Guide to launching your brand on the Web in 2023: develop 2/3
This article is part of a series of tips for launching your brand and follows up on the presentation given by the ASSONANCE team at the SEO Garden Party in July 2022. It follows the first part of the guide, which focuses on brand creation.
In the previous step, we explained how to develop your brand identity, right down to choosing a name. You now have everything you need; your brand identity is complete. But before deciding whether to prioritize SEO or inbound marketing(1) on social media, you’ll need to move on to a second phase of planning.
Choosing the Right Weapons for Your Strategy
By identifying your personas and their habits (who they are, what networks they use), you already know where to communicate. You should also define your goals. Brand awareness? Conversion? Depending on your goals, you can refine your decision-making. Once you’ve completed this step, you’ll have the foundation for your strategy in place and can define your acquisition channels.
Will you be using:
SEO: Focusing on an organic search strategy?
Can SEA be used to create a Google Ads campaign?
The power of social media? By creating tailored content and driving engagement within your community?
Content marketing in general (white papers, etc.)?
Print advertising—by creating flyers, brochures, and so on…?
TV or radio advertising?
Your sales goals and the very nature of your brand will shape your strategy. For example, a new backlink-building platform will likely focus on:
SEO,
The SEA,
Attend events (giving talks, doing demonstrations, etc.),
Offer white papers.
The brand knows that its target audience is primarily looking for performance and "proof through demonstration."
On the other hand, a web design company that primarily targets small business owners will focus on print advertising, wrap its cars with its logo, and promise a great website.
Create a content strategy
Here, we’re discussing editorial content strategy. ASSONANCE is a digital marketing agency whose core business is the production of editorial content. Drawing on our SEO expertise, we create articles and web pages with a single guiding principle: relevance.
What is relevant to the user?
What about engines?
Bonus: What's important for copywriters?
At this stage of developing your strategy, you already know your personas and the search queries to target. The art of writing lies in convincing both your personas and search engines. Among the objectives: driving a sale. And, for the more ambitious: building a lasting customer relationship. In fact, developing an editorial strategy requires another round of refining your target keywords. The goal is to create content that appeals to both the user and Google—content that, if not directly sales-driven, is at least engaging. The challenge? To encourage the user to recognize your brand as an authority in a particular field and, little by little, establish yourself as the go-to source.
If, on Day 1, your prospect reads an article that truly answers their question, on Day 2, they’ll certainly come back to you with another question in your field. Or maybe even make a purchase? (If you’re lucky, they’ll do it that very same day.)
But for an editorial content strategy to be effective, it must be strictly defined. We(2) call this the “editorial guidelines.”
Create a Functional Editorial Guidelines Document
What is an editorial charter, and what is its purpose? The answer to these two questions is as follows: a set of rules that precisely define the editorial format of content, the brand’s tone, and its objectives; ensuring consistency in content—and thus in the brand’s communication—over the long term.
For example, in an editorial charter, we find the following recommendation:
“‘Don’t write sentences as long as the one above. Write short, dynamic sentences to make an impact on the reader.’ ”
This document is absolutely essential to the success of any web marketing project. Even if you’re the only one working on it, if you don’t set your communication guidelines in writing, you risk ending up with a chaotic strategy. One day your tone will be casual; the next, it will be too formal.
What does this charter include?
The brand's tone (friendly, lighthearted, educational, institutional…),
Semantic elements (what vocabulary to use to convey the brand’s world),
"Editorial" graphic elements (Can we use emojis or not? Which ones? When?),
The format of the content (presence of images, links, number of Hn tags, etc.),
Accessibility (whether or not to use inclusive language, and in what form?),
The format of CTAs(3) (where should they be placed—in a sentence or as an action verb?).
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An effective editorial guidelines document is one that is clear and “actionable.” Content creators need to be able to understand exactly what is expected of them. To leave no room for interpretation, always illustrate your points with examples. At Assonance, we use the “Do’s and Don’ts” approach, which provides a clear framework for our guidelines.
Create an editorial calendar
Launching a content strategy without sticking to a schedule is like trying to bake a soufflé without a recipe. It can quickly fall flat.
An editorial calendar is essential to your content strategy. It allows you to:
Plan the creation and distribution of your content,
Organize your teams without any overlap,
Don't skip any design steps (such as proofreading),
Have a comprehensive understanding of the editorial strategy.
And, just like the editorial charter, the editorial calendar is useful even for solopreneurs.
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Concept
Google Sheets
Trello
Asana
Monday
Adopt best practices for content creation from the very beginning
Is your innovation in the nutrition sector? Position yourself as an expert by publishing content:
unique,
useful,
well optimized for SEO,
relevant,
Google EAT (Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness) friendly,
updated.
Don't rely solely on text-only editorial content. Consider formats that offer real added value and engage your audience (video, images, infographics, etc.), and content that combines UX and SEO. These best practices will help you build your brand online—and over the long term.
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Two free tools we like to use here at ASSONANCE? Google Trends, to capitalize on the latest news in your industry and stay on top of trends, and Google Alerts, to set up alerts for your product, your competitors, and the market.
Combining SEO, copywriting, and storytelling on your web pages
Do you think a product page doesn’t need storytelling or copywriting? That an “About” page can do without SEO entirely? Then it’s time to take a holistic approach to these issues(4).
| What Is the Purpose of SEO in Writing? | To Provide Search Engines with the Right Semantic Cues So They Understand What We're Talking About. |
| What Is the Purpose of Copywriting on a Web Page? | Turning Website Visitors into Customers. |
| What Is the Purpose of Storytelling on a Web Page? | How to Structure Your Page to Turn Visitors into Customers… and Build Customer Loyalty. |
SEO
Having an optimized TITLE on your "About" page helps improve your brand's search engine rankings and boost its brand visibility.
Example:
✅ Do: The LinksRoxxor platform—the power of backlinking
❌ Don’t: About - LinksRoxxor
Copywriting
Having well-written headlines and CTAs on your product page helps grab the user’s attention and encourage them to take action.
Example:
✅ Do: How does it work?
❌ Don’t: More info
Storytelling
Using storytelling to structure your web page brings narrative coherence to your page design and brand image. It allows you to design headings and sections that flow seamlessly along a conversion funnel. Storytelling creates narrative continuity between paragraphs and calls to action. It also helps you control the page’s visual design to drive conversions and build customer loyalty.
Here's what we recommend you do:
Knowing how to design hybrid pages
The good example we saw earlier illustrates the concept of a hybrid page—that is, a page that aims both to rank well in search engines and to drive conversions.
These pages can certainly feature well-written copy paired with striking visuals, as well as carefully optimized paragraphs of text. However, for this to work, the page must be structured properly. At ASSONANCE, we use wireframes (5), which are useful tools for building this type of page and, in turn, for leveraging the three pillars of persuasion.
Today, 92.1% of Internet users browse the Web on their mobile devices (The Moderator’s Blog). The advent of smartphones has changed internet users’ consumption habits and the amount of time they spend on a page.
We believe it’s important to adapt to web usage patterns and design pages with clever solutions that address all challenges. Siloing the use of acquisition and conversion strategies no longer makes sense today.
No matter what the case may be, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference.
Next step: Reaping the rewards?
Is everything in place? Do you just have to wait for internet users to come to you and pay for your products and services? Not quite. The hardest—and sometimes most frustrating—part is still ahead. Have you done the right things? Have you used the right strategies? Have you achieved your goals?
To answer all these questions and ensure your brand’s success and long-term viability, you need to track your efforts and measure their effectiveness. That’s where ROI (Return on Investment) comes into play.
This is Step 3 of your brand launch strategy and the focus of the next article: Measure, Adjust, Thrive: Building a Sustainable Brand in 2022.
(1) Inbound marketing. A strategy aimed at attracting customers to your business.
(2) And communications agencies.
(3) Call-to-action (or calls to action)
(4) A holistic approach is a comprehensive approach to a subject that takes into account all of its defining elements.
(5) A mockup or functional diagram of a user interface or web page.
