It's almost impossible to pick up a business publication without seeing some reference to the world of new media, especially the Internet and its role in marketing a product or service.

A substantial amount of this rhetoric, however, ignores one of the most important components of a marketing professional’s responsibility — building a brand or corporate reputation to create relationships with customers. When it comes to building a brand on the Internet, never have so many talked so little of what may be the Internet’s most stunning capability — strengthening the bond with customers and prospects.

“Branding is redefined online,” says Caroline Riby, vice president-media director at Saatchi & Saatchi Rowland of Rochester, NY. “We are moving beyond representing a brand to experiencing it.”

In this new world of e-branding, the Internet has become more than a gimmick or a mere line item on the communications budget. It can now play a pivotal role in enhancing brand relationships and corporate reputations.

It offers a huge advantage over traditional mass media. The speed people can move from awareness to action on the Internet is a true differentiator and challenge for e-marketers. This requires a new way of thinking about how to design Web sites and related marketing communications.

However as the author of The End of Marketing As We Know It, Sergio Zyman says, there is no difference between building an Internet brand and a traditional brand. In effect, the steps to bond prospects to brands are essentially the same. The difference, however, will be the speed a brand can transition prospects to customers.

Familiarity - During the second stage, the prospect becomes familiar with the company through acquiring an appreciation of the products or services offered, and various related features.

Trust - The next stage takes the relationship to a deeper level. The potential customer becomes motivated to purchase a product or service because of the perceived benefits derived from particular features. During this phase, positive imagery about the brand or company encourages a feeling of trust, which in turn, enhances the relationship-building process.

Commitment - The final stage is the most important. At this stage, a transaction occurs that consummates the relationship. The prospect and the company each get something from the other. They are no longer strangers. Both comprehend something about each other, hopefully encouraging many repeated exchanges.

In looking at media choices for creating this desired relationship, the advantage of the Internet over mass media is obvious. Mass media cannot communicate with individual prospects in a customized way. The Internet enables communication based on where each prospect is in the four stages of the relationship-building process.

With traditional media, the messages are sent out to the world no matter what level of trust and interest the company has previously generated. Accordingly, some prospects are told what they already know. Others are not able to learn what they need to know to engage further.

By contrast, a well-executed e-branding strategy, expressed in a well-designed Web site and integrated e-marketing program, can adapt communications to match the aspiring buyer’s needs and wants at any stage in the relationship-building process.

The Internet and Relationships

Don Peppers, co-author of The One-to-One Future, has noted the future of marketing is about persuading consumers to participate in a dialogue. Not just any dialogue, but one that helps to bond the consumer to the brand.

Rather than simply interrupting a television show with a commercial message or barging into prospect's lives with unannounced phone calls or letters, innovative marketers will first try to get individuals to voluntarily enroll in the selling process. A volunteer’s experience will almost always be more likely to result in the embrace of a brand than any forced viewing or consumption experience can ever accomplish.

Interactive technology enables marketers to inexpensively attract consumers into one-to-one relationships fueled by two-way “conversations” — played out via mouse clicks on a computer. Through this process, prospective buyers collaborate with marketers to fashion the product or service being sold. By inviting each prospect to join in a uniquely responsive and tailored dialogue, marketers are more likely to earn loyalty.

To nurture such a highly targeted and relevant engagement, the communications professional needs to create marketing tactics customized to whatever stage the prospect has reached in the relationship-building process.

Creative material on the Web site needs to do several things.

It must capture the attention of those prospects who know nothing or very little about the company, but are interested in its category. It also must build awareness of what the company does within the context of the industry in which it’s competing.

For those who already know something of the company, but not the advantages of doing business with it, site content should identify and link benefits sought by the consumer to the company’s products and services. This material needs to deepen to a level that triggers a desire to do business with the company.

Clearly, those individuals wishing to become customers need easy site access to satisfy their needs and assure the relationship develops even further. And most importantly, existing customers of the company need to feel their interaction with the site, identifying them as more than just an anonymous browser.

These customers need to be given some sense they have access not available to just anyone. They need to be rewarded for continuing to engage with the company.

There are many design elements that can accomplish the objectives of moving a prospect along the relationship-building continuum. These techniques can start with a simple interaction such as a brief registration forms to begin the relationship-building process. More sophisticated techniques are available such as games that intrigue the user on a category relevant subject, use of an intelligent component, such as cookies, that knows if the user has visited the site before and greets andtreats the user personally.

3. e-Branding Tactics

Linking Bricks and Clicks

One of the most interesting relationship-building uses of branding on the Internet are those companies like Barnes and Noble, Toys-R-Us, and The Gap, who are seeking to link the traditional brick and mortar brand experiences they provide with their e-brand experience.

Barnes and Noble announced it’s going to use store locations to provide same-day delivery. Toys-R-Us has already begun to use its stores for returns and exchanges. Both of these brick and mortar leaders are leveraging their facilities to fast-forward the distribution process.

Perhaps more critical than delivery is the actual order generating process. Here we find The Gap is leading the way. It is putting computers, for customer use, in many of its locations so consumers have the ability to order clothing styles they find attractive, but might not be in stock at the moment of their store visit.

Consumers can sample the goods in the stores and, based on the in-store experience, place an immediate order. They do not even need a computer at home to cybershop with The Gap. In this way these companies are building integrated “clicks-and-mortar” brands that work together to create a single brand relationship.

4. Measurement Issues

To maximize the opportunities of Internet branding, it is critical to measure the degree the site is actually migrating visitors to a deeper acceptance of the company and a greater attachment to its products and brands. Measurement of the effectiveness of a company’s Internet marketing activities yields significant insight for cultivating more business.

Traditional communications testing methods treat respondents alike. They must meet a pre-specified level of awareness or knowledge about the company or its brands.

Measuring a Web site’s impact, however, does not and should not base evaluative considerations on a “one size fits all” category. The dialogue with each prospective customer must reflect his or her unique transition along the relationship-building continuum.

Although there are standard metrics for measuring how well a Web site is achieving its purpose, Web site measurement and evaluation has an additional goal — seeking to calibrate the incremental movement of each individual toward a full relationship with the sponsoring company.

A strategic measurement system will need to segment prospects and customers into their respective place on the relationship-brand building continuum according to the depth of their relationship with the brand. An effective system will seek to calibrate how each type of customer feels toward the brand and how likely each is to be moved along the continuum toward a deeper relationship.

This need for measurement acknowledges the traditional model of marketing, which assumes people move through stages of interest in a brand (sometimes referred to as the AIDA approach, transitioning a prospect from Awareness, to Interest, to Desire, to Action), is still relevant.

The only difference on the Internet will be that the movement between stages can take place much more quickly. The need to accommodate the enhanced speed of relationship building on the Internet means that the speed that data about prospects and customers must be developed. A customer can move from neutral to satisfied to dissatisfied much more quickly via an Internet experience and, therefore, systems for measuring satisfaction must match the speed customers are changing their views toward brands.

The relevance of the traditional model should not be overlooked.

People will still need to develop a sense of trust about a brand and its Web presence before they will reveal data about themselves or share their credit card number. The branding power of a site relies on the ability to bring a customer back for repeated interactions, the degree of permission granted by the customer for ongoing dialogue, and the extent this access is being leveraged.

Once permission is granted, the marketer’s chief goal is to expand the engagement. If done well, this elicits more trust, satisfaction, and loyalty from each customer.

At the turn of the last century, the owner of a general store knew his customers so intimately he could suggest specific products to meet their unique needs. Now, 100 years later, marketers have the opportunity to make that same personalized connection.