What is the difference between building a brand and building authority? Some may think they’re interchangeable ideas, but they’re not mutually inclusive concepts. Online branding would be a form of helping others gain awareness of your brand via exposure to marketing, especially on social media and search engines.
To build authority, on the other hand, does the same thing but goes a bit further, ensuring that you come out looking authoritative above all. It’s more than just making a website or creating a Facebook page. These are a few ways to help get your brand the authority is needs to capitalize.
Run a Blog with Creative Content
Brand need blogs for three main reasons. For one, they help improve your search engine rankings; Google prefers it when a website regularly produces new, original content and updates more often than not. If you’re looking to achieve this, it’s smart to get a user-friendly content management system like WordPress, which won’t require too much technical know-how to get started.
Secondly, blogs are a great platform for you to share via social media. If the only thing you share on Twitter or Facebook are sales pages and product descriptions, there isn’t anything very interesting or compelling to click through. If you’re sharing interesting blog topics or ideas relevant to your industry, you’re more likely to have people sharing that post and gaining new traction for you.
Lastly, a good blog is an excellent way to build your brand authority for your industry. This is where you’ll need to add your extra efforts. Don’t just talk about your product, but provide useful content, such as:
• Videos
• Interviews with others in the industry
• Tutorials
• Infographics
When you produce great content, readers will recognize your authority because you’ll have proven that you’re worth your promise of knowledge. That makes you the one they’ll want to flock to for their needs.
Write Guest Blogs
Appearing as a guest blogger for another website in your industry is a way to get a bit of their traffic to your own website. When you have approval from a blogger, you’ll need to make your post a memorable one. Be sure it fits the guidelines of the website you’re posting it to and that it matches a similar tone; the readers are more likely to keep interested if the tone matches what they’re there to read.
Finally, be sure to include several links throughout the post. Don’t just promote your product alone, though; add in numerous internal links so the website owner can generate a little extra traffic too.
Comment on Blogs
Subscribe to the top websites and blogs known in your industry and be sure to contribute to each new post with a useful, productive comment. Unlike a guest post, it isn’t important to link around for your products; the purpose of this is to build further presence and show others in the industry that you are an authority figure.
Work Social Media
You’re likely already aware that it helps to have active social media accounts that regularly post updates, and it shouldn’t merely advertise your products. Getting engaged with your audience will allow you to keep the content fresh and figure out what it is the customer really wants.
Using Twitter
Save a search for your brand and keep an eye on what people have to say. Dedicate some time to responding to them — questions, complaints, regular comments, anything. When your audience sees how quickly you’re ready to discuss your brand on social media, you’re liable to gain trust and followers. Your followers may eventually try your products and recommend them based on how satisfied they were.
Even if you produce some of the greatest content available in the industry, people prefer to hear about it from a second source too. Check for some of the next-best content in your industry and share them with your fans. Relevant followers will come to you just for curating the best articles.
Using Facebook
Using your fan page gives you several options to engage with fans on Facebook. To get started, try different kinds of posts. Add some videos, some photos, some links and ask some questions. See which types of posts are the most well-received and be sure to keep it fresh.
You can also switch to your personal Facebook profile and like your business profile’s content. If you’re interested in talking one-on-one with your audience on a personal level, you can comment as your personal self as well.
Using LinkedIn
If you don’t already have a LinkedIn presence, there’s a market you’re missing. On here, you can add a page to post your services, products, updates and job openings for those who follow the company. That means you can update with your recent blog posts as well.
