Owned Media: Building Your Brand with Controllable Channels

Any way that your business can get positive exposure for its brand is welcomed and helpful, but have you thought about how to get that in the best way? Or really, how to do that in the best way?

Although a social media presence, paid advertisements, and mentions of your brand in news articles can serve your brand well, they don't come with the ability for you to fully control them and how long they last. Your business needs to hone in on its owned media in order to take the reins on building its brand identity and engaging with its audience.
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Battling it Out: What Makes Media Paid, Earned, or Owned?

Paid media is essentially just as it sounds: media coverage for your brand that your brand pays to get. Types of paid media include sponsorships and advertisements. Even social media is a type of paid media.

Although you may be under the impression that a brand owns its social media accounts, that's actually not the case. Sure, a brand creates its own accounts within the social media site, but it does not have total control over them. It posts its original content and works to get its devoted followers, but when it comes down to it, the account lies in the hands of the social networking giant. Your brand can only maximize its potential on social media with the full cooperation of the individual social platforms.

The concept of earned media is also fairly self-explanatory. It is the media that a brand gains for itself through public relations efforts or the simple sharing of information from person to person.

Typically, it presents itself within news sources and celebrities or other social influencers. Earned media can definitely help a brand to get its name out, but can also potentially inflict damage to a brand's identity since the brand does not have command of it.

Now, let's discuss owned media and all the treasures that it holds. When it comes to providing value to your brand and allowing it to establish its true identity, owned media is what will get the job done. Through things like your website, an email newsletter, or blog, you can have total control in promoting your brand, engaging its target market, and having that target market connect with you and form a lasting impression in their minds.

With these channels that are developed and maintained in their entireties by your brand, you are able to create relationships with people rather than them just having a one-time encounter with your brand through a news article or an online advertisement.

How to Build Your Brand with Owned Media

The most all-encompassing form of owned media your brand needs is a great website. With a website that contains valuable, informative, and trustworthy content for your target market, your brand can establish itself and promote engagement with it. A blog is also an effective way to use owned media to build its brand as well. By generating original content that is relevant and is what the consumer wants and needs from you, your business can demonstrate its areas of expertise, what it wishes to share with its audience, and what it most values. Once you have that solid foundation, SEO can be used to multiply your reach.

If your brand already has a website and blog, it might consider adding to its owned media portfolio with video assets, training guides, and similar valuable content that you own and control.

Why You Need a Strong Online Presence Through Owned Media

The owned media of your business is under your total control and direction. You choose the domain name, you create the material it contains, you publish posts to your blog, you make your editorial calendar...

It is your brand that makes the decisions and your brand that connects with the consumer. The owned media developed by your brand and for your brand lives as long as you so choose and maintains the identity for your brand that you so choose. No leaving your brand's exposure and message in the hands of third parties necessary.

There is no person and no other business that will ever know your brand as well as you do. Acknowledge that fact and set up your brand for success by making its owned media top priority in the branding efforts of your business.

More than stressing over how earned media is portraying your brand or shelling out the big bucks for tons of paid media, let your owned media live up to its full potential to connect with your target market and instill in them the recognition and ability to recollect your brand.