Here we go. Creating the online brand
The web user will ultimately “feel” a business and its approach to the world through the website. Not my words, the words of Gordon Montgomery a lecturer from the University of San Francisco. I agree, and the responsibility of the marketing manager is to give a holistic and realistic feel for the business through the website.
How do you create an Online Brand? Well this is a giant topic , so let’s start from scratch with basic elements required to provide effective branding with your website.
Step One – Create a consistent look and feel
If one were to rewind the clock 14 months ago Flaman.com and all the various divisional sub-sites had their own look and feel. It seems pretty basic but step one is creating a consistent look and feel for the websites. Beyond the look the feel it is hoped that management provides some guidelines on brand development or corporate identity:
- A statement for the overall goal for the brand
- Target markets identified for brand development
- Details on how the brand is to be differentiated from other brands
- Financial goals for the brand
Step Two – Back to basics again, how to define the look
Fortunately for the web the there are some guidelines that have begun to evolve for how a website should look.
- Logo on the top left corner
- Creating a navigation area that stays consistent throughout the site
- Global site navigation and local navigation
- Use a consistent color scheme
A year ago none of these guidelines were in use. They are now.
Step Three – Design for the user not you
While overall branding encompasses all aspects of the company face from business cards to billboards. The web is a little more complex than ensuring the correct logo is used with the appropriate sizing, font and Pantone colors. The brand of the site is also about the user experience. So focus your design around that. If the site is easy to use the customer will be branded to believe the company is easy to buy from or work with. If the site is an in your face yell and sell ad platform a user might assume the brand is about transactional relationships as opposed to long term relationships. So use all the right branding colors and follow the design guidelines but also be cognitive about how the user is going to use the site. Their experience is as much about creating a brand impression as the logo is.
Why is Branding important on the web?
As stated at the start, “The web user will ultimately “feel” a business and its approach to the world through the website”. The web is always on and creating an impression. I want it to be a good one.
Steve Whittington is President of Roadmap Agency Inc. He has also served for over a decade as a member of the Executive Team of Flaman Group of Companies an award-winning organization and has over 25 years of executive experience. Steve’s current board work includes serving as; President of Glenora Child Care Society; and Co-Chair of the Marketing Program Advisory Committee for NAIT’s JR Shaw School of Business. Previous notable board work included, Chair of the board for Flaman Fitness Canada, a national retailer, a Director for a meal prep internet Startup Mealife and Chair of Lethbridge Housing authority, the third-largest Social housing NGO in Alberta.
Academically, Steve was an instructor of Project Management at Lethbridge College for seven years. Steve holds a Bachelor of Commerce Honours degree; he is a Certified Sales Professional (CSP), Project Management Professional (PMP), Certified Marketing Specialist (CMS) and (CCXP) Certified Customer Experience Professional.
Steve’s first book Thriving in the Customer Age – 8 Key Metrics to Transform your Business Results teaches about the customer journey and provides a guiding framework spanning all stages of the customer experience. The book explains how every metric impacts an organization and how leaders can best utilize each metric to provide a stellar customer experience. Everyone knows the customer is the most important part of a business. This book provides the tools to improve an organization’s customer experience and drastically transform business results.
Recently Steve’s Blog has been profiled as one of the Top 75 Customer Experience blogs
Topic: Blogs, Defining A Brand, Logo, Marketing Series, Online Branding, Web Branding