The Brand Maker

Internet success is not just about your product. You can have the best product or service in the world to sell and still end up with no profits. On the other hand, you can have a product that's no better or worse than your competitors' and trounce them in the marketplace.

Are the winners just lucky and the losers not? Maybe. But more likely, what marketplace winners have is a great branding and marketing scheme - something that sets them apart from competitors. Something that makes customers remember their name. What marketplace winners have is better advertising. That was certainly the case with career site Monster.com. They've managed to make a business to consumer site a success in an overcrowded market by making their brand second only to mega-giants like Yahoo! and Amazon. Andrew McKelvey, the CEO of Monster.com parent company TMP Worldwide, explains his company's strategy.

TV - The Brand Maker

McKelvey disagrees with execs that say television advertising isn't worth the money. He says Monster.com's ad strategy can be summed up in three words: television, television, television. "This year, in the year 2000, we're going to spend close to $70 million in television globally - two-thirds of that in the United States," he says. "When it comes to branding, no other medium does it like television." Of course, television is also pricey. Dot-coms already short on the dwindling fund of VC cash may not have tons to spend. "Unfortunately, a lot of the dot-com companies are running out of money. Unless you're making money, it's very difficult to go out and get more," he says. He says he'd advise dot-coms to put anywhere from a few million dollars to $10 million on the table to pay the TV bills. "If you have enough money, as we certainly do, I just don't think TV can be beat."

Let Your Business Name Be Your Friend

When naming your business, make sure your name works for, not against you. Pick something short, memorable and easy to spell.

"Go to a cocktail party with four or five names, flash them to some people, talk to them at the end of the party and say, 'Which name did you remember?'" McKelvey advises. If customers don't remember your name, they can't visit your site. It helps, of course, if your name is connected with what you do. There's no doubt, for instance, about what Books.com or Garden.com is selling. But as McKelvey points out, some of the net's biggest brands have relatively obscure names. "What does Amazon have to do with books? What does eBay have to do with auctions?" he asks. "To that extent, the name Yahoo! probably doesn't have an awful lot to do with search. Many of your top Internet websites in fact do not correlate directly between the name and the product or services. But you obviously don't want to develop a name that's just so off that it makes no sense."

But something a little unusual is good. Monster.com is a lot more memorable than Jobs.com even if the latter name is more descriptive.

Guerilla Marketing Support

Television advertising is the cornerstone of Monster.com's marketing scheme. But as McKelvey describes it, TV ads are just the foundation of a very aggressive marketing plan, a plan he says is well funded by necessity. "This is America. Bigger is better," he says. "Our standard marketing, which in our case is predominately advertising, includes a lot of guerilla marketing and the Monster.com Blimp." McKelvey says Monster.com's two blimps have gotten them terrific press and attention, especially at sporting events. But he believes they wouldn't have been as successful without prior TV advertising.

"If they looked up in the sky and just saw a monster or Monster.com, it would mean nothing," he says. But for those who have seen Monster.com's many TV ads, the blimps serve to reinforce the brand and make sure that when people think online job search, they think Monster.com. Your company may not have Monster.com's funding or brand name recognition. But you can share marketing and branding strategies. After all, Monster.com was once a fledgling company too and look how far it's come in just a few years. With a few TV ads, a recognizable brand name and a blimp or two, maybe your company can do the same.