Reputation Management: How to Protect Your Brand Online in 2021 A positive brand image can undoubtedly influence a consumer's decision to buy a product — and, for virtually every business, building a positive brand image starts online. Nowadays, your reputation is largely dependent on social media and online review sites. For instance, consumers need to read an average of 10 online reviews before they feel they can trust a local business. Since brand image makes such an impression on someone's decision to purchase, you must regularly monitor your reputation online. Still, it can feel like a daunting task, particularly when so much of it is out of your control. Fortunately, there are plenty of tools and strategies you can implement to ensure you're protecting your brand in 2021. In this post, we’ll give a clear overview of brand reputation management, how to create a plan to manage your business reputation, and high-quality tools to supplement your process. Reputation management is a continuous process, as it allows you to stay on top of your brand’s public perception and address possible damaging situations as soon as they occur. When your reputation is positive, you inspire customer loyalty, a significant driver of revenue and growth. A negative reputation can be damaging to sales and customer retention, but it also helps you learn about what customers like, which can be helpful for updating business processes to better meet consumer needs. Brand safety has recently become discussed in conversation with reputation management,...

16 Benefits of Branding & Co-Branding In more ways than one, branding is a pillar of success. It helps you develop a set of features unique to your business, like a logo and brand name, which allows customers to come to know your brand and associate it with what you have to offer. Branding is impactful in and of itself, but co-branding brings additional opportunities and benefits to businesses that engage in it. In this post, discover the advantages that come from generating brand individuality for your business, and the added benefits that come from co-branding with a partner. 1. Branding is often the deciding factor for consumers making purchasing decisions. Branding is often the deciding factor for consumers when making a purchase decision. In fact, consumers report being more likely to buy from brands that they know or know and already have a positive experience with. This is especially true for social media, as 89% of consumers say they’ll buy from a brand they already follow and recognize over a competitor. Given this, having a recognizable and unique brand gives you a leg up with customers, as they would feel safer buying from a business they already know. 2. Branding gives your business an identity. Branding gives your business an identity beyond just the products and services you sell. You become more than just a name, especially if you develop a brand mission separate from your products. For example, if your brand is committed to social responsibility, you’ll become associated with those...

3 Easy Steps to Build Your Brand Promise If you're a decent human being, you always honor a pinky promise. For the uninitiated, a pinky promise is usually between two people and it holds more weight than a spit shake, legal contract, verbal agreement, and "I swear on my " statements combined. It's part of our social contract – once it's been agreed upon, it cannot be broken. A brand promise is the scaled, commercial version of the pinky promise, with the brand holding up one finger and its target audience holding up the other. Except, in this case, breaking it won't just ruin your reputation, it can impact your revenue. Let's talk about how to create a brand promise and see examples from popular brands. What is a brand promise? A brand promise reveals what consumers can expect from a brand across all touchpoints. It serves as a company's foundational value and informs every aspect of the company, from its messaging to its customer service. Your brand promise should be central to your company, something that remains constant as it grows and evolves. Not every brand promise is explicit. In many cases, it's more of an internal mantra that's shared with employees, investors, and partners. However, when you have built a strong brand identity and clear messaging, your brand promise can be assumed by your target audience. There's often some confusion between a brand promise and a tagline, so let's break it down. While it can...

5 Lessons We Learned from These Famous Rebrands It can be difficult (if not impossible) to create a brand that remains fresh, relevant, and inspiring years — or even decades — post-creation. Just consider Dunkin' Donuts: the brand, first established in 1973, recently shifted its focus to coffee — and, to demonstrate the shift, dropped the 'Donuts' in the name. The rebrand makes sense. Dunkin's consumers' preferences, tastes, and style have likely changed quite a bit in the roughly 50 years since the first Dunkin' was introduced. Dunkin' needed a rebrand to ensure its business could grow with its consumers, or risk falling behind. A rebrand can successfully re-establish your brand in an industry, help expand your product offerings, or attract new consumers. But it's not as simple as copying-and-pasting a fresh logo onto your homepage. A good rebrand demands redefining your company's vision and values, re-establishing your brand's audience, and rebuilding your brand identity from the ground up. Fortunately, if your business is considering a rebrand, you're in luck. Here, we've compiled five successful examples of rebrands to help inspire your own efforts. Use these examples to kickstart your own rebrand in 2021. Five Successful Examples of Rebrands 1. Petco In October 2020, Petco released an announcement declaring it would no longer sell electronic "shock" collars. The announcement was used to highlight the company's rebranding efforts — the pet store, which is over 50 years old, was officially rebranding itself as a health and wellness company for pets. The pet...

How to Create a Writing Style Guide Built for the Web Businesses pump out content at a staggering rate these days — and as that volume increases, more inconsistencies are bound to creep in. Whether due to lack of clarity about the style in which you'd like to write or disjointed communication across the multitude of content creators in your organization, failure to decide upon and document accepted editorial guidelines is a recipe for inconsistent messaging. That's why at some point, most companies accept that they'll need to develop a writing style guide. In short: a document that indicates the basic rules of writing we'll all agree to follow to ensure consistency across all our content — like whether I should've capitalized the "a" after the colon in this sentence. Answer: If you write content for HubSpot, you should not capitalize the "a." But wait... if that's the case, why would I capitalize the "If" in that last parenthetical? Because "If you write content for HubSpot, you should..." is a complete sentence, thus warranting the capital "If." These conventions are specified in our writing style guide. If you found that train of thought terribly banal, you might think writing style guides are the most boring things in the world and have a burning desire to click away right about now. Au contraire, mon frère. Why Writing Guides Are Important The existence of a writing style guide is what saves you from finding yourself embroiled in a debate...

The Ultimate Guide to Branding in 2021 Products are never just products, right? Coca-Cola is more than a soda. Starbucks is more than a coffee. Ray-Ban is more than a pair of sunglasses. Glossier is more than a tube of concealer. Interacting with these products provide experiences, and we buy them with that experience in mind. Better yet, the companies that create and market them know exactly the experience they want you to have when you make (or consider) a purchase. That’s why they create a brand. From the language in their Instagram caption to the color palette on their latest billboard to the material used in their packaging, companies who create strong brands know that their brand needs to live everywhere. They know their names extend far beyond the label. The result? These brands are known, loved, and chosen out of a long lineup of options. Who doesn’t want that? I know I do. That’s why we built this guide — to equip you to create and manage a strong brand that’ll help your business be admired, remembered, and preferred. Use the links below to jump ahead to sections of interest, and don’t forget to bookmark this guide for later. What’s a brand? Before I dive into the importance of branding and how to build a brand, let’s go back to basics: What is a brand? A brand is a feature or set of features that distinguish one organization from another. A brand is typically...

7 Australian Companies with Great Taglines It's no secret that people who live in startup-filled cities have seen some of the wildest brand names. And, that variety in company names makes sense. When many startups in similar industries are founded in one geographic area, brands need to come up with a name that grasps attention, lightly hints at their mission, differentiates them from competitors, or encourages prospects to learn more about them. This is especially true in Australia, which hosts startups from Sydney to Melbourne. These cities are the founding place of uniquely named startups and major brands like Sukin, Canva, and Billabong. While the successful companies listed above have made their names noteworthy and easy to recognize, their company titles only hint at what their brands offer. This is why successful brands like these also lean on taglines to give prospects a quick, clear view of a brand's overall mission or purpose. With a great name and an effective tagline, prospects will remember your brand's uniqueness, mission, or what types of products you offer. Then, when they're looking for a product in your industry or space, they might think of your brand's name and catchy tagline. If you're working in a busy startup hub like Australia, or are starting a business in an already crowded business landscape, take note of these seven Australian companies with taglines that stand out and set them apart from the competition. 7 Australian Companies With Great Taglines "More than Money" -...