Brand or Not to Brand Advertise
What do I know about Brand Advertising? So the question this month is to look at whether it is worth brand advertising or not. It’s not actually that much of a difficult a choice and the answer is almost certainly going to be Yes.
So the first thing you’d expect is that if you type into Google your brand name your website would come up. Or more pertinently if you typed a Brand you were looking for into Google it would show up. One question you might ask yourself at this point is would you type in a Brand name at all and would you remember or notice you were doing it? Oddly, we don’t actually type in the brand name as often as we think we do.
If I’m looking for Yacht varnish, I might well type in ‘International Paints’, but that’s not quite the whole story, is it? In truth our psychology as humans automatically goes a step further if it’s a common household Brand like Domestos we’re going to be looking for where to buy it, Amazon, eBay, Asda all spring to mind. But if we’re looking for something specific then we’ll look for the website of the manufacturer or ‘representative’ of the brand. We humans automatically make the decision when we type in our search requirements.
So – that’s the important question when considering whether to promote your Brand or not. Do you promote the brands you sell? Are you a reseller, will people buy from you, because you are you? Are you the manufacturer and therefore looking for ways to avoid the middleman?
And something else I’ve never quite understood, if you are avoiding the middleman – why price your pricing higher than your resellers, why not really cut out the middleman? I know that question has all sorts of implications, but it is a question that needs to be asked. When the Internet was first born it was seen as the place to avoid multiple steps in a buying process and get the right product or service into the right place for a lower cost. The result of 25 years of eCommerce is that it is often cheaper to nip out to Screwfix to buy a pot of Varnish.
Ways to Advertise Brand
The obvious way to push your Brand is through your domain name and website. All search engines will give a lot of weight to your website if it has your logo on it. And therefore you should expect a quick search on Google to see your name at the top.
But do not be fooled – there are a number of steps you need to take to ensure this is the case:
- Visit the search engine using your Browser in its Incognito mode. This mode hides your location and other identifying factors that search engines will use to make it appear your website is at the top. You have to look for your brand as if you were the first and only person to ever look for it.
- Try a few different Browsers and search engines the Browser wars have not really ended and in particular, Microsoft Edge is becoming increasingly important as a source of your traffic.
- Try looking on your Mobile as well. There is every chance that your website has more visitors on Mobile Devices than on old-fashioned desktops and laptops.
Once you are satisfied that your Brand does appear at the top if not very close to the top then you’re a significant portion of the way there.
The question that needs answering is whether or not you saw any Adverts along the way. If you’re competing in the world of Yacht Vanish there may well be 5 or 6 similar Brands to yours and because they sell products that are very similar depending on their reputation with Google then they may supersede your website.
The second of our major ways to advertise Brand is to have a Google (and a Bing) Profile – these used to be called Google My Business, but are now known as Google Business Profiles. It’s the big square box you see on the right-hand side of a Google search, Bing, has them as well… if you look up something like ‘who wrote Cindarella’ you won’t see this box – because it’s not relevant to anyone’s business… On the other hand, if you look up a Brand such as ‘Trainline’ you’ll see an introduction to their Profile.
You can claim this box for your Brand or Business and then edit accordingly. it will be yours to control.
This leaves Paid Advertising.
In days gone by I refused to recommend this course of action – what’s the point of spending money on Brand when you’re at the top of Google anyway? And the point I have learned is as follows:
- You control the narrative. Your brand might show up in the free listings, but Google often controls the text that goes with it. Or the text is drawn from your website. Either way, an advert has far more to offer, it can entice, have extra buttons, an image and generally make your brand look better.
- It’s cheap. realistically few people will be advertising on your Brand… and firstly if they are, you need to be above them and if they aren’t you will only ever pay rock bottom prices. Brand clicks can cost as little as £0.04p – they make your whole advertising campaign more cost-effective, drive clicks and also are what your customers are actually looking for.
- It’s a protection. other similar Brands will be put off advertising on your Brand if it means they have to pay a premium. They cannot steal your traffic and customers quite so easily.
- You control the narrative and costs and you can see the data. the data is often overlooked while you can vaguely ascertain where users come from and what they buy, with Paid Ads you get far more accurate and better data.
- Google promotes you. I’ll be in trouble for this one – but if you’re a paying customer, Google will prefer and respect you more. If you’re investing in your website or brand – Google is going to repay that investment – Many a time I have seen that a website’s total visitors go up by more than just the clicks they are paying for.
Social Media
When it comes to advertising on Brand we have to consider Social Media – many Social Media websites are App-driven on Mobiles… they also try to hide their ‘contribution’ to your brand. In short, they don’t really want people leaving their ‘network’ and visiting someone else’s website. it’s not good business for them.
You also have the issue with Apps – if a user does click a link in an App and that leaves the App and opens up a new Browser App to visit the website – no one knows where that Traffic to the website has come from. The apps do not share data. Google, Bing and the rest cannot tell what is going on. The App can tell a user has left the App, but the App cannot tell what caused someone to open it.
There is also a delay in people’s usage when it comes to Social media. People look at their Facebook and Instagram and browse through their updates, but they cannot or don’t necessarily click the links or immediately visit the Brand. Instead – something else triggers them later on. At another time. A quick purchase or some memory requires them to buy the Yacht Varnish and at that point, they type in the Brand on their search engine and at that point, it matters that the right website shows up at the top. With Social Media, there is a delay. But having the Brand at the top of the search engine when it is typed in is vital.
Conclusion
You can definitely save money on paid advertising when it comes to Brand, but is it worth it? If you have to spend on Sales and Marketing anyway there is one last law of advertising that applies and that is always reach for the lowest-hanging fruit.
Any salesman should be able to tell you that explaining something to a buyer that they already know will be the easiest way to sell them whatever it is you are selling. Varnish will protect the wood, and that will always be the best way to sell something. So really you just need to apply the principle of giving people what they already want. If they search for your Brand and a competitor appears, you will have lost a sale.
The lowest-hanging fruit should be the cheapest and easiest sale of them all, so why not make it what the customer already wants? – your Brand.