This is a guest post by Duncan Heath, an online marketer. You can website one of his business website: ExtremeSportsTrader.co.uk. Today, in this post you will get to learn how to establish your website/business as a popular brand and make Google realize it to get huge exposure. I am sure these strategies will be really helpful for you.
There has been a lot of talk recently about the importance of establishing yourself as an online brand to help improve your rankings in the search engines.
Some have argued that search engines are now paying more attention to online ‘brands’, others highlight how establishing yourself as a brand can win you new exposure and there are even those SEO’s who’s research shows that thinking ‘brand’ in your offsite marketing strategy could be more important than just going after desirable keywords.
In my opinion Google is turning to brands in an attempt to rid its SERPS of increasing levels of spam on the web. If it can identify which websites are ‘brands’ it can give more inherent power to these sites as they typically have very low levels of spam and are often well-trusted.
For example, it is unlikely for brands such as Apple, Nike or Sony to harbor spam on their sites or indeed link out to anything unsavory or low quality. Using this logic links from these brand sites can also therefore be given more trust and Google can help establish which sites deserve to be in its index and rank highly.
But how do you convince Google your site is worthy of being classed as a ‘brand’?
Here are 3 criteria that I think Google looks at quite closely and that you can adopt today.
1. Get Brand Links
Instead of just targeting keywords in your anchor text, consider using your company name. If you think about it, getting hundreds and thousands of identical anchor text links to your site is not exactly ‘natural’ and I don’t believe has the ranking influence it once did.
People linking to a powerful brand site such as sony.com wouldn’t all use the anchor text “Sony Bravia TV” would they? You would expect the majority to link like “Sony” or “Sony Corporation” or “www.sony.com” etc. Linking in this ‘brand’ way reinforces the fact that the site is a ‘brand’ company and so more power is given to it. This does not mean you should stop anchor text linking altogether, but instead insure that you have a healthy proportion of brand links compared to more targeted terms.
I recently started increasing the instances of Extreme Sports Trader link text as I found it was way out of proportion with some of my most targeted keyword link texts, which didn’t look natural at all!
2. Get Brand Search
Something that I think is increasingly important in the eyes of search engines is the amount of search conducted around your brand name.
For example, if thousands of people are searching in Google for “The Fast Cars Company”, but only a few are searching for “Mike’s Rapid Cars”, which do you think Google would determine the most popular?
It makes sense that highly searched for brands are going to be more trusted and more welcome in search results as they are what people are looking for in the first place. However, increasing the number of people searching for your brand is easier said than done, so how do you do it?
- Your brand search will increase naturally as you get more online exposure and more traffic from SEO
- Engaging in social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter can give you the opportunity to advertise your brand and get more people searching for it.
- Actively commenting on blogs in your niche and including your brand name (not necessarily a link) in your comments will help get your name out there and stuck in people’s minds
- Using offline media such as flyers, magazine advertising or public relations will increase the number of people searching for your site when they get online.
- These are just a few ways in which you can increase brand search, but I’m sure you can find many more that are just as effective.
3. Getting Brand Mentions
Getting mentions or references (not links) to your brand name or your website is something that I am seeing as an increasingly effective SEO strategy. Let’s say for example that Google has (via a number of criteria) pretty much established that your website’s brand is “Terry’s Tremendous Toys”. Now, every time this name is mentioned in text somewhere on the internet, this not only acts as reinforcement for the brand, but also an indication of it popularity – so why wouldn’t Google listen to this?
In the same was as links, I suspect getting a mention from a powerful website is worth more than one with low authority, otherwise this would be too easy to spam. Here are some ideas for increasing the number of times your brand or website is mentioned:
- Distribute online press releases using sites such as http://www.free-press-release.com/ including your brand name in the text.
- Use article marketing to not only build links but also increase brand mentions by including this at the bottom of the text
- Use your brand name in your forum signature whenever posting
I know it can be hard to pass up an anchor link building opportunity in favor of a brand link or just a brand mention (if you’re unable to do both), but I assure you the rewards can be far greater if you can convince Google you’re a trusted brand.
Top 10 Search Terms:
• Online Branding Methods
Ya i agree with you, And the most important is the convincing power i guess and how to impress it to your fullest. I would lay more attention toward Brand linking.
I think branding has been and is a very important part of an Internet presence. strong links and great anchor text..will be a big part of achieving this…
Great post Duncan and I think you are bringing a fresh look at ranking in Google and I have to say I agree totally with your logic. My buinsess The Margaret River Guide is an online resource and building our brand to stand out from the crowd in real tearms not just the internet has to be pivotal for the long term strength of the business, and for that instance as you point out Google’s long term success.
Thank you and I am greatful to be following you on Twitter to find this article shared! Social media at its best.
Branding is the first thing to do before creating product, before launch product you have to quite research of your branding
Good Job Duncan!
You have floated comparatively a new idea of Search Engine Optimization with Branding. I am convinced that this type of strategy will surely work with Google and other search engines.
In this way blog and website owners are actually investing their time for future benefits.
I agree with you. It’s good to see this information in your post. I was looking the same but there was not any proper resources, thanks now. It was very well authored and easy to understand. Good luck.
These are few useful tips for branding, I agree that branding your company name is really good in SEO as well as for reliability. Nice post Duncan.
Your legitimacy these days is very tied into your Google rankings. There are only 2 ways onto that first page, buy your way on or through content and linking.
doing guest posts on different blogs is also a good way to get backlinks and prove authority on a specific niche.. not to mention blogs should be of relevant niche and top PR and authority in itself
Hmm, Really interesting..
Today the thing I learned is that there is no use of using anchor text every time, and thats very true that big brands are never using things like sony bravia tv, they just use their brand names, that simply means we need to make our brand popular.
really interesting guide.