Branding
 

With the summer months approaching, I've already begun a concerted effort to complete projects that I've been putting off : redesigning old sites; creating new ones. I've completed a paysite and now I'm onto a new tgp. This brings me to something I'd like to discuss : branding.

Last night I was "researching" what will be competing tgps. I was instantly struck by the lack of branding. At least 90% of sites failed to create any visual brand whatsoever. Many had gone to the trouble to register witty domain names and not developed the identity any further.

It actually got kind of depressing. So many tgps and yet so little imagination or care was inherent in them. By the end of several hours, I was losing my faith in the quality and professionalism of our industry.

Then my brain caught up with the coffee.

I began contrasting many of these unknown tgps to well-known sites.

One of the main differences was branding - which is why I think it worth mentioning here.

In the porn world, these brands are like pepsi or levis :

Link-o-Rama
Shemp
Drbizzaro
Madthumbs
Smut Gremlins
Cleos-free-porn-links
and so on
and on
on
etc

In the collective mind of surfers, branding = quality. It also creates a mental association - through slogun, style or graphic images - that makes them remember and return.

I know all this is very basic. So it astounds me moreso that so few sites realise the worth of identity.

What does brading mean to you? Do you agree with my assessment or think I'm full of shit? What do you do to differentiate your sites from others? Can we all have a unique brand?

Let's hear ya! :)

Re: Branding
 

Branding places a bookmark in the mind.

The mind remembers graphics, images and shapes better than names letters and numbers.

When you come back to this message board, your mind is remembering this....

|ggandj

even if you don't think it is.

What Urb said. :)

I'm lucky as my background is in marketing. I know the value of putting my brand on everything, so I do. :D

It would probably do wonders for many people's sales if they went and bought some marketing and design books.

Lack of branding is just one of many problems I see. No one is going to click a BBW banner if they came looking for skinny teens, don't get me started. LOL

branding - It is the act of giving a name on a certain product, it might be letters, mumbers, or a combination of both, to be distinguished the difference of a product to the varieties of of which it categorized and fall into the market. An strategic planning is necessary when conducting or making a brand to catch and win your target market.
|jackinthe

I never really thought much about branding my site - it was more along the lines of "it's my baby" & I wanted to take care of it as much as possible. I only have 2 sites that I really take care of with a lot of pride (and you're reading one of them right now)

Re: Re: Branding
 

Hell, thats the last thing I see in my head at night when I go to bed so I started drinking more and more..... almost sleep all the way to the next day with out nightmares...

Almost....

|drunk|







|jester|

This is exactly why I dont like to see free sites that change LL recips to plain text... it is removing the branding/personalities of the LL's

I totally agree with GG here..my sites are "my babies" and I am very attached to them..branding is so very important..it's association in the consumers mind..
I've wanted to go for category text links but my logo is my brand so to speak..so I have not yet..

Many Link list have managed to keep the integrity and personality of their sites through text links on category links. The ones that come to mind:

Green Guy with Link-o-Rama
Hoes
Jays
LinkFor Sex
Outlaws Porn

I am sure there are others... but its these ones that stick in my mind... they have all maintained their "brand" with creative text links.

It can be done.

I totally believe in "branding" for sites that you want to stick through bookmarks etc.
On the other hand, if you are just looking to get a tgp up for traffic purposes alone, which seems to be a trend lately, branding doesn't matter one bit - actually some of the tgps would probably prefer not to be bookmarked as they are looking at pure "newbie" traffic running through - its just a numbers game.
If you are looking to build a good base traffic through SEs, etc then branding is the second most important thing you can do for your site.