Sunday, November 28, 2010

Why Branding Is Important



Brand Awareness Is Designed To Generate Customer Loyalty


It is the choosing of one brand versus another. Brand awareness and identity are components of a strategy to persuade a customer that its brand is reliable and trustworthy. Branding is no longer just the idea of logos, color schemes and a company's tagline of who they think they are. It is now tied into the perception of the customer and what they think and say about the brand.


What does your customer think about your company and brand? It matters what your customers are saying. Customers are using social media groups to share their thoughts about a company's products, services and brand. They are asking where they can get a particular product and getting answers back from tweets to Facebook posts. Is your brand being tweeted about, posted on Facebook or talked about on other social networks? It's not what you know, but it's who you know in today's social media marketing.


Why did you choose to purchase a Dell computer intead of a Gateway computer? Microsoft, Hewlett-Packard, Macy's, Tiffany's, Target and other companies are excellent examples of having the ability to win customer loyalty. Building brand awareness is more than providing a product or service. Customers want to purchase from reliable and trusted sources.


The customer's perception is an idea that they have or do not have about your company. All too often, companies strive for short-term results rather than long-term relationships that cultivate brand loyalty. A company that builds a strong brand is better protected from the impact of competitors. It also serves as a way to differentiate a company or product.

Monday, November 22, 2010

Wasting Money On Search Engine Optimization



In a recent report by a Conductor, a New York Company, that analyzes paid and organic search strategies, they found that Fortune 500 companies spend $51 million per day in aggregate on 88,792 keywords but only 20.8% rank in the top 100 of natural search results. This means that 80% of the $51 million a day, $40 million a day is completely waste.

The study measures the maturity of natural search efforts in comparison with the pay-per-click spending. The study also examines whether investments pay off for paid search terms made by Fortune 500 companies while looking at the top 200 and branded keywords.

"It remains alarming that more than the lion's share of pay-per-clicks are not showing up anywhere in search results for their most important keywords," said Seth Besmertnik, Conductor CEO. "As a group, the Fortune 500 continues to remain largely invisible in natural search results."

While your company isn't among the Fortune 500, are you too wasting money on pay-per-click keywords?

Monday, November 15, 2010

Integrated Marketing


Companies selling their products or services to manufacturing professsionals face the challenges that marketers in any industry do: determining who, exactly, the audience is and how best to reach them. These hurdles can be particularly complex in the manufacturing market, however, because business has rapidly moved online, and many marketers are struggling to keep pace. Because buyers are gathering so much information online, they're contacting suppliers much later in the buying cycle. By the time buyers contact them, they've probably filtered out a few companies. They've extended the buying process deeper without asking any questions.


This shift makes in-depth product information more important than ever. Many times, you're dealing with an engineer who needs very technical, specifications-based data. Is it big enough; fast enough; does it cycle this many times? There better be good information for them - and it better be within your web site.


Most important, marketers need to drive prospects to their web site. Marketers should be using an integrated approach that incorporates traditional media such as print advertising, as well as online tactics with vertical magazine web sites and search engine marketing.


You can't assume there's one best way to reach your audience. Even within a particular company, you might have one guy who's been there 20 years and is not getting online when researching products. But there may be an up-and-comer at the same company who's downloading podcasts and attending webinars to learn about things.


MY OBJECTIVE:

To share common sense lessons learned with 40-plus years experience in marketing, sales and as a B2B publisher.

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