How Powerful is Your Online Brand?

Online branding is something that many businesses these days invest heavily in and with great reason.  With over 2 billion web users*, the Internet is now a powerful way to share your message and sell to your customers.  The only problem is, many business owners have no idea how to harness the power of their online brand.

In an article on MSN’s Business on Main called, “Make Your Brand E-vailable“, the author explores simple ways that you can help increase your brand awareness and brand exposure with minimal time investment.  I highly encourage you to check that article out as there are awesome and easy steps outlined that you can take each day, each week and each month.

To add my own spin to the conversation, I want to talk about looking at how powerful your online brand currently is.  

Here are a few questions to ask yourself:

If someone were to drop in from the sky and land on my website without searching to get there or having any prior information, would they be able to discern what my company is about in 1-2 minutes?

When I am explaining what I do to people, am I clear and articulate or do I falter and fumble?  Do people seem to get what it is I am explaining quickly or does it take awhile, a few examples, etc.?

How many times have I heard, “What you do is so exciting / engaging / interesting / appealing!” and how many people have truly been excited about what it is you do?

How often do people refer others to my website, my offerings, etc.?

If you are finding that people have a hard time understanding what it is you do or they just don’t “get” the next step that they are to take when they land on your website, you may want to tighten up your brand.  The goal is to get people to act quickly and feel like, when they come to your site, that they are getting answers to their questions and solutions to their problems.

The quickest way to do this is to look at your website and change the “I” language to “you” language.  Instead of talking about yourself, your company, your achievements, etc., focus on talking to your prospect so that they can quickly discern if your website is the place for them.

The other thing you want to do is make sure that the information you are sharing is shareable.  Make sure that your online brand is setup in such a way that encourages the sharing of your information to others.  This could be through Facebook/Twitter share icons, a newsletter that people can forward or by providing solutions that people will naturally want to share.

Make sure that you check out MSN’s Business on Main article called, “Make Your Brand E-vailable” for quick, easy action items that you can literally do starting today.

* Statistic was taken from the Internet World Stats website.

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My blog is part of an online influencer network for Business on Main. I receive incentives to share my views on a monthly basis.

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