So how do you go about capturing those important top ten spots? You should begin by optimizing your brand’s homepage. Make your website as visible as possible on search engines for both your actual company name and the keywords you most want to have your brand associated with. Your homepage should also be a hub for all online information related to your company. Inform the public about your brand, making it clear both who you are and what you do. If your business is Aardvark Animal Toys in Peoria, IL and there’s another Aardvark Animal Toys in Salem, MA, don’t leave your customer wondering which they’ve found. You should also link to any other sites associated with your brand, as well as positive news, press releases and other articles about your company.

You can also grab important SERP real estate by setting up subdomains for your site. Because Google tries to give searchers real variety in their search results, they’re unlikely to rank more than one page from the same domain for any given keyword. However, Google’s algorithm treats subdomains as separate sites and therefore often includes such pages as separate results on the same SERP. Begin by creating a subdomain for your blog at the very least.

A third step in capturing the top search engine results for your brand is to create social media profiles for your company. This means starting accounts for your brand on sites like Facebook, Twitter and YouTube. Not only can social media marketing be a key strategy for increasing brand awareness, profile pages on social media sites often rank highly in Google results.

Finally, consider bidding for PPC on your brand’s SERP. Not only will this put your company’s link high up on the SERP, but having a paid link on a SERP has been shown to increase the number of clicks both on the paid link and on the organic results. Think about it–you search for a term, and not only has a company paid to show up on that results page, but Google has also ranked them organically for the keyword. It must be relevant. Wouldn’t you be more likely to click through?

I know, it’s obvious, but in every industry niche there are lots of bad products and few good products. When I say product, I also mean service (this applies to service oriented businesses!) Successful businesses need to innovate or die. You have to be one of those that has a potentially leading product, or find something else.

2.  Be a Good Fan.

The most popular musicians are the ones that love their fans. The most popular and successful companies are the ones that love their customers. This takes time and energy to love back, but is huge.

3. Be Authentic.

Ok, business is serious, right. Wrong, business is just like life because it involves people. It’s funny, sad, emotional, hilarious, exhilarating, and inspiring. Shouldn’t your communications reflect that? Build trust with your followers, be authentic.

4.  Tap into your Competitor’s Networks.

Guess what. If you have an innovative product, your competitor’s customers will probably like you better. Do them a favor and follow them.

5.  Patience and Consistency.

Yeah, that. You’re building something that takes a while to build. Yeah I know, we’d all like to have a million followers/fans tomorrow, but it doesn’t work that way. People know if you’re legit by your consistency in following and posting.