What brand is all about?
Though many things are considered to be part of a brand, a brand is essentially the perception of the customers towards a product. This perception is much more important than the tangible attributes that are commonly associated to a brand, like the name, logo, packaging and things that symbolically represent a product. The perception of the users is responsible for the equity of a brand or a brand value.
How exactly brands help to sell?
According to Davis Aaker, the Vice Chairman of Prophet, creator of the Aaker Model™, and an eminent teacher and writer on branding and marketing, brands have equity because they have high awareness, many loyal customers, and a high reputation for perceived quality. It is a general trend that consumers prefer high-equity brands because they find it easier to interpret what benefits the brand offers, feel more confident of it and get more satisfaction from using it. This brand equity or perception about a product cannot be developed overnight. It takes considerable amount of time and conscious efforts to establish a brand in the consumers’ psyche.
Why it’s a different ball game when it comes to World Wide Web?
Advertising and other marketing efforts are the most widely used mediums for establishing a brand and building brand value. Much like the conventional process of brand building, online business or e-commerce is also heavily dependent on advertising and online marketing campaigns.
Why search engines are so important for online brand building?
As major portion the online buyers depend on the search engine results to find the product or services they are looking for, search engines are undoubtedly the most powerful medium for building a brand in the online business.
According to a recent study, 62% of search engine users look no further than the first page of the search results and 90% of them do not go beyond the first three pages of the search engine result to select a site for making purchase. Moreover, 36% of search engine users believe that the top ranking companies at the search engine result pages are top companies in that respective industry.
How does SEO benefit the online brand building process?
• Be at the top - It quite evident that if you are looking to build a brand at the World Wide Web, your site must feature at the top result pages of the leading search engine and most likely in the first result page itself. It will not only guarantee increase of traffic to your site but also effectively build your brand image. To get that coveted top ranking at the organic search results of the leading search engines like Google, Yahoo, and MSN, search engine optimization is the most viable solution you have got.
• Break the digital divide - A successful SEO campaign will not only improve your search engine ranking but also put you in the same bracket with the best and largest players in your industry. Being at the same platform with biggest names in your industry will surely increase your brand value.
• Leverage from your ranking - With the top ranking at the leading search engines, it is quite evident that traffic to your site will significantly increase. The best part of this traffic is that most of them are pre-qualified customers and hence major part of these leads will convert in sales. So, with a search engine ranking your customer base will increase rapidly. This increase in the sales will not only give you a financial gain but also build an interest and reputation of your brand thanks to the recent trends of blogs and online reviews and of course word of mouth that spreads like fire in the consumer market.
• Improve the page rank - With more visitors, greater sales volume, the importance of your site is improved significantly. With this improving reputation at the online world, your site is all set for a top ranking for longer period of time that will result is a sharper increase in the brand value.
• Be consistent in your SEO objectives - With a consisting ranking at the leading search engine result pages, you create a long lasting and strong influence on the mind of your customers. This will guarantee the brand loyalty of the customers. Therefore, it is important that instead of one time SEO campaign to take a long time program for your SEO initiative that will definitely contribute to your brand equity.
• Brighten your online image - Online reputation management that is the buzz in the present context can be successfully done with the help of SEO. By providing better ranking of pro brand sites and eventually lowering the ranks of the ‘boycott’ or ‘flame’ sites you can achieve better brand management through SEO.
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