Is it better do you think to have one brand which does everything or multiple brands concetrating on each area. By this I mean either
www.everything.com - Does dedicated/shared/VPS/Reseller
or
www.dedicated.com - Dedicated Servers
www.shared.com - Shared Accounts
www.vps.com - VPS Accounts
is it more confusing for customers or is it better so that you can target certain market areas? Also assume basic cross links on sites which say. For shared hosting please see our sisters site www.shared.com
Rus
Devil Inside
03-31-2005, 06:04 AM
If handled properly - it may do better with multiple brands. At least as far as SEO and search engine ranking is concerned. But that will only go so far.
derek.bodner
03-31-2005, 10:08 AM
Not only that, but it may be beneficial to even have multiple brands of, say, one segment, operated by the same staff, with the same support staff, branded differently.
Cater to many different target audiences.
cahostnet
03-31-2005, 03:21 PM
If you have the money and can pull it off then multiple brands should work. If not then one should be the path.
AdWatcher-Boris
03-31-2005, 04:51 PM
Rus,
It's a pretty tricky situation.
Theoretically, the immutable law of branding says that each brand should stand for one specific product or service - whether you can consider "hosting" in general to be one kind of service or would like to sub-divide it into further segments, such as "dedicated", "shared", and "VPS" is something that only you can decide.
In terms of the actual brand, I think we all know that "ev1servers" stand for dedicated servers, "rackspace" stands for high-quality, managed dedicated servers, "hostopia" are resellers, and "site5" are shared (at least in my own opinion). In terms of this, each of these companies have managed to communicate their brands very effectively.
However, one needs to look at the amount of time and money they spent in order to do so. In other words, brands can be effective to communicate your company's image, so that people will know who to go to when they need a specific service in the future. If you're a small start up, you may not have the funds nor the reach to achieve the same results.
Now, at the same time, there is nothing wrong with having a separate website for each of the services you offer. Personally, when I'm looking for a dedicated server provider, I want a company that does ONLY that because I feel they'd do a better job. It doesn't have as much to do with branding, though, as it does with perception.
Hope this helped!
Boris
