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SEO Brand Marketing: the Power of Branding to Boost Your Rankings and Build Trust

20 mins read

SEO brand marketing. The potential of SEO branding marketing is something that people often underestimate when considering their SERP ranking. An organizational branding strategy not only helps with recognition but can also boost your site rankings.

Creating a strong, trustworthy brand not only helps in attracting clients but also significantly impacts your search engine rankings. In this article, I will show you how branding and SEO can work hand in hand.

Build Quality Backlinks For SEO

Is a Brand Awareness Important to a Website’s Ranking?

Branding is more than just a logo or a tagline; it represents the reputation and trustworthiness of a business. A brand is an asset that takes many years, in fact, decades, to establish. Branding is about having a reputation that foregoes your company. It generates positive associations before you even start to present your offer. A strong branding strategy will encompass your marketing efforts across all elements and media channels, including your logo, slogans, and news. 

Google prioritizes brands that offer good user experiences, valuable content, and engage their audience, which directly links branding with SEO success.

Here is the relationship between branding and SEO:

  • It increases your business’ lead generation because it’s easier for customers to buy things from a trusted brand.
  • It provides you with higher success rates from acquiring links organically or through sending out requests to influencers.
  • Search engines are more to highlight brands when ranking pages on search results (because people simply trust them). This increases your site’s chances of getting higher search rankings for difficult keywords, which leads to more targeted traffic that is searching and probably in need of your business.

Therefore, brand mentions and SEO work together nicely.

The Impact of Brand Awareness on SEO

The Impact of Google’s HCU (Helpful Content Update) on Branding and SEO

While content quality has always been a key factor in SEO, recent updates from Google, such as the HCU (Helpful Content Update), suggest that the relationship between brand authority (BA) and domain authority (DA) is becoming increasingly important. This update shifts the focus from simply creating content or building links to evaluating how well a site’s brand authority aligns with its backlink profile.

Research shows that websites affected negatively by the HCU often had lower BA compared to DA, meaning their link-building strategies outweighed their brand strength. For example, data from an analysis of ~2 million keywords in various niches revealed that sites penalized by the HCU typically had a much lower brand authority and a higher DA

ratio compared to those that either benefited from the update or were unaffected.

Key Findings:

  • HCU Losers: DA 74, BA 37 (DA
    ratio of 2:1)
  • HCU Winners: DA 73, BA 52 (DA
    ratio of 1.4:1)
  • Neutral Sites: DA 71, BA 50 (DA
    ratio of 1.39:1)

These numbers clearly show that sites with stronger brand signals tend to fare better in Google’s rankings. If your brand authority lags behind your backlink profile, your site could be at risk under the HCU.

Actionable Steps:

  1. Build a Recognizable Brand Identity: Invest in a brand that resonates with your target audience. For residential assisted living homes, this could mean creating an identity that emphasizes trust, care, and expertise.
  2. Increase Branded Search Volume: Utilize multiple marketing channels—social media, content marketing, and advertising—to drive more branded search queries, which can improve your SEO resilience.
  3. Balance Link Building with Brand Growth: Traditional SEO strategies like link building should be aligned with efforts to strengthen your brand. Simply acquiring more backlinks without growing brand recognition may now pose risks.
  4. Create Content that Boosts Brand Authority: Ensure that your content not only satisfies user intent but also reinforces your brand’s expertise and credibility.
  5. Monitor Your Brand-Link Ratio: Regularly assess your site’s DA
    ratio to ensure your brand signals are strong relative to your link profile.

With the latest HCU update finalized on September 3, 2024, it appears that Google is fine-tuning its approach to how it measures brand strength in relation to backlinks, a concept that has ties to previous updates like Panda. Monitoring and optimizing your brand-to-link ratio can help safeguard your site against future algorithm changes.

Building Trust Through Branding

Trust is the cornerstone of both branding and SEO. The more trustworthy your brand, the more likely people are to engage with it online. Google measures this engagement through metrics such as click-through rates, bounce rates, and time spent on a website. A well-crafted brand can increase user engagement, thus improving these metrics and boosting your search rankings.

For example, in residential assisted living, trust is built not only through a professional website but also through showcasing your care for residents. This includes a clear mission statement that highlights your commitment to providing top-notch care, professional designs that make the site feel welcoming, and content that speaks directly to the concerns of the residents’ families.

Key Elements of Branding for SEO

To effectively combine branding with SEO, certain elements of your brand must be optimized:

  • Mission Statement: A clear, passionate mission statement sets the tone for your brand. For assisted living homes, the mission must reflect care, empathy, and dedication to quality service. This emotional connection builds trust, which is essential for SEO.
  • Website Design: First impressions matter. Your website must be clean, user-friendly, and mobile-responsive. Google gives priority to sites that are easy to navigate and provide a positive user experience. Poor design can lead to high bounce rates, hurting your SEO performance.
  • Content Creation: Regularly publishing valuable content (like blogs or videos) positions your brand as a thought leader. High-quality content not only engages users but also earns backlinks, which are essential for improving SEO. For assisted living homes, consider writing articles on topics such as senior care tips or showcasing video testimonials from families.

Logo and Visual Identity: Your logo should be professionally designed to instill trust and credibility. An unprofessional or outdated logo can make potential clients doubt the quality of your services.

SEO Branding Components

I will share my thoughts and discoveries about the core of the search engines.

What is the goal of all search engines? 

Search engines were created to provide the best answer to a user’s request. “Best” in this case stands for the most credible, complete, and reliable. And the term “brand” is just about credibility and reliability.

A strong brand name inspires confidence and trust to the quality of each service or product that a company offers to customers.

If we divide the brand into SEO components, then it will contain:

Type-in traffic – when users go directly to your site through the address bar of their browser. In fact, it means knowledge of your brand without any hint.

Brand traffic – when your company is searched by the brand name in the search engines. Partially, this could be interpreted as a well brand recognition with a small hint; or just as a strong user’s habit to visit exactly your website.

Citation and co-citation — mentioning your brand (not necessary with links) on credible resources, as well as citing them along with other well-known brands, which can be interpreted as “brand pollination”. Some also call it link building without links.  You may use this tool that will help you increase the citation level of your brand and build a positive reputation with sponsored articles on reliable news platforms. 

Backlinks from trusted traffic sites – are indeed one of the main indicators of brand credibility. Content is king when it comes to SEO. Consistently creating high-quality content boosts your brand’s visibility and helps in earning backlinks. Backlinks are essentially other websites linking to your content, which signals to Google that your site is trustworthy and authoritative.

Instead of focusing on the quantity of backlinks, aim for quality links from reputable sites. For example, if a local newspaper links to your website after you host a community event, it not only helps your brand but also gives your SEO a significant boost.

Well, in this case, you may also get some help. This service will improve SEO rankings with high-quality backlinks to your website.

Why Your SEO Should Focus on Search Branding?

A level of brand awareness is very hard to measure. And, unfortunately, there is no one indicator. However, Google has refocused attention from inbound links towards branded queries. Such giants, as GM or BMW, both will have lots of inbound links. Or if a Coca-Cola brand is more expensive than a Pepsi brand, this doesn’t mean that the first one will rank higher.

To understand which site a particular SERP user likely wants to find, the Google algorithm will look at branded queries, as one of the steps. By looking at the number of people actively looking for a particular company, the search engine hopes to understand what users want to see and may use this knowledge to affect the order that the websites appear.

And if you look at the big picture, you’ll see a clear correlation between brand value and ranking. You can’t argue with the fact that brands are receiving more traffic than little-known business names.

SEO Branding Strategies

Let’s move closer to the daily practice. How to use all this knowledge? 

Take a look at a few examples of SEO brand strategies to increase your brand value:

Build your brand for better rankings

This is exactly the example when it is easier said than done. If you want to persuade the client, ask yourself a question “How can we increase the value of our brand?” And try to find several answers.

Branding contains not only a logo, a slogan, or a user interface. Branding includes the experience your customers have learned with your business, this is how you make them think and feel about your products and services. And remember to double-check the results of your strategy and your current work, tracking clients’ reviews and information about your company. Check out this tool, that will help you to monitor mentions of your brand in the news. It’s crucial to track the mentions of the targeted keywords and not to miss messages from your competitors in the news flow around the world.

Consider a competitor’s brand-level when analyzing niches

It often happens you look at the search results and have no idea why some websites are at the top. But when you’re looking at their branded traffic, the cause-and-effect relationship is becoming clear. 

Competitor intelligence gives you the tools to differentiate the way you create your brand strategy from the rest. You should know your company’s unique value proposition before starting with your branding activities.

SEO brand marketing is diversification

Diversification makes it less sensitive and vulnerable to issues in any media channel. With the constant changes of SERP features, the slightest change of search objective can transform the whole list on the first page of results. If your site is filtered by the search engines, then branded traffic will still provide you with clicks.

Brand traffic improves consumer behavior

Emotionally or physically, brand strategies have an enormous effect on buying behavior, no matter how old they are. If you have loyalty to a certain company, then you will put more effort into buying or finding the answer to your question on this exact website. Brand recognition is a powerful thing. Powerful enough for you to skip on Google’s top-ranking post and find your favorite company. Powerful enough to make a more expensive purchase.

User experience

Making all elements and processes in your website easy for users provides better user engagement and eventually increases brand awareness.

Also, it takes away all barriers from sharing information about their experience to different social networks.

Publish content on the quality websites

The main idea of publishing information about your company is that you should add value to website content and demonstrate competence in your niche. Guest posts on credible websites like Fortune can drive people to learn more about a brand or a product, mentioned in the article. 

You have a great opportunity to delegate this task to a reliable service for publishing quality content, which will empower your brand.

Articles for Talent Visa

Social proof     

Building a solid following base on social networking sites such as Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, or ClubHouse is as important as building your targeted keywords’ rankings on search engines. It doesn’t just give you a big commercial opportunity, but also benefits in generating traffic and conversions as well.

Measure branded search traffic

Understanding what part of your branded traffic you’re receiving will help you find out what works for your reputation and what doesn’t, how much effort you should put into brand management, or just understand whether you have chosen the right direction or not.

Google Analytics allows you to monitor the number of people who entered your website through the brand terms, use a browser bookmark, SEO clicks, and conversions per page for specific periods. 

Other SEO Brand Levers of Influence

But I have to remind you, SEO may become strong not by a brand alone. From this article, you might get the feeling that by increasing SEO brand marketing, you will immediately move to the top. 

It’s not that simple. After all, we all know “You don’t bring a knife to a gunfight”, which means that there will be always a brand stronger than yours. In the world of SEO, there are lots of different levers of influence, that you can compete with other brands. Just remember not to neglect this factor.

Besides, the brand has another positive side, I mean its capitalization:

Targeting the Right Audience

A common mistake businesses make is focusing their marketing efforts on the wrong audience. For assisted living homes, the real decision-makers are often not the seniors themselves, but their adult children. These are the individuals who search for and decide on a care home for their parents. Your online branding and content should speak directly to them, addressing their concerns, and building trust. This approach not only helps your brand resonate with the right audience but also improves your site’s relevance in Google’s eyes, leading to better rankings.

Offline Branding and Its Online Impact

Your brand isn’t just built online; offline activities play a critical role too. Hosting events, partnering with local organizations, and participating in community service can create stories that resonate with the public. Sharing these stories online through blog posts, social media, and press releases helps strengthen your brand and builds trust. For instance, organizing a community event or offering services like meal deliveries to seniors in your area can create a positive image that translates into better online engagement.

Bottom Line: SEO brand marketing

Understanding the power of SEO brand marketing can help you stand out from your competitors. Increasing brand awareness will not only encourage engagement and empower loyalty, but it can also improve your rankings on the SERPs. 

What are your favorite SEO tactics? Let me know how you’ve used SEO to boost search branding metrics in the comments. 

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