In many ways, the Internet is almsot a hybrid of most other marketing channels (print, broadcast, DM) with outdoor possibly being the exception. But the segments that really stand out would be social media and search. Engagement and influence has never been known to such a degree before.

Branding Online as a Medium is a post from: Online Branding Blog - reactorr.com

The results? While the clear winner is SEO, about 60 percent of respondents said they will increase their budget for social media marketing; with 53 percent planning to increase their budget towards SEO and 40 about percent will be increasing their PPC budget.

While social media is clearly the trend as of late, it’s often difficult to measure. But despite this, social media is not hype. What needs to be understood is that it takes time, and it can have significant influence towards online branding efforts.

SEO might take a while before seeing signs of progress, but it’s the clear winner. With the highest conversion rates, SEO outperforms all other means of online marketing. It’s worth mentioning that while PPC can bring traffic almost instantly, it will cost more over time than SEO, and is most suitable for starting a campaign to acquire traffic until an SEO campaign kicks into high gear. Additionally, PPC only earns about 10% of the potential search traffic, and if you’re not in the top spots (which are more expensive bids) then you won’t see a lot of visits.

Report

SEO, Social Media, PPC Compared is a post from: Online Branding Blog - reactorr.com

Let’s clear the air and get this in the open to remove any misconceptions. They aren’t one and the same, but one can have a significant impact on the other.

Online branding and SEO (along with social media to some extent) have shown an increasing value to each other in the last few years, but somehow more than a few don’t get it. So let’s break it down and get to it.

When taking the approach of using online branding with SEO, you need to build your rankings for keywords of relevance so that your brand begins to become synonymous for a phrase through search. Read that last sentence again.

Not only does it have a positive affect on your online reputation, it also creates momentum for the entire marketing initiative.

It’s not one versus the other, they need to work in a cohesive manner.

Online Branding SEO is a post from: Online Branding Blog - reactorr.com

“When I was growing up in the industry, let me entertain you, let me make you smile, I’m very versatile, it was one way.”

Advertising was this way for decades, and what may have worked for the last 40 years clearly isn’t as effective these days. A shift like this comes as no surprise. Whether its advertising or just about anything, things change.
Reinhard goes on to describe the way things work now by suggesting…

“Now it’s we’re better together”.

This is a great point as the emergence of social media has had such an impact on brands, possibly one of the largest in recent times. Consumers are tired of being told and now look within their networks or trusted resources or contacts for more impartial views and recommendations.

An interesting point also brought up in the video mentions how when a CEO is really involved with the brand, the brand endures, has integrity, and can sustain the revolving doors of marketing directors.  A great point as with each change in marketing leadership comes someone that scraps direction and previously built equity.

One of the best definitions of a brand I’ve heard was provided during this interview…

A brand is who you are, what you do, why you do it, and how you do it.
One person that has maintained these types of values is Steve jobs of Apple. Over the course of the last 20 years Apple as a brand has probably never strayed far. But one example of branding confusion that comes to mind is McDonald’s. It seems with each new agency they hire (every 2-3 years) there is a different direction in the messaging. For example, they make burgers, they make them fast, and their affordable. But over the years they’ve introduced pizza, ribs, and even salads.

Online branding will take marketing to new heights with the speed at which you can connect with consumers. With social media, search marketing, and Internet advertising a brand can literally grow at sonic speeds compared with the past.

Marketers still seem to overlook the potential of SEO and how it can drive measureable revenue to their online business, yet have adopted to the virtues of social media rather quickly.

Perhaps it’s the inability of the average marketer to truly understand the benefits of how SEO and online branding belong together and how it can help their bottom line.

With paid search marketing results (PPC) accounting for roughly 20% of the clicks in typical search results, that leaves a lot of cash on the table in terms of customer acquisition.

For SEO’s, the following isn’t new information, but it might be of interest to marketers which are less familiar with the practice.
If you try the Google Keyword Tool you can get some insight to the potential of SEO and appearing in natural search results. Depending on the phrase, you can increase your visibility by thousands and more with a properly executed SEO strategy that pushes your site into the top 10 results.

It’s important to note that SEO is similar to branding in one sense. It’s a process and requires a fair amount of time to achieve those top ranking results. Realistic expectations depending on your industry to rise to the top can range from 6 months to several years. One of the keys to increased success in this venture is the quality of your content or offering. By focusing on this aspect, marketers stand to gain advocates, which will assist in the link building process by blogging, tweeting, or linking to your site for you.

You might be thinking tweeting falls under social media, but it’s the content they tweet that should be part of your SEO strategy. Sometimes referred to as link bait, it’s about the creation of quality content that will help to get those links.

Content creation and planning sometimes falls on the shoulders of an SEO, as does PR and many other tasks.  It’s always wise to have an SEO involved in the process but not necessarily depend solely on them to create this sort of material.

The role of SEO is about optimizing a site (for starters), but more important, is to improve the online visibility of said website so that it will rank for phrases that you’re targeting for your business.

When you think about it, there isn’t anything much better than your site showing up in the top listings when a potential customer is in the buying mode and looking for a product or service like one you might offer.


There is more likelihood of them inquiring or purchasing versus presenting banner ads all over. Most web users have banner blindness. Can you recall 3 banners you’ve seen in the last week? Most are lucky to be able to name one they had seen.

There probably isn’t a better way to position your brand online than showing up in the top search results. In the long run, your brand will become synonymous with the phrases you’ve targeted and displaying in those results also provides credibility to your brand’s product or service.

You should note that when you appear in those results, the url in first position will get about 42% of the clicks, while second gets 12%, third gets 9%, and it starts to drop sharply with each position after. And being on page two is like not being found at all.

You can see the entire interview mentioned above here.

Branding Online – Why Marketers Need SEO is a post from: Online Branding Blog - reactorr.com

When building your brand online there are several ways to go, or you can include them all. Internet advertising is often the route many will choose to start, yet similar to branding offline, it is both time consuming and expensive.

Social media is another option, but I don’t think this a strategy to rely on entirely. More of something to include with your internet marketing plan in addition to other strategies you might include.

With search engine optimization (SEO), there is really only one downside, and that is that it takes time to develop before seeing results. However, it’s been proven time and again that SEO provides the best ROI in the long term.

With SEO, not only do the links drive potential customers, it also has direct correlation to online branding because as you begin to rank for key phrases that consumers are already searching for, it creations a connection to the brand. This means that a brand can become synonymous with phrases that consumers are looking for, and creates that top of mind awareness when a site is ranking.

By including SEO in your online branding efforts you’re going to push your brand harder, and can achieve the branding holy grail – having keyowrds trigger consumers to think of your brand. This is how strong brands evolve.

By ranking (or owning) a phrase, your brand becomes synonymous with a phrase. In the offline world, it takes marketing and advertising agencies years and years to achieve this. If ever.

Your brand image is more than the logo or identity created. It’s about reputation management, advertising, public relations, and the emotion or thoughts that it conjurs up when mentioned.

SEO could be one of the most powerful tools available to grow, shape, and ultimately reach brand status.

      “The value of identity of course is that so often with it comes purpose.”

- Richard R. Grant

You can define and craft a vision of what your brand stands for through SEO by ranking for terms and phrases which represent your product or service.

Case in point; if you were to search for “buy books”, depending on your location, you’ll probably see Amazon as the first result. In Canada the website Chapters displays first. And considering that 42% of the clicks will go to that first listing in the search results and only 12% to the second result, its clear that the majority will click on that first listing and probably associate it as where they should just go if they wanted to buy books.

It’s important to note that online branding success factors differ from those of offline brands. If you take a look at Interbrands top 100 you’ll notice that many of those such as Google or eBay are unique to the web, or that the internet would have played a large part in their development.

Brands overestimate the extent to which consumer pay attention to branding, but the way it influences their decisions is almost subliminal, and SEO can be a major force.

Pick your battles/keywords wisely and you just might shave a few years off of developing your brand online.

Online Branding and SEO is a post from: Online Branding Blog - reactorr.com

Reactorr has created SEO ROI calculator to determine the potential value of ranking between positions one and ten, depending on the value of a sale, and the conversion.

How Much Is Ranking Worth? is a post from: Online Branding Blog - reactorr.com