As mar­keters, we’re ensur­ing that the per­cep­tion, and there­fore the online rep­u­ta­tion, of a brand and its prod­ucts is as pos­i­tive as pos­si­ble. Is your brand doing its best on all fronts to influ­ence as many con­sumers as pos­si­ble to pur­chase a prod­uct?

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I stum­bled across a TED talk by John Wood­en, a famous U.S. bas­ket­ball coach who is regard­ed by many as the best coach of all time. His talk was full of some great and often mov­ing poems and lessons you know it takes a life­time to learn.

One of the pearls of wis­dom Wood­en shared made me press pause and reach for the key­board. It was:

“Your rep­u­ta­tion is what you’re per­ceived to be. Your char­ac­ter is what you real­ly are.”

My team at Linkdex are doing work with brands around the globe to mea­sure how their online rep­u­ta­tion is play­ing out inside the Google search ecosys­tem. Our objec­tive is to help brands bench­mark and improve prod­uct sales through the pos­i­tive enhance­ment of brand and prod­uct rep­u­ta­tion amongst the search engine rank­ings.

How we’ve approached these chal­lenges is for anoth­er day. The inter­est­ing thing for me, in Wood­en speak, is in the fact that what we’re try­ing to do is opti­mize the per­cep­tion of a brand and its prod­ucts. Ensur­ing that the per­cep­tion, and there­fore the rep­u­ta­tion is as pos­i­tive as pos­si­ble, in order to influ­ence as many con­sumers as pos­si­ble to pur­chase a prod­uct. Real lead­ing edge momen­tol­ogy.

What we don’t have con­trol of is the ‘char­ac­ter’ of the prod­uct or ser­vice itself.

• Is it actu­al­ly any good?
• Is it best in class?
• Is the com­pa­ny and its cus­tomer ser­vice amaz­ing?
• Is there real brand and prod­uct affin­i­ty?

It’s in the prod­uct that the pri­ma­ry bat­tle­ground of dig­i­tal mar­ket­ing is being fought. Then there’s mar­ket­ing. The sec­ond wave.

• Can you build the aware­ness, cre­ate a need now, or leave suf­fi­cient cog­ni­tive foot­print to be recalled in that moment of need?
• Can you come off best when con­sumers are search­ing for infor­ma­tion to inform key pur­chase deci­sions? Do your fea­tures com­pare favourably? Is the price right?
• Is your rep­u­ta­tion­al foot­print bad, neu­tral, pos­i­tive?
• Can you make it easy for them to buy from you and close the deal?

If they do what many con­sumers do and go last minute deal shop­ping, where will they end up? Do you still make the sale? Under­stand­ing the answers to these ques­tions is pos­si­ble. Very pos­si­ble – it just requires brands to want to know and try. To try their best on all fronts.

When was the last time you tried search­ing for your own prod­ucts through a typ­i­cal pur­chase jour­ney like a con­sumer would? How does your online rep­u­ta­tion rep­re­sent your char­ac­ter at all the dif­fer­ent moments a con­sumer might meet your brand?

It is a great place to share anoth­er Wood­en pearl. He said:

“I coined my own def­i­n­i­tion of suc­cess, which is: peace of mind attained only through self-sat­is­fac­tion in know­ing you made the effort to do the best of which you’re capa­ble. I believe that’s true. If you make the effort to do the best of which you’re capa­ble, to try and improve the sit­u­a­tion that exists for you, I think that’s suc­cess.”

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What’s your def­i­n­i­tion of suc­cess when it comes to man­ag­ing your brand and prod­ucts inside Google?