Best brands online
The power of the brand is a curious thing, it makes one firm weep and another firm sing...
With the fight for attention heading from the magazine pages, television sets and high street stores to the internet, brands are continuing to invest more time and money on their crucial online presence.
While some brands have struggled to translate their personality online, others have flourished and even grown through the internet.
Meanwhile, as already famous brands battle for supremecy, a raft of new, yet already household brand names, have emerged from the inner-echelons of the ‘net’.
Strange named brands – Twitter, Facebook, Bebo and Google – now roll off the tounge as though they have always been an integral part of daily life.
Potential
But, between the old and the new, the traditional and the online, which brands are the best brands online? Which brands have caputured the potential of the internet, using it to sell products, swap stories or send a message?
Moreover, what makes a brand great online? Is it how it looks, how it functions or can the idea itself make a brand great?
The Drum asked digital agencies E3, Rippleffect, Digital Brand Response Group, Whitespace, Peach Digital, Voltage and Coolpink to chose their favourite brands online. What follows is a mix of the predictable, the traditional and the new...
"THE GIRLS", E3
Our favourite online brand is ASOS, originally known as ‘As Seen On Screen’. The idea was to sell clothes made famous by celebrities, available to everyone but without the designer price tag. The online store was launched in 2000, and has grown to become one of the UK’s most fabulous online retailers.
Both women and now men love it because it stocks a massive range of designer and high street brands, something which even now is relatively unique. The fulfilment is faultless, and highly targeted and clever e-marketing acquires and retains customers, who become passionate about the brand. Paparazzi style photography and catwalk videos show the clothes at their best and clever marketing such as birthday vouchers are popular.
ASOS has turned the traditional retail model on its head, growing significantly where offline retailers are struggling. The brand designs ASOS own-label clothes and publishes an award-winning magazine to promote them. The online magazine links to its own Facebook page, which features exclusive content. And there’s still absolutely no high street presence. www.asos.com
BEN HATTON, MD, RIPPLEFFECT
Nike has utilised the web to help build a strong global brand and establish itself as a market leader in sport and fitness. It excels in its use of mixed media marketing to create impactful and engaging content that appeals to a wide demographic and an international audience.
The brand has successfully blurred the line between online and in-store shopping. It has enhanced the customer experience by making it more interactive with viral and e-marketing campaigns that bring the product to life. For instance, its e-tail site NikeID.com allows the customer to personalise every item and reinforces its urban, trendy and smooth image.
Nike has taken its online presence up a notch and ingrained itself with its audiences by providing useful online tools for the amateur sportsperson. Its ‘bootcamp’ viral campaign showed football stars keeping in shape during the close season and encouraged amateur footballers to train over the summer. While the Nike + project is geared at users sharing training regimes, success stories and advice and tips online. Evidently Nike’s digital success is linked to a focus on brand positioning, creativity and market knowledge. www.nike.com www.nikeid.com www.nikeplus.com
SIMON JONES, CEO, DIGITAL BRAND RESPONSE GROUP
At the moment, my favourite online brand – which just happens to be a pureplay – is Twitter. I wish I’d thought of it first! It also seems to be the favourite of a number of celebrities including Jonathan Ross (Twitter name Wossy), Stephen Fry (Twitter name Stephenfry) and Gordon the Gopher’s best mate Phillip Schofield (Twitter name Schofe). It’s a great way of gaining a small insight into celebrities’ lives, if you’re that way inclined. I tend to use it to keep in touch with friends and family or more accurately sneak a peak at what they’re thinking at the time they Twitter. On this point though I can’t help agreeing with Modernista founder Gareth Koepke that “…we should see ‘social’ as a truth about people and communication, not a media channel”. Twitter for all its publicity at the moment is a great way to ‘see’ into other people’s lives, if only 160 characters at a time! www.twitter.com
IAIN VALENTINE, CREATIVE DIRECTOR, WHITESPACE
My favourite online brand will be different tomorrow, or even by lunchtime. Unlike some of my favourite things, star bars for example, online brands are really only ever as good as the information or experience you want at any particular time. We get bored quick, we find what we are looking for, or we try to get it cheaper – then we move on. So during our work with The Scottish Government (know the score campaign) we came across the current online campaign for FRANK created by Profero (http://www.profero.com/showcase/cocainebasement/). This is a great example of a truly integrated campaign (that means above the line agency and digital agency working together), an uncompromised, realistic and engaging approach to content (check out the effects on the heart interactive! http://www.talktofrank.com/basement.aspx#/Heart) and online advertising that utilises the potential of rich media. Great work, strategically solid, creative strong and technically sound – hats off. www.talktofrank.com
MALCOLM MACMILLAN, DIRECTOR, PEACH DIGITAL
I have chosen John Lewis because they have taken care to use the strengths of the web to build upon everything they do so well offline.
Any retailer that can remove the hassle of the physical shopping experience for me starts high in my estimation.
The thing about John Lewis online though is how they have managed to get it so absolutely right – they have been entirely faithful to their core values so that I am totally convinced that I will get the quality, service and value for money that I have grown to expect from the store; the site is well-constructed, making it really easy to find products on the site; and because it’s the web and because they are service oriented, they really understand the importance of simple and flexible (and currently free) delivery/collection options.
So I get all the reassurance of shopping at a John Lewis store without going anywhere near Buchanan Galleries (Glasgow) at lunchtime. Brilliant! www.johnlewis.com
MARK BOWER, MANAGING DIRECTOR, COOLPINK
Choosing Amazon as my favourite online brand? Hardly Original? But that’s the point. It’s the one online brand my Gran would stand a chance of recalling. It’s the Coke of the online world; the first and perhaps still the only genuine online super-brand (outside the realms of giants such as Google, Yahoo and MSN).
Can anyone really claim to have played such a pivotal role in shaping online experience and expectation as the mighty Amazon? Amazon isn’t about technology or about wowing users with the latest ‘cool’ functionality. It’s about consistently providing a superior experience and keeping them coming back for more.
It’s about putting us, the punters, at the heart of the business model and providing simply and elegantly for our needs. In short, it’s about building enormous levels of trust. And at the end of the day, isn’t that what every brand worth it’s salt should strive for? www.amazon.com
ROB BOOTH, DIRECTOR OF ONLINE, VOLTAGE
For me, facebook shows what happens when you get an online brand absolutely bang on.
They were by no means the first to enter the arena of social networking, but facebook has worked itself into the public consciousness in a way which earlier sites failed to do. The key has been to protect their brand identity whilst simultaneously allowing user generated content and free access. The antithesis of this is an adolescent’s myspace page, where the brand has been diluted beyond recognition. Web developers can use facebook as a platform for launching new applications, ensuring that the site’s functionality is constantly changing and users are being re-engaged all the time in their own online communities.
Facebook is pretty much at the stage of becoming an iconic online brand – it is instantly recognisable, has huge media and social networking appeal and reaches a wide demographic. When Monkey from the PG Tips ads starts wearing a t-shirt saying “I facebooked your mum”, you know that you’ve hit the online brand jackpot. www.facebook.com