The importance (or not) of Brand when Advertising Online

While companies with established brands can often benefit from online brand based customer acquisition strategies, using these is not always the best way to achieve their goal, firms looking at internet marketing consulting may be interested to discover.

Justin Rees, writing for Econsultancy, claimed that the received wisdom that branded is always best is unfounded.

He said that many companies looking at lead generation campaigns which involve heavy branding will only respond when there is some kind of quid pro quo benefit on offer.

"The other main advantage for advertisers using an unbranded execution, whatever the vertical, is that it is often a 'plug and play' solution ... All advertisers really need to know is what their CPA target is and how many leads they can get for their budget," he added.

Among the benefits that this model can provide are that there is only a minimum of campaign planning required and that there are no forms to test and integrate.

While Mr Rees acknowledged that the brand can often help with lead generation, he highlighted the importance of recognising that it can sometimes actually get in the way of a good prospect.

Last month, research by IDC Retail Insights suggested that internet adverts on popular websites can be key ways of improving customers' awareness of particular brands.