I’m not here to talk about linguistics or redundancy itself, don’t worry! I decided to open with a provocative title just to mention something that often goes unnoticed by freelancers: consistency in branding. Ever wondered how to get a better positioning for your brand?
Nike, Adidas, Apple… they all are consistent.
Your (key)words will help you. How? Well, in short and without going too geeky, you have to make sure you stuff your website and pages with keywords that can redirect your prospects to you (read: your website, your Facebook, your Twitter, your blog, your shop and all that jazz).
The same is true for ‘redundancy’. Let me explain: while redundancy won’t help you in writing a novel – or in translation, where usually, unless it’s your style and you like it so, redundancy is carefully avoided) – being redundant in terms of branding will help Google like you more. The search engine does appreciate consistency.
Consistency in branding is very crucial: as mentioned in several webinars on this topic, clients want clarity and if they know your name or brand that’s what they are likely to be remembering when looking for you. You would not believe the number of times I’ve tried to remember someone’s Twitter handle or website but failed miserably as they didn’t match their main identity. The same is true for your clients – and you want to be found, not irritate your source of work!
Of course, there’s nothing wrong in choosing a trading name (eg. Laura Rossi is a legal entity trading under ‘Rossi Linguistic Services’, to make an example) but in my experience, the easier the set of avatars, names, handles and domains you have, the better eg. my Twitter is @rainylondon, my FB is RainyLondonTranslations and so on and so forth.
In a recent talk on SEO by colleague and friend Xosé Castro, he mentioned Namechk.com, a very useful tool that lets you check whether the name you’re willing to use is taken or not and on which platforms. Another good point Xosé mentioned is the use of the so-called ‘Vanity URLs’. Vanity URLs are meant to be doing exactly what they say on the tin:
☞ ☞ ☞ identify you and you only, to help you stand out of the crowd (the only case when being vain is a must-do!)
Try to be different… 🙂
To recap, to be consistent in branding – at least at a very basic level – you can:
- make sure your domain is easy to write down and that it reflects your actual brand name e.g.: Rainy London Translations is exactly that on my website
- create a vanity URL – it can be applied to most platforms and they are trustworthy in the eyes of your audience and easier to remember
Rainy London Translations’ Vanity URL is… obvious.
- use handle names or account user names that follow the KISS (keep it simple) approach, making sure they refer to you/your brand. No underscores or dots, whenever possible – and no number unless it’s in your brand name
- customize every section of your platforms – info fields, images that are yours and only yours, graphics that show your name and brand logo etc. Covers can be made specifically for Twitter or Facebook – bear in mind they have to respect specific guidelines of sizing and shape
- make sure your blog is consistent too – it can have a different name but clearly refer to your main brand or be linked to your main page
- make sure all photos & hyperlinks are wisely named and used ( = rich in keywords) so that they can drive traffic to your page.
These are just a few tips and ideas.
Anything else?
☞ Do you have any others?
☞ What’s your experience?
☞ Want to read more?
- http://www.wordstream.com/blog/ws/2012/10/10/vanity-url
- http://www.vanityurlshorteners.com
- http://digitalmarketing-glossary.com/What-is-Vanity-URL-definition
…and of course, stay tuned on Twitter and Facebook for the #RainyBrandingTuesday hashtag throughout today.
(Special thanks to APTIC + Xosé Castro for the inspiration on the topic for this article. His SEO talk is available for a short period of time. PW: APTIC)
Rainy London Branding 