This document discusses how to build a web hosting brand. It recommends starting with audience research to segment the market and understand customer needs. Next, define the brand's values with measurable rules and create a consistent tone of voice and design style across all communications. Finally, collate all branding elements into guidelines for internal use and review periodically. The goal is to establish a coherent brand identity that differentiates the web hosting service from commoditized competitors.

1. Building a web hosting brand
By Robert Mathers

2. Content of this talk
What is a brand?
Audience research
Values
Tone of voice
Design

3. What I mean by ‘brand’

4. What I mean by ‘brand’
A brand encapsulates how an individual feels
about a product, service, organisation or
individual

5. What I mean by ‘brand’
Branding shouldn’t just be part of marketing

7. How branding generates value
More new customers
Word of mouth referrals
Customers who come to you directly
Sale amount per customer
When existing customers are looking for a new product
Higher retention rates
Less likely to cancel

8. Why branding matters in web hosting
It helps you become more than a
commodity to your customers

9. Start by segmenting the market
Hobbyists Bloggers < Home
Large
Mid-sized
ecommerce < Business
Ecommerce
Large
design
agency
(11+
staff)
< Creatives
Small
design
agency (1-
10 staff)
WYSIWYG
users
First time
website
builders
Brochure
website
Small
Ecommerce
SOHO
web
designers
Part-time
freelance

10. What you want to find out

11. What you want to find out

12. How to get your research

13. How to get your research –
Google Consumer Surveys
Create questions
Define who you want to answer them
Analyse the responses

14. How to get your research

15. How to get your research -
Google Analytics
Find keywords used to discover your website
e.g. Cheap Web Hosting

16. How to get your research
Anecdotal knowledge from yourself and those you work with
Asking the customer if you have a close relationship

17. Values –What they are
Concepts that you stand for and will
not compromise within your activities
and operations

18. Values
Trust
Contribution
Teamwork
Innovation

19. Values

20. Values

21. Values
Leadership
Passion
Integrity
Accountability

22. Values

23. Values

24. Values
Simplicity
User focused
Personalisation
Fun & humour

25. Values

26. Values

27. Defining your values
Look at your audience research in relation to:
Your products and services
The experiences you provide beyond your
products and services

28. Defining your values
Create between 2 and 4 values with at least one
for each of these two areas
Your values should never change

29. Making your values measurable
Create sets of rules for your values

30. Making your values measurable
Trust
No hidden renewal fees
30 min response times for queries
No copy and paste responses

31. Managing your values over time
To help your brand fulfil the needs of your audiences
even more over time you can:
• Add additional rules to your values
• Make your current rules deliver more value e.g.
increasing the query response times you work to
from 30 minutes to 10 minutes

32. Tone of voice
Definition
Tone of voice is how you talk to your audiences
across your different touchpoints

33. How to define yours
Go over the interests, content they consume and where they
consume their content sections within your audience research.
Look at the tone of voice used on these sites and look
at your values to define your tone of voice.

34. How to define yours
Levels of formality
What clothes describe the formality
of your tone at this touchpoint?

35. How to define yours
Financing Business Innovation

36. How to define yours
Let’s build a smaller planet

37. How to define yours
(FAQs) help is on its way…all your burning questions here

38. How to define yours
Word bank
A word bank is a collection of words you’ll commonly
use in your communications
e.g. awesome, excellent or lovely?

39. How to define yours
On-brand Search for your perfect domain now
Too formal Browse excellent domains with exceptional ROI
Too informal Check out these super-sweet domains!

40. Design
Go over the interests, content they consume and
where they consume their content sections within
your audience research.
Look at the design used on these sites and look at your
values to define your design style.

41. Colour palette
Use basic colour psychology to select your colours in Paletton

42. Colour palette
Blue
Integrity, trust, authority

43. Colour palette
Green
Growth, nature, environment

44. Colour palette
Red
Power, love, passion

45. Logo
Keep things simple

46. Logo
Establish the different variations of your
logo and where you’ll use them

47. Icons
Have a consistent visual style for your icons that
ties into your larger design style
Try to pick a single source for your icons e.g. Font Awesome to
avoid having icons that are all flat design but clearly look different.
Establish consistent rules e.g. no strokes on vectors, shapes and
silhouettes are front facing.

48. Brand guidelines
Put all together into coherent guidelines
Give to all members of the team and new starters
Review every six months to see if you want to implement
any changes
Always consider any changes to your design or tone of
voice in the context of your larger brand

49. In summary
1. Start by segmenting the market to do audience research
2. Define your values with measurable rules
3. Create a consistent tone of voice across your
communications
4. Create a consistent design style across your design
elements
5. Collate all your findings into a brand guidelines
document

50. Thank you
Robert Mathers