You can’t spend much time online without seeing people talk about the importance of online branding — building a brand, defining a brand, you name it. But what is your brand, really?
In many ways, brand is everything. It is the total of your company, your product or service offering, your people, your values, and mission. Perhaps most importantly, it is the public’s perception of all of the above. Your brand is a customer’s first impression of your company, and it also determines what their lasting impression will be.
And everyone knows you never get a second chance to make a first impression. For most businesses, that first impression doesn’t come from the product, the service, or even the customer service team. It comes from the name — and from what a customer finds when they look that name up online.
The Importance of Online Branding Starts With Strategy
In the digital era, your brand position online tells customers and prospects what you have to offer and what sets you apart. It’s more than your brand identity — your logo, your color scheme, your typographical choices. It tells customers about your unique selling propositions and the benefits you offer.
Most brand positions are established online now, for the simple reason that online is where people are most likely to do research and find products and services. They’re looking for everything from home goods to new homes. The first step, of course, is simply having a digital presence — an unavoidable necessity for pretty much any modern business.
But simply being online isn’t enough. It’s just the price of admission for doing business in the digital era. To stand out, you need online branding strategies that help your business grow, thrive, build trust, draw in new customers, and retain the ones you already have.
So what is a brand strategy? Simply put, it’s a comprehensive plan that covers the long-term development of your brand. What that means in practice is a business plan focused on building the brand you want for your business and making sure it’s the impression customers and prospects walk away with. It’s not just about how your company looks, but how it feels. A good brand strategy ensures that your brand evokes the emotional impact you’re hoping for and communicates what makes your business unique.
And it starts with a name.
It All Starts With the Name
Plenty of memorable business and brand names are seemingly irrelevant to the product or service they provide — think Amazon, Starbucks, Google, Häagen-Dazs, or Ikea — and the importance of the brand name remains the same. Because names are the first impression many people have of your company, and because they’re the foundation of your overall brand image, a well-chosen name should be memorable, easy to spell, and Google-friendly, first and foremost. With that approach in mind, brand success is made easier.
None of this is new. Brand naming has mattered since the early 1900s, when companies began to realize that product quality on its own simply wasn’t enough to outsell the competition. For that, they’d need memorable logos, creative packaging, and product jingles that stayed with potential customers long after they heard a commercial on the radio. Above all, they’d need memorable names.
Names such as Brooks Brothers, Nordstrom, Dick’s Sporting Goods, Dunkin’ Donuts, Williams-Sonoma, Pizza Hut, and 7-Eleven all enjoy an enormously valuable brand presence built, in part, on a memorable name and brand consistency that’s been maintained for decades. Each one is virtually synonymous with the product or service it offers. What you might not know is that all of these companies were founded before 1960. Their longevity and success are tied to offering a good product or service, sure, but they’re also a product of their consistent branding, year after year.
What Is a Brand Name?
A brand name, very simply, is the name by which consumers know your business, your product, or your service. Whether you’re selling canned soda or a real estate development, you’ll need a brand name not only for your company itself, but for each specific product, service, or line that you sell.
Brand names are often associated with company logos or other design elements, but a brand name is more than just your logo. It’s what people will call your company or your product anytime they talk about it, post about it on social media, or recommend it to their friends and coworkers. You can see why choosing the right name is so vital. It’s literally how your company, your product, and everything you do will be known from that point on. It’s also the first thing a prospect types into a search bar — which is exactly where the importance of online branding takes over.
Why Brand Consistency Matters
Imagine you have a friend you’re trying to introduce to the rest of your social circle. Each time they show up, they’re dressed completely differently than last time, they act differently, and they insist on being called by a different name. Your other friends wouldn’t know what to make of them — and they’d almost certainly be confused about what to call them. That’s what it’s like when a brand isn’t consistent. It can lead to consumers not even knowing what your brand is, and it makes it difficult for them to recommend it to other people.
There’s a deeper reason why brand consistency matters so much, though. It comes down to trust. You want the people who interact with your brand to not merely know what it is. You want them to feel good about it. That means building trust so that consumers not only recognize your brand, they rely on it. Think about the people you trust. They’re reliable, they’re straightforward, and most of all, they’re consistent. That’s what your brand needs to be if it’s going to win the public’s trust and keep it.
As a marketing and branding solutions company, L&P knows the importance of the brand name, and we also know that the choices behind every branding decision go well beyond catchy names and colorful logos. Your brand is the sum total of your business as it is perceived by the consumer market. It is your product or service, your customer experiences, your people, your company, the charities you support, your vision and mission, the promises you make, the values you uphold, your reputation, and so much more.
Every aspect of your business is connected to your brand, and everything your business stands for should be considered in every aspect of your brand strategy, across all marketing efforts and channels. Consistency is a large part of the importance of online branding, too, because online is where customers encounter you most often — and where any inconsistency shows up fastest. To say that it’s nuanced would still be the understatement of the year. But here at L&P, “nuanced” is our middle name.
Naming in Practice: Five Texas Communities
We understand what it takes to help shape a business into a brand that’s unique and recognizable and creates an immediate connection with potential customers — starting with choosing the name that will identify your business or product to the world. Here’s how that worked for five master-planned communities.
Kissing Tree
This distinctly Texan community for active adults aged 55 and over needed an equally distinctive name. That’s why we dug through archival records at the University of Texas about the land where Kissing Tree was being built, until we found the story of the Kissing Tree. According to legend, when Sam Houston came to the town of San Marcos, he was welcomed with a giant handmade Texas flag. Standing beneath a spreading oak, he thanked each of the women who had made the flag with a kiss on the cheek, and thus the legend of the Kissing Tree was born.
When we found the story, we knew we had a name that would get people talking — just as Sam Houston did all those years ago — which opened the door for us to tell them about the community and its legacy of hospitality combined with gentle irreverence. We even had an actor dress up as Sam Houston and tell the story at prospect events, which shows how a good name can lend itself to marketing opportunities right out of the gate.
Collins
Sometimes you don’t have to go far to find the perfect name for a community. Isaac Newton Collins was the first settler on the land where the community is being built, and his family still owns the land today. In fact, generations of his family have lived and gathered here, so it only made sense to name the community in a way that honors not only the original owner but a family legacy that goes back more than a century. The name reminds prospective homebuyers that this is a place where families can build a life that will last for generations.
Tallgrass
Indigenous peoples often selected a location name for its ability to communicate something unique about its natural features, connecting people to the place. Texas is fortunate to have a wide array of beautiful and memorable landscapes, and sometimes the best way to make somewhere feel like a destination is to pay tribute to the local landscape in a way that conjures the kind of images homeowners want to see when they look out their window. Tallgrass conveys the essence of the region where it is built and brings to mind the Coastal Bend area where the community is located. Another benefit: the letters lend themselves to strong typography, even looking a bit like tall, waving grass.
Easton
There are many ways to honor the place where a community got its start, and a direct approach is a name that explains where the community is located and how to get there. Collaborating with Brookfield Residential, the Easton master-planned community took its name simply from the fact that it is located on the east side of Austin. Beyond the name of the community itself, developers wanted to highlight the many parks in and around the neighborhood, which led to “park” becoming foundational for a whole nomenclature system for the different parts of the community, as well as community events like Parkapalooza. It even inspired the red park bench that became part of the logo and an iconic symbol of this master-planned community in east Austin.
Double L Ranch
Sometimes the best naming approach is no approach at all. Founded in 1898, Double L Ranch was a 5,000-acre working cattle ranch. Owned by a single family for generations, the land is now being transformed into a master-planned community where hundreds of new families will put down their own roots and begin their own legacies. We decided to leave the name — and the literal cattle brand — as is. What better way to honor the land’s history and celebrate its future?
Online Branding Strategies That Build the Brand
A brand strategy is a far-reaching thing, so it’s made up of a lot of parts. The digital component — your online branding strategies — will likely include a wide range of approaches, including the following:
- Web development to increase your organization’s visibility, legitimacy, and credibility, and to make sure audiences know where and how to find you when they come looking.
- Content marketing, including blog posts, infographics, videos, and case studies that tell potential customers what sets your business apart.
- Search engine optimization (SEO) to help you rank higher for targeted keywords and drive customers to your digital doorstep.
- Social media messaging on sites like Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, X, LinkedIn, or Pinterest to build customer relationships.
- Email marketing to help promote sales, events, discounts, new products, and more.
- Paid advertising (PPC) to increase impressions and clicks and get your brand in front of as many eyes as possible.
- Public relations to increase awareness through online press releases and other outreach.
All of these online branding strategies (and more) work together to create your digital brand. So what is the importance of online branding, again? It’s a way to control and determine how potential customers and prospects see you, what they think (and know) about your company, and how they feel about your brand. Building an online brand is about forging a strong identity that customers can recognize and understand.
The Benefits of Strong Online Branding
A recognizable identity is just one of the many benefits of online branding strategies, and the clearest case for the importance of online branding is everything else it does for your business. Online branding can also:
- Make you an authority in the marketplace, so customers turn to you when they have questions or concerns.
- Give you greater market reach so you can get your product or service in front of more potential customers and prospects all over the world.
- Increase site traffic and qualified leads, which reduces the work you have to do to reach clients and prospects.
- Create value that leads to brand advocates. When customers see your brand adding value to their lives, they’re more likely to recommend you to friends, family, and coworkers.
- Make it easier to launch new products or services. One of the hardest things about launching something new is building it up. With an established online brand, you can use that built-in base to jumpstart your new endeavor.
The Name Is the Start. Consistency Is the Work.
Even the best name in the world means nothing without a good product or service to back it up. If you deliver something amazing, your company’s name will become synonymous with excellence, no matter what that name is. So while it’s important to pick the name that’s right for your company, it’s also important to have fun with the process, make sure the name you choose is easy to Google, and focus your real energy on delivering something unforgettable.
The importance of online branding isn’t a one-time project, either. Building your brand is just the beginning, and it’s just as important to stay consistent across all the different channels of marketing, advertising, public relations, and media. Maintaining an online brand requires dedicated (and consistent) effort and attention, which is where a partner like L&P comes in.
Whether you’re trying to build a new brand from scratch or have an established brand that just needs to be refreshed a bit, L&P can help you find the intersection of what you have to offer, what your customers want, and what sets you apart from your competitors — and then channel that into an effective and consistent brand identity. From coming up with that all-important brand name to fashioning all the disparate elements of your company into a consistent brand message, L&P is your partner for what your company needs, every step of the way.
As a branding, marketing, and media firm, we like to think of ourselves as the best little big-idea shop in Texas, and we’re here to help you connect every aspect of your business to make sure your customers always get the right impression — whether it’s their first impression or the one they’ll take with them.
