I am a big fan of business branding built around the image of founder, or, CEO. Bill Gates and Sir Richard Branson are shining examples.

But it hasn’t been easy for even the most charismatic of CEOs and business founders to actually go and connect to their prospects and customers. Web branding didn’t exist. Blogs were’nt there. They couldn’t generate raves in forums and websites around the world. ( war-time propoganda has existed for centuries though!).

But it has changed with the advent of web 2.0. As my illustrationon the left depicts, that we are surrounded by certain layers of web. To convey your brand through these layers is the way forward. And logical.

Those who read Seth’s blog would know that this post is inspired by his latest post on personal branding . Seth knows that people have learnt to judge you on your web-face- value. So why not tighten up our acts and do a little image makeover.

I am not going to be suggesting drastic changes, such as, re-doing your corporate logo etc. Imagine if a hotel chain thought about re-doing their logo.Massive exercise.

I have this easy list, which you can implement and see the results roll out in an integrated manner over time.

• Website logo and banners- No need to re-think your logo, but may be you can find a way of explaining what a VW in your logo means, in line with your overall brand image.
• Web colours and font:- Again visual input is a powerful branding factor; Virgin’s and Ferrari’s red, Apple’s silver etc.
• About Us/Company Info page:- So powerful, so in-your-control, so underused. Craft your About Us page very carefully and give it some thought.
• Google/Yahoo search results on your brand/personal name:- Always know what the world thinks about you. Google yourself and find out. There are plenty of ways of gaming or architecting your Google image over time. So its good to know what it is in the outset.
• Blogs/Forums sig and comment branding:- This is the easiest bit but again so ignored. I dn’t know how many CEO’s actually read and participate in other people’s blogs and forums. But I certainly know that your company employee certainly do that. They do it on their aliases which are a no-good for anyone. Why not get them to carefully use your company’s branding and spread the word around? Or, if you dn’t trust your employees with your brand image, hand-pick a bunch of guys and set them free in the cyber world.
• Pics of you online:- I use a gothicy pic for me here in this blog, because I dn’t want to pose in a suit and give impressions of a super-serious marketer. But you have to understand and take feedback before you let your pic out on the net. It could be your About Us page, online press release, profile pic on foruns/blogs, or, Facebook/Myspace pic.
• People talking about you-generating reviews and positive news about you:

Liverpool Hope University

I have an unbreakable bond with Liverpool Hope University in Liverpool. I studied for me my PG in Literary Criticism at Hope!!  Well, this review has nothing to do with my MA, but, as I recently stumbled upon the website I knew I have to contribute my tuppence.

Hope's Website

As an educational institution during recruitment season, Liverpool Hope’s target audience are prospective students. It’s not easy to segment all ‘prospective students’ in one group. There are many categories-

• Straight out of school for Undergrads,
• Some university experience looking for a PG course (like me!),
• Mature students with work experience,
• International students, both for PG and UG courses,

Without going in any details, it’s obvious that all the above student groups need relevant information and have different expectations from the University. Most important criteria for most students would be course availability and acceptance. No doubt most students would also want to know how the social life in the city and the university is. International students would want to know about costs.

Student preferences

Mature students would want to know about course usefuless and of course the costs involved. The above graphic should make a blueprint in terms of what info should be reflected on the homepage. Lets ask a few questions keeping in mind the above and Liverpool Hope’s homepage:-

• Does the site appeal to A-level passouts looking for first Uni experience?
• Does the site present professional info about Uni’s industry credentials?
• Does it reflect on WHY an international student should come here?
• Does the site cash-in on the fact that its based in Liverpool ( capital of culture 2008)?
• Is it slick, stylish, professional, thought-provoking, inviting, or, informative?

I had a little look at some of the educational sites. Yale.edu takes you on a slideshow tour of the life at Yale. The tour smartly answers a lot of subconscious queries of prospective students from all groups.On the other hand, Edge Hill University, which is one of Liverpool Hope’s competitor from north-west England, caters to young and slick audience. The home page has a personality and presents that confidently to visiting students.

Liverpool Hope lacks both of these approaches; neither does it present an informative slide-show option which answers questions from most prospective students, nor does it target a single student-group confidently. Apart from these issues, I couldn’t help noticing these problems:-

• The favicon still shows Joomla cms’s icon.( Joomla is a cms which Hope’s site uses to manage content,  but they haven’t bothered to get a customised favicon designed)
• Site is not a valid HTML or CSS document. A cardial sin for a university website!!
• Accessibility statement says, ‘If we can make our Web site more accessible to you, or you have any comments regarding our website please e-mail us at..’ There is no email address on that page, and they expect visitors to request accessibility features. Very proactive!!
• Basic branding debacle: logo on the home page is different from rest of the site. None of the logos are examples of creative genius anyway. The placement on the home page banner is amateur.
• The overall site coloring is boring to say the least with very little use of multi-media use.

It wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say that an alien coming from Mars would date the site to early 2000 on the basis of its look, style, branding and, absence of web 2.0 elements.

The Matrix image

Do you have a brand identity online?

Let’s reiterate, is your online-business proposition unique? Do you provide a package that nobody else provides?
These questions hold as much value for a web entrepreneur as for an offline brick-and-mortar venture.Maybe more.

Tom Peters in his book BrandYou50 mentions (coins?) the phrase, cubicle slave anonymous (CSA), reffering to Dilbert cubicle workforce who are brandless and faceless entities. I have not read the whole book, only the review by Cody McKibben and I picked up this phrase.

If you remember the film, The Matrix, Neo was a typical CSA.With all his skills and talent he was still confined to his cubicle and a small crappy flat. But he ends up becoming ‘the one’. The process involves rigorous training and hammering by Morpheus who knows Neo is the one.

Neo was offerred two choices, two pills- blue and red. One of the pills would keep him in his present state as a CSA in his Dilbert cubicle, and, another pill takes him on a path of self-realisation.

Some points come out of The Matrix story.

• You always have an option to break free out of the Dilbert cubicle.
• You have to make a choice.
• You only have few choices.
• Once you choose the break-free route, there is no coming back- you have to tumble down the rabbit hole.

Now, translating the Matrix story to web business world, the cyberspace is pregnant with CSAs. Any keyword search on Google would would return thousands of results. Making yourself stand apart out of those thousands web-links requires a science and art to be mastered. Remember, you only have a few seconds to make a mark.

A business website is one of the most cleverest ways to reflect and reinforce your brand. And that’s not all. It’s the fastest way to leverage upon that brand. No other branding medium will get you results this fast. In fact, no other medium lets you measure your brand value in figures. Still its surprising to see so many web businesses following the bandwagon. Every industry has so many brand-less participants. I’ll call them CSAs.

The Agents from Matrix  are there to stop anyone making a decision to stand up. These  signify several factors making it harder to choose a path to brand-dom. Is it lack of expertise for you? Cost factors?  Or just lack of clarity towards the significane of online branding? Whatever it is, Neo has the inherent power to slay the Agents.

Has your web business found a route to tumble down to freedom? Or, are you still following what thousands others do within your industry!

You have to start by making a choice.Blue, or, red.