Image-building activities - be visible on the Internet

Branding activities are everything a company consciously does to ensure that customers, partners, and job candidates see it in a specific, positive way. On the internet, they include the company’s website, social media, monitoring mentions and reactions to reviews – and the lack of them does not mean neutrality; it is an image built by chance, without the company’s control.

What are image actions?

The question „whether it is worth investing in image” in practice boils down to another question: does the company want its reputation to be determined by random comments on the internet, or by a thoughtful, consistent plan? This difference determines whether the company reacts to events or shapes them.

Image actions are planned steps that are intended to influence how the company is perceived by customers, business partners, the media, and its own employees. On the internet, these include content on the website and blog, presence on social media, press releases, responses to opinions and comments, as well as constant monitoring of what others say about the brand. Image is built regardless of whether the company consciously manages it – the difference lies in whether it does so with a plan or leaves it to chance.

Even a company that has never published any posts or responded to a comment already has some image – built from what customers, former employees, or competitors say about it. The lack of image actions therefore does not mean neutrality, but rather handing over control of that narrative to someone else.

Good image building differs from advertising in one way: advertising directly says „buy our product”, while image building builds trust, which makes the customer want to hear the offer in the first place. A company with a good reputation sells more easily – with lower costs of reaching out and less resistance from the customer.

It is worth distinguishing between external (to customers and partners) and internal (to employees) image-building activities. Both types overlap: an employee who speaks well about their employer in private conversations is part of the company’s image, even if they have never posted about it on social media.

Companies that invest exclusively in external image while neglecting the internal one often only discover a disconnect when a candidate checks the opinions of current and former employees. Advertising may promise a „great workplace,” but it is the real relationships within the team that ultimately determine whether that promise is true.

Image-building activities need a plan, not just ideas

A common mistake is treating image activities as a collection of separate ideas – a new post, a new promotion, a new collaboration – without a common plan that connects them all. The plan for image activities, or the so-called e-PR strategy, should answer the same questions as any good one. communication strategyWho is the target audience, what is the goal and how does the company know that the actions are having an effect? Without this plan, it is easy to fall into the trap of publishing „something” regularly, instead of publishing content that actually builds trust in the brand.

Image-building activities - plan your e-PR strategy

Every action in business must be based on a decent, carefully prepared strategy. The strategy will set the path for the company to follow in order to achieve its goals and be successful. In addition, it will allow you to avoid unnecessary mistakes that could have a negative impact on the entire activity of the company.

In creating an image strategy on the Internet, it is worth using tools and methods public relations. E-PR, also known as Internet PR, is shaping the company's relations with the environment via the Internet. The purpose of e-PR is to communicate with recipients, build a positive image of the company or specific brand products, and develop brand recognition among Internet users.

Why a company needs online image building activities

Consciously conducted image-building activities affect several specific areas of a company's operations:

• easier construction relationship with customers based on trust, not just on price,
• shorter time needed to convince a new customer to engage in a business conversation,
• a lower risk that one negative comment will turn into a crisis of image,
• easier recruitment – candidates check the employer’s brand before sending their CVs,
• a better position in negotiations with business partners and investors.

These benefits rarely come in a single moment. A company that builds customer trust usually also attracts valuable employees more easily – because a good reputation externally usually goes hand in hand with a good reputation as an employer, although this is not a rule without exceptions.

We write more about how image is related to purchasing and hiring decisions in the article about sustainable development of the company, where reputation is one of the pillars.

It is worth noting that the effects of image-building activities are rarely seen immediately. It is a long-term process – a single campaign may increase temporary interest, but lasting change in brand perception is built over months of consistent, cohesive efforts. Companies that expect results after two weeks usually give up too early before the actions have had a real impact.

Offline image activities still have significance

Although the article focuses on the internet, it is worth remembering that a company’s image-building activities do not end with the website and social media. Participation in industry conferences, the company’s experts speaking at events, and the way employees talk about the company privately also influence the image – and often end up on the internet in the form of reports, photos, or third-party mentions. Consistency between what happens offline and what is seen online is one of the most often overlooked elements of image planning.

Example: A company participates in industry trade shows and prepares an attractive booth and printed materials for that occasion. If the same aesthetics and the same messages are not subsequently displayed in the website and social media relations, a significant part of the image effect from the trade show remains in the exhibition hall, instead of reaching the people who were not at the trade shows.

The website as a basic image-building tool

The website is the first place where most recipients check out a company before contacting it. It should be clear, consistent with the rest of the brand’s materials, and up-to-date – an outdated website works against the company’s image because it suggests that the company is not working or not paying attention to details. Key importance also has the positioning of the pageEven the best-built image won’t help if the potential customer doesn’t even find the company in the search results.

The website also serves as a reference point for all other image-building activities. When a client sees the company on social media or hears about it from a friend, the natural next step is to check out the website – and it is ultimately what confirms or undermines the initial impression.

Image-building activities in social media

Just being present on social media does not build an image – it is the concrete actions that count. Effective image actions in social media They are based on three principles:

• regularity – the irregular publication makes the profile look abandoned,
• authenticity – content that is consistent with how the company really operates, and not solely with how it would like to be perceived,
• commitment – responding to comments and messages, not just publishing posts.

Cooperation with influencers It can strengthen the image-building efforts, provided that the creator’s values and target audience match the brand. Choosing an influencer „because they have a large following” without checking the fit more often harms the image than it builds it.

Authenticity

The image built on a lie is fragile and easy to destroy. The truth always comes out sooner or later. Publishing false information and creating a brand other than what is in reality is the easiest way to lose customer trust, which may have a negative impact on the functioning of the company. Image-building activities on the Internet must be credible. Honesty pays off!

Regularity

The internet never sleeps. The activity in social media is based on the constant updating of the feed, sharing interesting content and replying to comments / messages. Regular publications are an opportunity to reach a wide audience and build strong ties with them, based on trust and loyalty.

Attractiveness

The created posts should arouse the curiosity of the recipients. A company that operates in an unconventional way, stands out from the competition, has a better chance of achieving spectacular success. The goal of any brand's online business should be to create an engaging, fascinating story. A story that people will be happy to share.

Aligning image activities with the target group

This same set of image-building activities won’t work in every company. A brand that sells services for other companies (B2B) builds its image primarily through expert content, industry publications, and presence on LinkedIn – purchase decisions in this segment are slower and based on trust in competence. A consumer brand (B2C) uses social media more for image and story, because that’s where a quick impression and emotions matter. Therefore, before choosing specific actions, it’s worth first answering who the target audience is and where they actually look for information about companies in the given industry.

A good test is to check where new customer inquiries are actually coming from – from which channel they came before contacting the company. If the majority of inquiries come from recommendations rather than from the internet, prioritizing support for those recommendations with materials that are easy to pass on instead of investing in additional social media channels may be a priority.

Internet monitoring – why it is part of image-building activities

Branding activities are not just about publishing content, but also about listening to what others say about the brand. Media monitoring It allows you to spot mentions – positive, neutral and negative – before they grow to a size that is difficult to handle. Popular monitoring tools include Brand24, SentiOne, NapoleonCat and Hootsuite – each of which tracks a different set of channels, so it’s worth choosing the one that best suits where the conversation about the brand is actually taking place.

Self-monitoring without a defined response path yields little. The company should know in advance who responds to notifications from the monitoring tool, at what time and in what tone – otherwise the mentions will be noticed, but the response to them will still be delayed by several days.

The most common mistakes in image-building activities

• No response to the comments. Silence in response to a question or complaint from the recipient is interpreted as a lack of interest.
• Outdated website. Old contact information or an outdated offer undermine the credibility of the entire company.
• Deleting negative comments instead of responding. It usually leads to escalation, because the author of the comment republishes it, this time with a description that the company removed it.
• No internet monitoring. The company only learns about the problem when it is already large and difficult to control.
• Inconsistency between channels. A different tone on the website, a different one on social media, and a different one in customer service.

Most of these mistakes cost more than just fixing the problem at the time – rebuilding trust after a series of missed signals takes much longer than consistent, albeit modest, image-building efforts from the beginning.

How to check if image-building activities are having an effect

The number of followers or likes does not directly reflect a company’s image – it is easy to boost this with paid promotion; it is more difficult to translate it into customer trust. Indicators that show the quality of the relationship rather than just its reach are more effective: the tone of comments under publications, the number of direct requests for an offer, the number of positive reviews compared to negative ones, and whether customers recommend the company themselves without any incentive. It is worth regularly checking each of these indicators, not just once, to see the direction of change, rather than just a single result.

It is also worth remembering that image-building activities complement a company’s broader communication strategy and do not replace it – image is one of the goals of this strategy, alongside, for example, sales or recruitment, and it works best when it is consistent with these strategies and not pursued separately.

The profile should include, among others:

• logo and company name,
• buissness description,
• the values that guide him,
• other elements of visual identification and company culture.

Image activities with Commplace

At Commplace, we carry out image building activities from diagnosis – what is being said about the brand today and where – through content and communication planning, to ongoing monitoring and response to changes. If you are looking for someone to comprehensively manage your company’s image, see, how we conduct public relations activities. Every stage of this work – diagnosis, plan, implementation, monitoring – has its own evidence: measurement before the actions are taken, a record of the findings and results after a specified period of time, not just a subjective impression that „it looks better”.

The results of image-building activities – mentions, page visits, the tone of comments – are visible in one place in the dashboard. Commwork®AI, Alongside team tasks and deadlines. This way, the client team sees not only what has been published, but also how recipients are reacting to it, without having to switch between several tools.

It is also worth reading: image-building activities in B2B and building an image on the web.

Sources: work of the Commplace blog editorial team.