Two types of customers visit your site-- brand-searchers and category-searchers. Red Door Interactive's president explains how to greet and sell to each.

One of the great benefits of a brand is that it stands for something. It has a meaning beyond the name itself and the people who connect with the brand could communicate attributes about the brand to others. In essence, they may describe a brand much like they would a person or thing using words that would be considered keywords one could use in performing a search. 

One of the most common referring key phrases to a company's or product's site is often its brand name. However, for new customer acquisition, you'd like to also see broader key phrases that are more like category definitions also appear in the top referring key phrases to your site.

Two categories, two customer types
When you break down the variety of traffic referred from search engines, you could group some of that traffic into two particular categories. One category could be brand names, which could be the company name or popular product names. And then, the other category could be defined as ways to broadly describe product or business categories.

By breaking out those two categories (bear in mind, there are many others, as well), you are basically identifying two types of potential customers. One type is the brand-searcher, who knows you and will already have preconceived notions about you. If they are shopping, they've already put you into their consideration set based on particular attributes associated with the brand either by referral or by their own experience.

The other type of potential customer is a category-searcher. This type has not yet made up their mind about whose products they are going to choose within the category. They've not defined their consideration set and they likely need more information to make their decision. They are not as likely to be tied to the brand. These people, you know much less about, however you will likely know one important thing: the key phrase they typed to find you. Taking advantage of this information is handled in a relatively straightforward manner with a combination of landing pages, content customization and testing.

Understanding the brand-searcher customer type
To make the best use of the brand-searcher, you need to understand the common preconceived notions that people have about your brand and what key phrases people would use to describe your brand and products. To gather this information, you need to conduct market research and study your site analytics with this tactic goal in mind. This research will help you define both what a brand-searcher means to you and your products, as well as what a user is expecting when they visit your site to purchase.

The benefit of understanding this information is that you can ensure that brand-consistent information is present to the user, but the primary focus for this user set is to either direct them to a specific model they're already familiar with or to help them select consonant features they believe are at least on par with those perceived available within a product category. This user set is also more likely to increase their own conversion value with additional purchases, as well as become a repeat buyer in the future.

The brand-searcher's landing page
As internet marketing professionals we all hopefully understand the value of customizing content based on the user, using landing pages based on a campaign (search or otherwise) and optimizing the conversion funnel. If a user has typed in a particular key phrase that we are promoting, we'd like them to enter on that key phrase's conversion path. However, for people who type the brand name into their search engine, they are most likely to enter on the homepage or main product page from the organic search engine results. That, in essence, makes the homepage the brand name's promotional landing page; the challenge with it is that it is often the landing page for so many other targets and activities.

The critical aspect of leveraging benefits of the brand-searcher is to map out the most minimal path to conversion based on the understanding that, if you manage your other entry points appropriately, such as URLs within investor-focused press releases or PPC landing pages, you can leverage the characteristics of your brand to sell.

If you treat your homepage as the primary landing page for a brand-searcher, then based on your understanding of your brand's characteristics (identified most aptly by market research) you can "assume the sale" and drive them to convert. For example, for someone who searches for your brand, you can inject them into the sales process by introducing them immediately to familiar options that would indicate which product they want as well as offer them a quick list of available products to dive directly into the conversion funnel for the product they already know.

The familiar, primary options you choose to promote to the brand-searcher should be different than the brand's assumed attributes, which, for example, could be "American-made," "enduring" or "quality" if those are what people would associate with your brand. They already know that and have made the commitment to the brand. At this point, they are looking for something more specific under the brand's umbrella.

Think of approaching this audience like you would from a fast food counter: "May I take your order?" and "Do you want fries with that?" This is a different approach than one you would take with a category-searcher where they are asking you, "Who are you and what do you have to offer?" Or inquiring, "Do you have a product with these features?" The former will select from the available menu, provided critical standard components are not missing, whereas the latter will likely formulate a feature scope from a broad set, then focus on their most important features (which brand is unlikely at the top) to make their purchase decision.

Conclusion
It is no new concept that a brand name often has an associated persona. Companies have used advertising and branding strategies for years in an effort to develop personality traits for themselves. Now, in the era of steady search engine usage, brands now carry with them key phrases that reflect consumers' interpretations of the brand personality on a measurable level.

The key to maximizing the value of a brand online, and consequently brand-searchers, is to understand assumptions about your brand and its implications on how someone uses your website to purchase. People who buy in to the brand are your most valuable customers and should be supported within the web strategy.

Reid Carr is president of Red Door Interactive. Read full bio.