Whether to add sitename (branding) in the title or not?

What do you prefer?

[Imaster]

With respect to titling style, what do you prefer? Adding the sitename (branding) at the beginning in the title or at the end. Or simply not add the site name at all.

For eg: If the site name is ABC.com, and the product page is Widgets.

Which title do you prefer?

1 ABC.com - Widgets
2: Widgets - ABC.com
3: Widgets

- Which one among these is most likely to get a higher ctr?
- If you prefer either of these, why do you prefer it? Branding, higher ctr, or other reason.

[zeus]

If you sell a product I would place my name at the start, that means you have respect for your name and stands by it.

[Imaster]

Its a content site and I recently added the sitename in the end. Anyone!

[phantombookman]

I would put the most important (in terms of search) words first. If you have a name that is affective then it may well be worth adding.
I have a site which I do that with because the site name gives each title a bit of gravitas in amongst the spammers and affiliates.
Regards
Rod

[john_k]

I run a content site and put the name of the site at the beginning. This is just one elment of my branding effort, and I feel it has paid off.

The content for my site is such that the target audience is likely to see the site listed in search results for different searches over time. I don't do any cloaking or other tricks, and the site is easy to navigate. When someone clicks through, they will see a unique site that has the information they thought they would find. The next time they search and see the name of the site in the results, they are more likely to click on my link first.

I feel that this also leads to more type-ins.

One catch is that the site name & domain name need to be easy to remember.

[maximillianos]

I agree with John. I like to list my domain/site name first in most of my titles. I think it helps to distinguish your result listing from the others that just put the keywords first. Particularly if you have a good domain name that is catchy and short. If your domain is long and not easy to type in, it may not benefit you to use it in the title.

I have also seen my direct access/type in stats go up using this technique. Right now about 45% are direct access/bookmark/type in.

[BwanaZulia]

I use:

content name - site name - site url

This is mostly for bookmarking and search engines. I want the content title to be the most important, having a thousand pages of "Site.com -...." isn't that helpful.

BZ

[Robino]

I think "site.com..." is helpful for bookmarking.

(I guess it depends on the type of site)

[King of Bling]

Imaster

A practice that has brought us many happy returns is to title the page in reverse hierarchal.

So www.travelsite.com/texas/austin.htm would be titled “Austin, Texas – travelsite.com” Just invert the breadcrumb trail (you are using one, right?) Home > Texas > Austin.

This work with products, too (as long as their categorized properly).

Thus, www.gamesite.com/xbox/fighting-game.htm becomes “Fighting Game (for) Xbox (at) gamesite.com”.

Works wonders with SEs. Many combinations unfold, too.

Best of luck
KOB

[createErrorMsg]

I always put the content title FIRST, no matter what kind of site I'm building. I'm of the belief that most web surfers don't care what site they are at when they're searching for information. What they care about is the information. Caring about your site comes only after a surfer has gotten value from it, in which case they will find/remember/bookmark/jot-down your site name and url no matter where it is.

Titles serve one essential purpose: they tell users what the page is about, whether those users are humans or spiders. If the page isn't about a site or company, that information does not belong at the beginning of the title.

breadcrumb trail (you are using one, right?)

This is off topic, but last year an SURL useability study revealed that breadcrumb navigation is not used nearly as much as web designers would like to think. Most users still rely on other navigational methods (back button and main menus), and breadcrumb users are not shown to be better site navigators than non-breadcrumb users.

I'm not saying there's any damage in adding them to a site if you want to, but, at least for now, it's not quite an essential, must-have element.

Software Usability Research Laboratory (SURL) study [psychology.wichita.edu]

[john_k]

I always put the content title FIRST, no matter what kind of site I'm building. I'm of the belief that most web surfers don't care what site they are at when they're searching for information. What they care about is the information. Caring about your site comes only after a surfer has gotten value from it, in which case they will find/remember/bookmark/jot-down your site name and url no matter where it is.
Titles serve one essential purpose: they tell users what the page is about, whether those users are humans or spiders. If the page isn't about a site or company, that information does not belong at the beginning of the title.

But when they search for "green widgets", and see a list of results like this:

Green Widgets
Green widgets
Green Widgets
Green's Widgets
Extra Green Widgets
WarmFuzzy.com Green Widgets
Best Green Widgets
Green Widget Reviews

Then the branding part becomes important. When they see "WarmFuzzy.com Green Widgets", and they know and trust WarmFuzzy.com, then they will click it. Maybe they've been to the site before, and maybe not. Maybe they even have bookmarks to other pages on the site. Maybe they simply recognize the name from a friend or some article. Maybe they just always see it turning up on their search results, and never went there before. But eventually they click through. They like what they see, and they remember the name. Next time they click your link first, no contest. This is branding 101.

The original poster asked the question in the context of branding. If they are interested in getting one-time visitors who are going to make an impulse buy, then the branding aspect is not as important.

[King of Bling]

IMHO I like:

"Review Green Widgets at warmfuzzy.com"
or
"Compare Driving Games for XBox at xboxworld.com"

Actual mileage may vary :-)
----------------------------------------------
Branding?

Do you remember playing Broken Telephone as a kid? You whisper something in one person's ear, she whispers it to another, and so on and so on. At the end of the game, the original story that has Bob going to the store, now has Bob vacationing with his neighbor's wife on the beaches of Hawaii wearing pink bunny slippers. This predictable but hysterical outcome is similar to what happens when you ask people to define "branding."

We can trace the origins of virtually every marketing concept to a scientific discipline, such as psychology, neuroscience, or anthropology. If we wanted to play Broken Telephone, we could trace the thread as far back as Aristotle, although "branding" or "conditioning" was not scientifically validated until Pavlov published his paper "The Experimental Psychology and Psychopathology of Animals" in 1903. You may recall Pavlov from high school science. He was the guy who made the dog salivate at the sound of a bell. He conditioned the dog to respond to a trigger (the sound of the bell) by associating it with the taste of meat. His experiment provides three key elements critical to understanding and implementing "branding":

Consistency -- Pavlov never offered food without ringing the bell and never rang the bell without offering food.

Frequency -- The bell rang several times a day, day after day.

Anchoring -- Pavlov tied the experiment to something about which the dog was emotional. Frequency and consistency create branding only when the message is associated with an emotional anchor. This is the most difficult and essential element to get correct.

When Pavlov tried the same experiment using dry bread or acid instead of meat, it didn't work. The dog learned to salivate at the sound of the bell because the dog craved meat. That is what it loves most. With anything but meat, bell ringing only annoyed the dog.

Before you invest in a "branding exercise," make sure the associative memory you're implanting makes your customers salivate and isn't a thinly disguised gimmick or prop. All a gimmick does is annoy the customer and cost you money. When you talk to the customer , in her language, about what is in her heart you're on the right track. Will you serve meat or dry bread to your customers?

Cheers!
KOB