One of the most often overlooked areas of search is brand reputation management. If your customers are looking for your brand, most likely these are folks that know who you are and what you’re about. If you’re lucky, they will remember your brand name and how to spell it. Hopefully they will find your listing at the top of the results page followed by brand related articles, blog posts, press releases and more.
In some cases, they will also see positive and negative articles that talk about your products and services. Even if you are ranking #1 for your brand, there are many different types of searches that could produce brand related results of which you may not be aware.
Below are some typical brand searches and what they mean:
Brand – These searchers know who you are, have seen an ad you just placed or want to do a little research on your company. These types of searches include “Company Name” or “Company Name + Location”. Growing brand searches are strong indicator that you are doing something right in your overall marketing and search campaigns.
Product – These are searchers looking specifically for your product. If you sell drills, then they will typically search for things like “Company Name + Drills”.
Product & Brand Reviews – These are searches for your company and brand for 3rd party sites that include positive or negative reviews. These include searches like “Company Name/Product + Reviews” or “Product + Feedback” or “Company Name + Scam”. These keywords are important to own since many potential customers will be doing lots of research before they decide to buy your products if they’re more than a few bucks.
Product/Brand vs. Product/Brand – These are searches for your company or product when someone is comparing two or more options and can’t decide what to buy. These searches are also important to own since these buyers are at a critical point in the purchase process. They are considering your product but want to make sure it’s the right one.
I hope the details above help explain what and why people are using these keywords. It’s important to look beyond the obvious brand research Google and other tools give you to drill down into what your customers are thinking. You may uncover some real gems that can influence your campaign performance and brand image.
More on Brand Reputation Management Strategy:
SEO Moz
Search Engine Watch
Sean lives in Ohio working as a SEO consultant and social media marketer with his digital marketing company Interactive Cleveland LLC. Sean also enjoys running, cycling and spending time with the fam. Follow him on Twitter @seanhecking
