“Online” Is the Real World

Jean Aw | April 9th, 2009 - 11:25 AM
(13) Found this useful. Do you? Yes

I feel like i grew up online. My personal brand barely existed without being online in some form… perhaps email and IM were where it all started, moving quickly to free websites, to my own domains, to my own network of sites… my world – my brand – has nearly always been digital! NOTCOT the name itself came about because of a late night rhyming session to make a random email address between high school homework…. notcot@hotbot.com … So i suppose i can’t speak much to the transition from real world to internet….

BUT… this last week i went more offline than i have in years… all while still checking in on my sites and skimming emails about twice a day briefly for a whole week (sad, isn’t it? how that feels like not working at all?)… it’s certainly helped give me more perspective. Knowing this article was in the works made me more conscious of branding i encountered all around me in my day to day! Also being around older family members who were less techy than usual… seeing the ways they look for information and discuss brands was fascinating! (No, they don’t use maps or google on their phones… and many were just starting to try to make sense of their iPhones and looking things up on wikipedia was this slow and new thing that would come up during dinner conversations…)

I think the singular most crucial question to ask before jumping online is… WHY is someone looking for you online? For example, if you are a restaurant, they probably want your address, hours, and menu… AT THE LEAST. If you are a store, they may want your address, hours, product listings, product availability… you get the point. As a user, there has been nothing less frustrating than searching for more information on a company, finding it online, and then having a completely unusable or outdated site with little to no information. So, DO IT RIGHT. I know so many are jumping on bandwagons left and right these days ~ tossing up multiple facebook fan pages, twitter accounts, microsites for every product ~ tempting and trendy for sure. And probably the easy answer to “How do i take my brand online?” But done badly they will only hurt in the long run…

While the overhead costs for tossing your brand online and making a few webpages are substantially lower than say… opening a brick and mortar store filled with gorgeous shelving and product from wall to wall… the level of planning and detail ready to go into it should be no less. If you’re going to launch 10 new places to “foster conversation”, make sure you have the team in place to fully engage, respond, and play with the community you are inviting in. If you are launching a twitter account, make sure you have the right person (or people) ready to man the account, check the replies, keep an eye on the search results ~ and respond as promptly as the twitter community is accustomed to! Last thing you’d want would be to appear like the shop everyone tried to stop in to that was always out to lunch, not open, or had rude shop people?

I guess to me ~ taking your brand online, should be approached (conceptually) no differently than taking it public and into the real world! Same best practices apply ~ understand the space and expectations, and exceed them!=)

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COMMENTS

4/9/09 - Jinal Shah Says:

Well said! Agreed entirely. Hope all else is well in your world
4/9/09 - Sarah Says:

As a marketing student, this feeds directly into my interests. You brought up a few good points. Thanks for sharing ideas!
4/10/09 - Chris O. Says:

I too am an almost exclusively online brand builder. Running the customer care at Referral Key, I get a feel for how a wide range of professionals approach branding on the net.

I agree with everything you say (especially about keeping your info updated) accept for perhaps the planning necessary to launch a website.

The web has become so competitive that, unless you are serious about devoting time and money into S.E.O. and blogging, you should simply use your website as a place to host materials your existing clients may want to download.

I wouldn’t spend too much time on your site. You can set up a free site on Weebly in a matter of minutes. Furthermore, a strong profile on a business networking site can be more effective than a $5,000 website.

All too often I see small business owners create a site and become disappointed when they realize getting the site on anyone’s radar is a full time job in itself.

It’s not 1998 and just having a website literally means nothing anymore.

You want to promote your business right? Not your website.

The web is littered with dormant small business websites. Not because the design or content isn’t good but because the owner couldn’t (and in many cases doesn’t need to) realistically drive enough traffic to have any kind of Search Engine clout.

It really comes down to what type of small business you’re running.

Yes, a restaurant needs to have some basic information and will most likely get picked up by popular directories like “City Search” and “Yelp” anyways.

Should Financial Planner blow big bucks on an interactive flash site, an S.E.O. specialist, spend two hours a day blogging, creating compelling content and creating inbound links?

Probably not because now he’s promoting his website in the hopes that it will lead to new business; essentially just adding one more step to his marketing strategy.

He’d be better off taking advantage of a profile on a networking site (Which are already ranked) and using that time and money to do some face to face networking.

Just ask a small business owner how much new business they’re generating via their website and the answer is probably little-to-none.

What websites are good for, is hosting resources and information for your existing clients. For example, a Realtor can have a .PDF of their work, an attorney can have a case study for download, an account can create a platform for exchanging documents and so forth.

But remember, these are people who already know about you so the website should be more like stepping into your office; not a store front.

best,

Chris O.
Referral Key
“Your Trusted Referral Network”