Increase Brand Awareness
Proactively making your company known in your industry, in a positive way, will go far in helping you build a client base. Why? If you can make your brand name come to mind when someone thinks of your industry, even regionally, you will be the first call they make when they need the service or product you provide.
Of course equal care should be taken in avoiding negative brand awareness – remember that if a customer comes away with a bad client experience, that impression can spread like wildfire across your industry. Prevention is always easier than repairing a bad reputation so make your client service a top priority.
So how do you build brand awareness?
Do-it-yourself
- Put out press releases. It doesn’t cost
you a thing but time to write and distribute press
releases and if your story gets picked up, the media
exposure is priceless. Put together a list of as
many local and industry press contacts as you can
and send your releases directly to them via email
or fax. You can also distribute releases to the
press at large through a newswire: the most commonly
used are BusinessWire
and PRNewswire,
both of which charge depending on the extent of
your distribution, but a relative newcomer called
PRWeb.com
is free!
- Attend industry events and seminars to see what
your competitors are doing, hobnob with potential
clients and partners and keep up-to-date with developments
in your industry.
- Volunteer to speak on your topic of expertise
for regional and industry organizations. This is
an ideal way to establish yourself as an expert
in your field, and it puts you in front of prospective
clients at the same time!
- List your company in appropriate regional and
industry directories. Many of these are Web-based
and free (like www.superpages.com)
though some specialized sites may require a subscription
fee.
- Make sure your website content contains prominent
placement of industry keywords – this is the
first step towards increasing your ranking in search
engines and it also makes for a smooth transition
for visitors who come to your site from industry
directories.
- Submit your site to search engines. Submission to most search engines is free, you’re basically asking them to take a look at your site with regard to certain industry keywords so they know it’s there and can consider it for their search rankings. See the Additional Resources below for links to major search engine submission pages.
Professional
- Enlist help to identify the most effective places
to be for brand awareness in your industry. If you
don’t have the time to do it yourself or don’t
know where to start, we can help identify and place
directory listings, see Services
| Marketing.
- Exhibit at industry tradeshows. While national industry shows can be quite costly for exhibitors, regional shows are often a more cost-effective option. An effective tradeshow presence includes a booth design that reflects your corporate identity, trained booth staff, and effective pre-show promotion and post-show follow-up.
Expert
- Advertise your business through the most effective
channels for reaching your specific customer audience.
This could include magazine ads, billboards, TV
and radio commercials, or online banner ad campaigns.
Because the direct impact of advertising on your
bottom-line is often difficult to measure, look
at most advertising expenditures as an investment
in solidifying your brand image to your client base
and for building awareness of your name in your
industry. See also Services
| Marketing or Portfolio
| Print.
- Invest in professional search engine optimization (SEO) for your website. When you enlist the help of a reputable firm to optimize your website, they’ll analyze your site’s current rankings on your chosen keywords and use the constantly evolving rules of various search engines to specifically optimize the text and code of your site for select industry keywords. Beware of firms offering SEO services at cheap rates or guaranteeing high ranking – there is no way to guarantee top ranking. If it seems too good to be true, it is.
 |
Have an idea or tip for building brand awareness
that you don’t see here?
Email
it to us and we’ll add it, crediting you
with a link to your site (if you’d prefer, we
can also post it anonymously).
|
Additional Resources
| PublicityInsider.com | Good information on writing effective press releases. |
| PRWeb.com | Free newswire distribution of press releases. |
| Submit your site for consideration in search engine rankings. | |
| Yahoo | Submit your site for consideration in search engine rankings. |
