Report - Luxury Brands Not in Control Of Their Own Names Online

Download the full report here....
Paradigm has just produced a new report to clearly show that Luxury brands have lost control of their own valuable names on the search engines. A situation that is completely controllable at minimal cost, yet they continue to allow grey market discounters to own their brand names online.

The report makes shocking news for those in charge of promoting and protecting these most sacred names. This report shows how how 23 of worlds’ top luxury brands are positioned online. Without exception, it shows that discounters are prepared to bid on winning the top position for brand names like Cartier, Rolex, Jaeger-LeCoultre, Piaget, Mont Blanc, Dunhill, Louis Vuitton, Baume & Mercier, Dunhill, IWC, Tag Heuer, Patek Philippe, Gucci, Chanel, Chopard, Chloe, Bulgari, Burberry, Prada and Dior, whereas these brands are nowhere to be seen in the bidding war for their own names. Right now the overriding impression the online consumer gets when searching for their favourite brand is that it is synonymous with big discounts. That cheapens brand image and tempts potential genuine customers away from authorised retailers.

Using Pay-Per-Click campaigns across the top search engines and content sites, companies can bid for keywords on a cost per click basis, to ensure they are always listed in the very top positions when a search is conducted against that word or phrase, thereby driving very targeted traffic to their web sites. They can also exclude words such as ‘replica’ ‘cheap’ or ‘discount’ so that if brands did invest in controlling the search engine results for their own names, they could be sure to exclude any irrelevant searches from their campaign.

Ensuring that the first message and link any user sees when searching for e.g. Rolex is the brand message and link to their web site, will be one important step closer to controlling the image of a luxury brand online. The summary below the link should highlight that genuine Rolex watches are only available through authorised retailers, and that customers risk invalidating their warranty if they purchase from other sources. If always in the number one position, this would ensure the brand message is always the first seen by potential customers who might otherwise be tempted by discount messages further down the results page. Luxury brands could also ensure they control all of the top sponsored results by co-funding authorised retailers to bid on all subsequent positions, keeping the discounters out of the top listings altogether. Surely when it comes to protecting brand image, this is not a big price to pay.

The report shows that not a single luxury brand in the list is bidding to secure its own name on the search engines. Just one typical example is that there were 38,239 searches (not including Google searches and markets outside the US) for the word ‘Cartier’ in June 2004. That volume does not include any discount terms such as ‘replica’ or ‘fake’. The top bidder demesy.com was paying $0.40 per click with the results summary message “Cartier at DeMesy Fine Watches. Significant discounts on new and pre-owned Cartier watches.” With an average click-through rate of 5% this etailer would have paid around $765 to own the Cartier brand name for the month, and it must be paying as he’s continued to do so for around two years. Surely that fine luxury emporium could afford to see and raise the demesy.com bid in the interests of protecting its image and driving consumers offline to the boutiques of its authorised retailers around the world? The search volume for Cartier on an annual basis would be around 458,868 which means that customers are being exposed to discount messages in association with the brand name that many times, while brands like Gucci, Prada, and Rolex are exposing their customers by the millions each year.

Paradigm New Media advocates that the very least luxury brands should be doing is taking control of their own brand names on the search engines, but that they should also be bidding on search terms such as ‘luxury Swiss watch’, ‘designer handbag’, ‘luxury gift’ amongst many others that would identify and attract affluent consumers while they are online and in product research mode.

The report is available for download here. It is an Excel spreadsheet so please select the option to save it to your desktop and then open it on your PC.

Download the full report here....

Pay-Per-Click Campaign Service
Paradigm New Media can take back control of your brand name and important keywords. We can also devise campaigns to keep grey market dscounters out of the top listings altogether. We will give you a proposed Pay-Per-Click search engine campaign (including Google) by market to illustrate clearly what your financial commitment will be to gain control of your own brand name online. To enquire about a campaign to achieve this for your brand now click here.

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