Have You Googled Your Brand Name?

I typed the names of several wine brands in the Google search bar and came up with some very interesting results.

The first search I performed was for a very well known brand and resulted in the following:

Organic Search Results

1. A listing for a lower price point subsidiary brand
2. A listing with the winery’s URL, rather than their name, as the title and their navigational categories as the description (for example, “………popular categories, Napa Valley, wine tasting”).  These results are not at all useful in building the brand or enticing the user to click through.
3. Shopping results pointing to sites such as Amazon.com, Bed Bath & Beyond, and a discount wine retailer

Sponsored Links

1. A wine retailer with the following description “Thousands of wines including (Winery’s Name) and other greats”.
2. “Buy (Winery’s Name) books”

There were several other sponsored links for this brand including two people finder ads, several competing brands, and an ad for Fresh & Easy.  The image below is an actual Google Ad served for a search of this brand.

The second search I performed was for another major brand and yielded the following results:

Organic Search Results

“(Winery’s Name) website requires Macromedia Flash. Get Macromedia Flash.  If you have Flash installed, click to visit the website. …”

This was the fourth search result (following some Wikipedia entries).

Sponsored Links

There was just one sponsored link, for an online retailer advertising “a huge selection on sale now”.

The third search I performed had much better results (and I’m happy to report that this was an IBG client). 

Organic Search Results

The first three organic results pointed to the winery’s website:

1. Local business results complete with a Google map and reviews
2. A listing with the winery’s name as title and a compelling description
3. A listing which pointed to the winery’s product catalog page (again with a nice title and description).

Sponsored Links

The sponsored results were not so positive though:

The first was for a bargain retailer

Cheap (Winery’s Name)
Looking for (Winery’s Name) on sale?
Compare Wine & save up to 48% now!

The second result was for WineZap

Buy (Winery’s Name)
Compare prices at hundreds of
US wine shops online

What should you do?  First, make sure you’re appearing first in the organic listings when you search your winery’s name.  Most likely you will be.  If you’d like to tweak the title or description that appears, just login to the admin panel for your website, go to your site settings and make the necessary adjustments.

Should you consider paid search advertising for your brand name?  My feeling is yes.  Appearing at the top of both the organic results and sponsored links adds authority and leads to confidence on the customer’s part.  It also provides you with an opportunity to tie any offline promotional efforts directly to your website.  You’ll likely end up with the top spot at a much lower cost than anyone else bidding on your brand name because you’ll have a higher click through rate and thus a higher quality score.

In developing the headline and description for your ad, I would keep it very simple.  Let visitors know that yours is the official winery site and that your wines can be purchased directly.  You might try doing a search for other companies whose products are sold both direct-to-consumer and through retailers, i.e. Godiva Chocolates, Clinique, Sony, and Dell.