Building A Successful Online Brand

The reasons for branding a company, product etc are basic enough; you want someone to think of your business first whenever they think about a product or service. Online branding doesn’t mean having an animated logo or online using your corporate colours. It is about what you can offer a user, credibility, trust and good user experience.

It is a hard road especially if you are a new brand in an existing market where competitors are many. It doesn’t get any easier when your brand exists solely online and a consumer is not bound by locality or time. A consumer can just as easily buy the same product from overseas at a cheaper price than their local provider. They won’t get personal service or a friendly face but they will get a significant discount on the item delivered straight to their door with only a few extra days wait.

Still, online shopping doesn’t have 100% penetration. There are still more people browsing online that aren’t actually buying online. The proportion has been shrinking steadily and it will be the companies that have invested in their online brand, made positive connections with the early to mid adopters that will continue to build and reap the benefits.

There are some key elements to online branding that many businesses still don’t understand. Lessons have to be learned.

1. Value proposition. This doesn’t just mean that the products for sale online are cheap. Low prices are expected but the ‘value’ of the user experience is what will build brand loyalty and spark the beginnings of the holy grail of online brands – word of mouth and community.

   What are you offering to the consumer? Ease, convenience, price, speed – you have to make sure you deliver! Online consumers are quick to praise a good site through a multitude of avenues open to them, but they are much quicker at ripping a site to shreds if their experience is negative.

2. Community or user generated content. A new brand online has the problem of starting from scratch. No content besides a product offering can make it hard to get traction. The best content is generated not by marketing executives or advertising agencies but through the user themselves. Reviews, blogs, forums and comments, form a bond between a new user, existing users and the brand itself. A real user’s opinion is worth a thousand opinions of the editor.

   Besides the SEO benefits user feedback, forums and reviews can provide stickiness to a site that feeds itself. It can act as a feedback forum for new functionality, a sounding board for new ideas and create brand evangelists that will do your marketing for you!

3. Credibility, transparency and service. Why do users bail out at the last minute? Trust and credibility – “will I actually get what I am paying for?”, “who are these people and where are they?” and “what do I do if it all goes wrong?”

   These questions have to be answered on the site, clearly and immediately. A user’s perception can be clouded by many things; a poorly chosen url, hidden contact details, hidden charges and disclaimers and lack of help options.

   Make it very clear what the user will receive, how they pay for it, how much it costs, return policies, provide a clear method of contact and make sure any user contact is responded to quickly and clearly.

   An online brand that ignores its users will inevitably fail – good service is still the cornerstone of successful user retention.

4. Customisation of functionality and user tools. A good online brand respects its users and their valuable time. If you expect repeat business and you ask a user to register their details, maybe even their interests and habits, then use the information in a way that will benefit them.

   Consider targeted content through information gained through registration or past purchasers. If a user has bought 25 CDs of classical jazz they most likely don’t want to see promotions for heavy metal drum solos.

5. Strategic partnerships with ‘like’ brands. A user’s journey on the internet can start in one place and end seemingly miles away – but mostly the journey will be based around their personal interests or current needs. To this end linking your site to others that are not in competition but are complimentary is a very effective branding tool. It also allows great revenue potential when you start serving targeted banner ads through display advertising or Google adwords.

6. Reputation Management. Subscribe to relevant blog feeds, consumer forums and communities. Find out who it is that is talking about your site or your brand and try to understand them, engage them in genuine conversation and take advantage of the free market research this provides. Services such as Google Blog Search, search.twitter and Google Alerts all offer RSS feeds to help track your reputation.