Brand perception: How online presence and testimonials help

By Yinka Olaito in Nigeria.

Brand perception is vital to brand success. Like we know, perception is everything. An audience may hold negative perception about a brand without any good reason. That is their opinion. Their opinions affect the success of your brand. So effort must be made to ensure audience perception of your brand is exactly what you want it to be.

Perception, personal opinion or reality can be formed from different cues. It may be a result of what an individual sees, feels or thinks. What the individual feels is important to them even if the judgement is wrong. This is why brand custodian must do everything to continuously work hard to sell right impression. Last week I was consulting for a United Nations Agency (African region), the experience I learnt thought me a great lesson on the impact of great online presence, testimonials in shaping personal brand perception. These lessons also are applicable to other brands’ perception as well.

At the closing event, a sub regional director did state that when my name was sent to him for approval as one of the consultants that will work with the participants at the conference, he was a bit sceptical. According to him, even though he had not met me before, he was still in doubt if the senior officer who recommended me was sure I could make great impact and add required value. According to him, while still keeping this notion in his mind, he did a background study on my person, ability and professional experience online.

According to him, the result he got from his research was so positive enough to justify the need to hire my services. Some of the things that convinced him according to his speech include my ability to demonstrate thought leadership on my area of expertise and testimonials of those I have been privileged to work for or with. All these he found online as he did not want to ask question from anyone. In his final analysis, he congratulated my sound expertise that eventually justified my inclusion as well as my professional delivery at the conference.

My conclusion from the above is that people form opinion about any brand daily. The opinion can either be positive or negative. Whatever opinions formed of your brand can be changed, strengthened either for good or for bad by what they read online about the brand. Those who feel online world is not important may have to have a rethink. From the above case study, it is obvious many decisions are being made or have been made about your brand based on what they see or read about your brand online. Have you considered how many business opportunities you might have lost just because of what they see online about your brand?

This case study also showed that online reputation management should not be taken with levity. Hence the need to hire, engage someone to work hard on this for your brand especially if you do not know how. In order to positively strengthen brand perception, here are my thoughts:

Web presence: give a good thought to having a vibrant web presence that really show potentials what value your brand brings to the table.

Demonstrate thought leadership: Everyone is a publisher today. But your brand needs to go ahead of the pack through thought leadership promotion. Show your expertise and uniqueness to the world online.

Testimonials: When you have done a good job, do not forget to ask for testimonials. If the clients oblige you of these and allow you to publicize them on your web for other to see you stand better chances. Testimonials from satisfied customers aid better perception, understanding when decisions are going to be made about your brand.

 

Yinka olaito, a passionate Brand-PR, Social Media expert, Trainer and Speaker. He is the CCO of Michael sage consulting, Lagos Nigeria.

 

Visit his website at www.yinkaolaito.com

 

This article was originally posted on Nigeria Business Communities

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