That’s why we have impressions, or views.

Reach is a one way to measure visibility and brand awareness. 

What is Brand Awareness? 

Brand awareness is the level of familiarity consumers have with your brand. 

The more brand awareness consumers have, the more likely they are to recall your brand when they’re ready to purchase. 

For example, when consumers are asked to name soda brands, they might say Coke or Pepsi. Those brands have extraordinarily high brand awareness; Coke is one of the most recognizable brands in the world.

What’s the Difference in Reach vs Brand Awareness? 

Reach measures the unique consumers who’ve seen your content and brand awareness tells you how well those consumers recognize and remember your brand. It’s a quantity vs quality assessment. 

How Do I Get More Reach as a CPG Founder? 

A lot of CPG founders think that by posting trending formats & audios, they’ll reach more people. And while that’s true, it doesn’t necessarily mean you’ll reach the right people. Part of my job as a social media strategist is deciding which trending formats are right for each of my clients so they avoid wasted time and effort.

Aside from trends, there are other ways to get more reach as a CPG founder. 

Platform-Native Formats

1. Use short-form videos on Instagram and TikTok

Short-form videos perform very well on both Instagram and TikTok. 

You may find different types of videos perform better on different platforms; that’s expected. I still recommend posting the content on both, but with a few tweaks. 

My system creates the content for Instagram (more users, more potential reach, and usually the stronger platform for my clients) then tweaking it for TikTok: shorter captions, the same 5 hashtags on each post instead of varying keywords, and using different audios or fonts to make the content seem more native to TikTok. 

2. Add audio to carousels on both platforms

This seems like a no-brainer for TikTok, but it’s also a way to increase your reach on Instagram. When you add audio, Instagram will push the content to the Reels tab, where it’ll be shown to accounts that don’t follow you. 

I will add a caveat for carousels: if you have a super small audience (less than 1,000 followers), I’d avoid them for now. Carousels work fabulously when your audience is a little bigger because of how the algorithm sorts the content. First they’re shown to your followers. If your followers engage, the algorithm will show that post to accounts that don’t follow you. But if you have a small audience, or worse a disengaged audience, that’s unlikely to happen. 

3. Use simple visuals that are legible and easy to read in under 2 seconds

This is important for any form of marketing. It needs to be easy to read and understood in less than two seconds. 

Problem-First Messaging

Always make it obvious who the content is for within the very first line (your hook). This applies whether it’s a caption, graphic, or reel. 

Then lead with the pain points your target consumer experiences. Those pain points allow you to speak to the situations and life moments they’re experiencing, not just product features. 

Shareable Content

Want to reach more people? Create content they want to share with their friends. I break down how shares increase your reach in this reel.

Remember: creating content people want to share doesn’t mean you have to be funny or trendy. It means creating a “so-and-so needs to see this” reaction. That could mean a really delicious recipe, a solution to a problem they’re experiencing, or a lifestyle hack they didn’t know they needed. 

Broad, High-Level, Top-of-Funnel Messaging

Everyone says this for a reason: it works. 

When you use broad, high-level, top-of-funnel messaging, you’ll naturally appeal to more people. The key is using broad messaging while still attracting the right people. 

I do this for my clients by creating every post like it’s being viewed by a total stranger (because that’s literally the goal, right?). This was a major key to success for my food & beverage client in 2025; she increased Instagram impressions by 76%. Read the entire social strategy that led to her results.

The key is not to speak to literally every person on the planet; but to speak to people as if they’ve never heard of you. Because they haven’t. 

When you’re using insider terms, buzzwords, or assuming too much product or brand knowledge, the content won’t resonate with as many people. That’s like educating on the ins & outs of very niche ingredients and expecting it to go viral. 

How Do I Get More Brand Awareness as a CPG Founder?

Posting for reach gets you in front of consumers, but posting for brand awareness is what keeps them thinking about you long after they’ve closed the app. 

Consistency

Get repetitive with your messaging. Say it ten different ways in a variety of formats. Just because you’re bored, doesn’t mean your customers are. In fact, most of the time they’re not even seeing all of your posts, and if they do, they don’t remember it. Their days are busy with their own lives, not one post they saw on Instagram. 

It’s not that consumers are stupid, it’s that they’re busy and distracted. 

Super Clear Positioning

Within 3 seconds of landing on your Instagram or TikTok profile, a new person should be able to tell who you’re for, what problem you solve, and why you exist beyond the product you sell. 

Why are you making high-fiber sauce? Who are you to create the next snack innovation? This is why you should have a brand & founder story. 

TLDR; consumers want to know who you are and why they should care. 

Visual & Verbal Sameness

People like familiarity; they like to know what they should expect. From their boss, from their friends, and from the brands they interact with every day. 

Use the same color palette in your social media content. Keep a consistent filming style and (more importantly) a consistent photography style. Show up in a predictable scene, format, tone. This also helps you create more & better content because it takes the decisions out of it: you’ll be reusing formats that you know work. 

Now it’s okay to experiment and try new things, especially in the beginning. The goal isn’t to be married to one type of content or one creative style, and it’s definitely not to look the same as everyone else. But don’t reinvent the wheel with every post. 

TLDR; We want consumers to see your post on the explore page and instantly know it’s yours. 

Social Proof

Social proof is one of the strongest types of content that I recommend every single brand on planet Earth use. This can include reviews, testimonials, founder-led content, brand values, even behind-the-scenes that explain why you do things a certain way. Just make sure the content is always relatable and relevant to your consumer, not just to other CPG founders or industry professionals. 

KPIs to Watch for Brand Awareness

Reach tells you you’re on the right track, and impressions are valuable too. 

You can also look at the quality of your new followers (are you attracting the right people?), profile visits, social media engagement from the same customers, and website traffic from social. 

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Wait, Who Am I?

Hiiii! 👋🏻 I’m Sarah, a CPG social media strategist with over 10 years of experience. I went from starting a clean beauty blog right out of high school to managing social media for Canada’s largest wellness retailer. Now I live in the middle of nowhere in North Carolina, helping high-growth entrepreneurs get SEEN so they can build a crazy fun life their business supports, and not the other way around.

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