While watching the football game this past Sunday with my family, I automatically started singing along to a commercial that came on. It was a catchy tune and a song that was well known. At the end of the commercial, my brother turned to me and asked, “What was the commercial for?” I started to answer and then stopped, realizing I had no idea. So, though the creativity for the commercial was completely there, the main point was completely missed. What was the advertisement for?

My sisters and I used to play a game whenever we happened to sit down and watch a show together. It’s played like this: every time a commercial comes on, guess which company it’s for. The first person to guess correctly wins. Some of the commercials were ones we had seen before; many were brand new as we didn’t watch a lot of TV. Depending on the commercial, whether it was new or not, we could guess the brands based on the setting, characters, or slogans. However, many of the advertisements backfire. Though we remembered seeing them and could even recite a line or two from a couple of them or sing along with the song they choose to use, we didn’t know which companies they are for until the very end (or until the brand is shown which in some commercials, is only at the end).

Developing Brand Recognition

It’s important to develop brand recognition, however how can you have that when people don’t recognize your product when it’s presented to them? You have to come up with an idea of how to best portray your products or company in a way that ensures it won’t be forgotten. For example, Progressive Auto Insurance has commercials out there with a basic theme; each one includes the use of Flo, a sales representative and each have their logo splashed across the screen everywhere you look. Rice Krispies uses family time to accentuate their product. In every commercial, the family is either making Rice Krispie bars or eating the cereal, listening to it “Snap, Crackle, Pop”. Whether you like them or hate them, the instant they are on, people recognize them immediately.

One of the things these brands have in common is repetition and logo placement. It’s the same commercial every time with a slightly different story for each one. Same or similar characters and similar settings make them easy to remember. The easiest way to represent your products is to showcase your brand throughout your entire website, commercial, or advertisement of any kind. Also, choosing a common theme that is easy to remember is important. You want people to automatically think of your company when they need something specific. For example, when you think of auto insurance, what do you think of? For me, it’s the companies that use commercials with repetition. Regardless if they are the best, they are usually the first that comes to mind which drives people to the companies when shopping for car insurance.

Try this; which brands do these commercials represent? I chose a mixture of visual aspects and commentary:

• Peyton Manning & Justin Timberlake

• “Hello, I’m a Mac” “and I’m a P.C.”

• “There’s a map for that”

• The little pile of money with googly eyes

• “If you think all batteries are the same, consider this…”

• A white duck

You may have easily known them all, if not, the answers are, in order: Sony Electronics, Apple, Verizon Wireless, Geico, Duracell Batteries, and Aflac. (click on the brand to view the commercial mentioned).

Developing Your Brand on a Website

When creating your industrial website, you want to make it easy to navigate and visually appealing. If the navigation is simple and your site is easy to jump from one page to the next, people will stay on it for longer periods of time once finding it in the search engines. You may be one of the top spots but if you don’t have what the customer is looking for or you make it hard to find, your conversion rate will be much lower. Also, the more visually appealing your site is, the more clients will return to your site for additional services or information. For instance, consider your website to be like a commercial. If you provide unique, quality information for each page yet construct them to be the same in color scheme, navigation, and cross-linking, your site will be easier to follow and clients will be more likely to convert. After all, isn’t that the overall goal?

When designing and creating your online presence, first consider the things you like about other company’s sites. What draws you to them? How does the content, visual effects, and navigation grab your attention? Second, consider what you have to offer your clients. What sets you apart from your competitors? What makes you a high quality industrial company? Highlight those things through visual stimulation and quality information. Recently, our company completed a website for a company that wanted to highlight their “green-friendly” guarantee. The site used green for their headers, navigation, and cross-linking and included the recycling image on every page. From the first page, the “Thinking Green” campaign succeeds. Third, consider your own visual appeal. What colors do you associate with your company? Use that color scheme throughout the site and make sure your name and logo are visible on every page. Also, use the name of your company throughout your online copywriting as this will relate your information to your brand.

For more information regarding brand recognition, contact the SEO team of analysts at Ecreativeworks. We’ll help you determine the best way to build your online presence.

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This entry was posted on Thursday, January 28th, 2010 at 11:36 am and is filed under Driving Traffic, General, Usability & Conversions. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.