Multi-Company Web Marketing Strategies

[WebMasterKrames]

Here is an excerpt from an internal email I wrote to other people in our marketing department, I thought it might be informative to the WPW community as well:

I’ve said it before, every company that is or will be open to the public should have its own web site. It’s good to have our web sites link to each other, but we should NOT combine multiple companies that offer different services on the same web site. It’s bad for search engine ranking, because it makes the overall purpose of the web site not as specific.(I.E. if someone does a search for “retirement community”, a web site JUST about retirement communities will rank higher than one about retirement communities/restaurants/catering companies/coffee shops/XYZ.) I think it’s also less effective from a marketing standpoint, if a 20 something wants to find a local coffee shop, they’re not going to sift through a web site about a retirement community to find info on a coffee shop. If they did a google search for “ocala coffee shop”, and a retirement community site pops up in the list they probably won’t even click on it.

[Dcrux]

Beyond what you mentioned, I can see a lot of problems and issues.

Some companies have used this technique, and it might be an interesting topic of discussion.

Westin Hotel teams up with Aveda to offer toiletries, as others do. With the alternative of mailing out samples to consumers, an expensive proposition, such teamups can make some sense. Car makers team up with leading branded audio equipment manufacturers.

Will a Nickelodeon themed hotel pay off? I think the question rests on the ability of the matchup to provide an innovative and compelling customer experience independent of the component company contributions.

And let's face it, most marketing is done in fits and spurts. Too often marketing falls prey to an all tactics and no coherent strategy to pull it together. Such pogo-stick marketing efforts won't work with a company teamup. Most company teamups lean heavily on the branding of individual components, making any combination a thinly veiled marketing ploy and a poor customer experience.

In contrast Phillips and Unilever teamed up to create an iron. The iron has a cartridge using a Unilever product for garment care rather than the usual water steam reservoir. And there are similar teamups all the time.

On the web, the idea of mashups is specifically about mix and match web services from two, three or more companies. Mostly the key here is to create a unique brandable experience which makes the components disappear in the customers mind. Ideally, you would create a new product or service category which has only a sketchy connection to the contributing parent companies.

If this doesn't happen, you run the risk of creating a chimera. Chimera products and services are a mismash of ill matching components with no over arching theme or reason. But when the combination is more than the sum of its parts what happens? You get a new product of service with its own set of keywords which don't compete with component parts.

[WebMasterKrames]

I agree!