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When It’s Time for Your Brand to Stand Up or Shut Up
Your brand is your personality. It’s how others see your company as a person — someone with whom a consumer can identify, and think of as a friend. As with life, your brand will be stalked by those who take that friendship for the identity to a weird, creepy level.
The rule for every dinner table, cocktail party, office, Facebook post, tweet, or Google+ post, lest your followers become a minus, should be; “no sexual, political, religious, or money discussions allowed.” There are other things people like to hear. Unfortunately, brand loyalty often falls upon consumers knowing the company brand stance on all of the taboo subjects that have nothing to do with how clean your dishes can be, or how less delicious your greasy hamburger would be if the brand didn’t meet your own ideals. Often a brand is called out to state an opinion, and sometimes someone at the top just can’t keep their mouth shut.
My Company — MY RULES!
Freedom of speech you say? True. It’s often followed by the freedom to buy another brand.
Recently, and it’s hard to keep track as brand blunders happen almost every day, the CEO of Barilla Pasta made a statement that caused the LGBT community and straight supporters to blast the company via every social media channel for his views and how it effected his business decisions.
BANG! Not defensible, somewhat like the spin on a similar statement from the president of Chik-Fil-A, where it was argued that it was his personal opinion, did not reflect business practices, and appropriate apologies were issued. The Barilla statement targeted a group, stated the brand belief, which brought the business into the incident, and made it sound like a commitment for which no apology was ever necessary, or deserved. Perhaps this is why the follow up apologies are rarely, if ever, accepted by consumers. It’s time that wipes memories clean!
Even just a foolish trip on Twitter, or using the wrong hashtag at the wrong time can be a disaster. Plenty of top corporations have had to do damage control after an innocent slip up, or moronic social media employee posted the wrong tweet because he/she thought they were on their own Twitter account. Yikes! Protecting one’s brand is a 24/7 job for not just outgoing social media, but also for inbound reactions.
Brand Building Changes
Brands used to build loyalty sheerly upon the friendly, and popular feeling people got from using the product, based mostly on brilliant commercials, pushing a brand image. Who would want more?
In the modern, corporate world, donations are made, sometimes for tax reasons, but other times for philanthropic reasons. It is the recipient(s) of those charitable donations that can cause a brand bump if your base of consumer support doesn’t agree with the work of those charities. THAT has forced some very brave, and risky brand stance. Why are corporations starting to weigh in on hot issues, such as support of the LGBT community?
“Businesses see more reward than risk in communicating their acceptance toward LGBT people. Companies that come out against DOMA want to reflect contemporary market attitudes,” says Bob Witeck, president of Witeck Communications, which advises corporations on LGBT issues.
In her article, “Those Who Stand for Nothing Fall for Anything,” Tara Hunt writes:
You can smell a brand who is following a formula or just follows advice and ‘best practice’ guidelines. Their voice is forced and weak. They won’t take a position. They are afraid of what others think. They define themselves by what they ARE NOT, but refuse to own who they ARE.
The easiest explanation for such risks to one’s brand, is that no business can live within a self-controlled bubble anymore. Social context has now become the key to consumer brand loyalty. The current backlash of economics and politics, at least in the perception of consumers, make them want more control over large corporate entities. Don’t support MY beliefs? I’ll feel my power by not buying your product. It’s a self-affirmation for a society that feels more, and more helpless, and feel the companies that depend on consumer dollar power, can be bent to meet yet another step in the evolution of brand building — consumer political, and social opinions.
There are also those who smell a conspiracy. Corporate support can wield a lot of power, and contributions do buy power. Of course, when it comes to brand awareness, some people believe store brands are just as good as name brands, but save money, and their eyes and ears are closed to any opinions, good or bad. Money does talk!
Top image ©GL Stock Images
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Review: Extreme iPad Stand
How extreme is this iPad stand? Watch the video to find out. Official product info: hyperspacecompany.com Social Me: Twitter: twitter.com Facebook: facebook.com Facebook App: apps.facebook.com iTunes Ping: bit.ly My Websites: Personal Site: daviddifrancojr.com TekSocial teksocial.com Di Franco Media difrancomedia.com Other Channels Mobile Videos: youtube.com TekSocial Video: youtube.com Web Hosting Discounts: Squarespace: teksocial.com Go Daddy: teksocial.com
Video Rating: 4 / 5
Top Level Domain Extensions – What do they stand for?
The first brick that lays the foundation of the pillar of your online presence is a domain name. When we talk about domains, it becomes important to mention top-level domain names (TLDs).
TLDs contribute considerably in the structuring of Internet. Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, ICANN, manages the creation of TLDs, which are operated by different registries. Each registry, like us, pays a fee to ICANN for getting the rights to operate TLDs.
Dot Com (.com)
The ‘.com’ TLD is the king of the jungle of TLDs since 1994. Nearly everyone, from individuals & SMBs to big corporate houses, who steps on the Web wishes to grab a ‘.com’ TLD at the first instance since it stands for ‘Commercial’. It reflects that the site is for commercial purpose. However, now this domain extension has become more or less a ‘defacto extension’ used by almost everyone.
Dot Net (.net)
The ‘.net’ TLD stands for ‘Network’. This is one of the original TLDs mostly used by Internet-specific providers /businesses, such as social networking websites, SEO, web hosting etc. It’s the one of the most coveted domain extensions after ‘.com’.
Dot Info (.info)
The ‘.info’ TLD stands for ‘Information’. This TLD is mostly used by information & resource-based websites, which are not involved in commercial activities. This domain extension can be used for lead generation, knowledge sharing and community building. You can use this TLD for providing information to reinforce your brand.
Dot Org (.org)
The ‘.org’ TLD stands for ‘Organization’. This domain extension is mostly used by non-commercial & non-profit organizations. This TLD can also be used for building your community & leveraging your branding endeavors to win over your potential customers.
Dot Biz (.biz)
The ‘.biz’ TLD stands for ‘Business’. This domain extension, originally created in 2001, is mostly preferred for creating business websites. This open TLD is exclusively for “bona fide business or commercial use”, and has an immense sales pitch.
Dot Name (.name)
The ‘.name’ TLD stands for ‘Name’. This domain extension, originally introduced in 2001, is mostly used by individuals, who use this domain extension to represent their real names, fictional names, display names, nicknames, pseudonyms etc. These days, this domain extension is being popularly used as a web address for Digital Identity applications.
Dot Mobi (.mobi)
The .mobi’ TLD stands for ‘Mobile’. This domain extension, created in 2005 but available for public registration since 26 September 2006, must be used for all mobile-compatible sites as per the standards. This TLD is financially supported by biggies such as Google, Microsoft, Nokia, Samsung, Ericsson, Vodafone etc.
Dot Tv (.tv)
The ‘.tv’ is a country code top level domain (ccTLD), introduced in 1996 for the islands of Tuvalu. Its intended use is for all entities related to Tuvalu, whereas it’s promoted commercially for television/video sites. However, it can be registered for any purpose by anyone.
Dot Me (.me)
The ‘.me’ TLD is yet again a country code top level domain (ccTLD) introduced in 2007 for Montenegro. This domain extension is being promoted adequately for its global use, and become more like a personal name space. It can be registered for any purpose on the Web. However, it’s being marketed on the Web by the registrars as ‘.ME domains all about you’.
Dot Cc (.cc)
The ‘.cc’ TLD is also a country code top level domain for Cocos Islands, Australia. It was introduced in 1997, and administered by VeriSign as the ‘the next .com’. This domain extension is put to different assortment of sites, some of them especially referring to Cocos Islands.
It is expected that a dramatic change in the creation of new TLDs would be observed in 2010. We hope that many more new TLDs would flow in the New Year on the Internet as well and we shall be able to offer you more of such TLDs.
Currently, LimeDomains is offering 10 major TLDs to its users at mostaffordable prices in the market. Register yours now!