subject: Branding You and Your Business! [print this page] Branding You and Your Business! Branding You and Your Business!
If you've been hanging around the internet for a while you've probably heard the statement that you should "brand yourself" on the internet. What does branding mean and how can it help in your online marketing efforts? We're talking about promoting your name so when a person hears your name they relate to the product or service that you represent. On the other side of the coin you want people to think of your product or service when the person thinks of you. This is what successful branding yourself on the internet is all about.
The buzz word "branding" has been around for a while and many of the major companies have done a great job of branding themselves. These big companies have totally redesigned their marketing campaigns, corporate logos, created catchy theme songs as well as spending millions of dollars on super bowl ads just to create a brand for themselves. Many times a person or company may be recognizable by using only one letter of the alphabet.
One individual that has really capitalized on this concept uses the single letter "O". Who do you think of when you see the letter "O"? .. Oprah! When you see the letter "M" you think of McDonald's. When you see the huge horses pulling a wagon, you think of the "King of Beers." Many of these marketing giants have spent millions of dollars to brand themselves as the biggest and best in their specific product or service category. It may not be true, however, the general public relates to these success stories.
If you have a lot of money and too much time on your hands you might be able to duplicate the same end result, however, branding yourself online is much simpler than that. Branding yourself online is all about letting people know who you are, what you do, and how you do it. Your whole point here is to make the potential client come away believing that you are bigger than, better than and you have the ability to give better service than your competition.
You need to define your brand right up front and keep that name in front of your prospect as often as possible without becoming obvious of your intent. When a user visits your website the first thing they should see is who you are and what you can provide to meet their immediate needs.
Having a website that is loaded with flashy graphics and catchy slogans but still leaves the potential client wondering what you are marketing is absolutely worthless to you and the user. The best approach here is to spell it out for the user in simple, down to earth, non techie terms so there is no mistake about what you or your site is all about.
It's important to let the potential client know exactly what you do rather than who you are at this point. It is vital to let your customer know what your product or service can do for them so they can determine whether you are important to them and their immediate needs. Once they know what you are offering, then you can introduce yourself and explain how that you can help them with their dilemma.
Graphics and flash may be appealing to the user; however, it is not important to the search engines. What impresses the search engines is good keyword rich relevant content in your website. The engines do not read pictures, flash, java etc., the engines only reads content.
What matters most when designing a website is to try to cover all the bases we've already discussed above. Just remember the most important of all these elements is the content of your site. Without the search engines picking up your site and ranking you according to your abilities to optimize your opportunity you will never be found by user when a query is searched for on the search engines.
If you want users and fans to visit your site and purchase your opportunity you must have interesting, brand-related content. Always write your information in a non-techie format. Having a lot of bullet points will n appear to some users as a little bit techie so just write like you talk and you should see some positive response from your visitors rather quickly.
If you do end up using some fancy spinning logo or flash make sure it's relevant to your opportunity and not just decoration. You flashy logo should reinforce your identity and message about your product or service.
It's all about learning how to brand yourself and your company name. This simply means that you should let the consumer know what you do, who you are and how you do it, in simple, words without all the hype, smoke and mirrors that many marketers are using today in their marketing campaigns.
The eBiz Solutions Team is standing by to assist you in your marketing challenges. Call today for your free 30 minutes "no obligation" consultation.
