Wednesday, June 29, 2011

How to Create Your Brand Digital Dashboard

How can I keep track of my Brand online?

That seems to be the question I hear all the time these days. In our insta-share culture, Brands are realizing that they can either hear about the conversation after the fact, or they can participate in the conversation in real-time.

Here are a few of the triggers that cause Brands to ask "How can I keep track of my Brand online?"
- Search Trends
- Blogs/PR
- Social comments
- Product recalls
- User Generated Content (Videos)
- Reviews
- Voluntary Product Placement
- Competitive activity

Last year, I worked with Google's iGoogle team to develop a framework for Brands to create their own Brand Digital Dashboard.  Let me show you how its done.

Create a New Tab on iGoogle
- Go to iGoogle and access iGoogle's settings
- Add a Tab so the Dashboard can live on its own and be shared easily
- You can customize the theme/banner of the tab with your own brand

Add Gadgets
- Search the iGoogle Gadget Directory for gadgets to add to your Tab.


Here is a list of gadgets I recommend
Google Insights for Search
- customize this gadget's settings with the search terms and locations you want to see. You can add multiple instances of this gadget so you can see Rising Searches, Top Searches, and Interest Over Time.
Google News
- customize this gadget's settings with the topics you want to see
Google Analytics - login to your Analytics account and access Analytics reports.
Twitter Search - simply type a term and see the most recent Tweets with that term
Flickr - simply type a term in the search tab and see relevant pictures
Blogs - you can also add any blog you want as an RSS feed (ex: Yahoo Answers, etc...)
Other Gadgets of interest may be: YouTube, Facebook, Amazon, etc...


After you have created your dashboard, the key will be to develop marketing strategies that will allow you to act on this real-time insight. But, at least you now have a better sense of what's happening with your Brand online.

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