The Case for Branding in SEO

In a post in June, Aaron Wall wrote a very thorough post on how to build a brand with SEO. In that post, he outlined the importance of branding within keyword research and implementation.

Too often, the only time you see the words “brand” and SEO in the same sentence is on the ramifications Google’s “Vince” update, where big brands began usurping smaller publishers and sites in the search engine result pages (SERPs), which is a separate discussion altogether on domain trust, online reputation management (ORM) and advertising dollars. This is not one of those times.

Unfortunately, with the exception of Wall’s post, branding – the positioning of a company or product by key constituencies – gets little to no attention in SEO. In contrast, reams of content is written about the importance of branding and social media. Hourly.

So why isn’t there more discussion of branding in SEO? Practice and process.

For years, SEO existed in a vacuum, often in this magical black box. Companies paid, expected pixie dust and results, then went on their way. Over the last 10 years, the industry has obviously changed dramatically, but SEO still struggles to get beyond it’s pixie dust (and snake oil) past. There was no brand discussion, because neither side thought to ask.

Additionally, for a long time, the SEO process didn’t lend itself to knowing and understanding the client’s brand. Clients want results as quickly as possible (and rightly so), and knowing the client, the competitive landscape as well as the actual implementation was difficult enough to corral, let alone having a complex discussion on brand.

I know I’m no expert at branding, nor has every SEO firm ignored branding, but we should have been asking and understanding.

I’ve made no secret in blog posts, tweets and conversations that content marketing and development should be an increasingly important part of SEO strategy. If content ranks well, and is valued by key constituencies, it’s more likely to convert.

Therefore, if you agree content marketing is going to be a part of SEO strategy moving forward, how can you tell a client you’re going to be writing and shaping content on their behalf without understanding brand voice, especially in the enterprise? Who is asking if the content being developed breaks that brand promise?

The alternative may be ranking well with a piece of content that alienates in the long-term because it’s brand agnostic or worse, damaging.

Social media gets brought into the branding discussion so often because it’s been shepherded by PR and advertising agencies. These groups eat branding for breakfast.

The case can be made pretty easily that a company shouldn’t consider any strategic marketing until it has determined the brand. If SEO wants to be considered in the strategic marketing tool set and finally remove the black box veneer, it can no longer get a pass on branding.

Search shops have already learned that customers no longer want organic SEO to exist in a vacuum. Content marketing, social media and online PR are too important, and now too intertwined with SEO, to ignore as an SEO practitioner even today. If the future of SEO considers these skill sets, then the future SEO practitioner must also know branding.

Flickr photo courtesy of pink_fish13