Here’s the deal. I spent several hours creating a voluminous point system to grade brands’ efficacy in all Brand Command categories. I tweaked it ever so carefully to ensure fairness, and balanced the weight of various factors just so.

But I feel a little tentative, in an anal retentive sort of way, to publish “official” grade scores on this very unofficial site. Does it really matter if I report that Thomasville.com scores 784 points and Ashleyfurniture.com scores 651?

So, I have decided to come up with a unique grade “description” for each brand we do a full evaluation on, which will be located toward the end of the evaluation’s posting.

Note: Brand Marketing practitioners, please take the evaluations on this site with a grain of sodium. We aren’t in the business of ripping on brands, we’re in the business of helping brands succeed with their online strategies and goals. Different companies are in different stages of online marketing proficiency based upon what their industry demands.

With that stated, let’s take a quick look at product-specific web pages on the Thomasville and Ashley Furniture websites. Can you tell which URL is indexed by Google and which one isn’t?

First, Ashley Furniture:
http://www.ashleyfurniture.com/Showroom/Showroom.aspx?PageId=Showroom&CategoryID
=17&ItemNo=B365-57&SetDomTab=1&SeriesNo=B365&CollectionId=&style=&PageNumber=
1&IsClicked=1&CatPageNumber=1

…and Thomasville:
http://www.thomasville.com/Item2517/Attache-Panel-Headboard-Full-Queen.aspx

Creating search engine friendly product pages will dramatically increase the visibility of Thomasville’s furniture lines. This is right in line with Nancy Webster’s vision to market more directly to consumers.