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Good Hands Branding: New Heardable Research Shows Insurance Carriers Winning the Digital Turf War Against Aggregators

The Top 100 Restaurant Chains in America Unveiled by Heardable in New Brand Research

Chili's ranked #1 full service restaurant brand online, followed by Denny's at #2, Olive Garden at #3, Applebee's at #4 and Souplantation at #5.

Today Heardable, Inc., (http://heardable.com), the standard for measuring online brand performance, released the findings of its latest research report that benchmarks the online performance of the top full service restaurant chains in America. Chili's earned the #1 position in a field of strong competitors.

According to the research, Chili's's brand health score of 636 out of 1,000 possible points beat its nearest competitor, Denny's, by 6 points, or 0.94%, and surpassed third place Olive Garden by 10 points, or 1.57%. The gap between Chili's and lowest-ranked Macaroni Grill was 151 points, or 23.74%.

Heardable research does not rely on aggregate cookie data, customer opinions or satisfaction with particular brands. Instead, the Heardable brand monitoring platform studies how effective each brand performs according to 800+ online marketing metrics and best practices. Brands are examined and benchmarked based on measurable performance data, rather than estimates or opinions.

So how did Chili's rise to the position of category leader? Three areas of competence caught our attention: 

1) search engine optimization

2) social media participation and fan base

3) mobile optimization

In addition to chilis.com, Chili's maintains a strong social media presence in Facebook, YouTube and Twitter, along with testing location-based channels such as FourSquare and mobile (mobile coupons, mobile advertising to boost ordering via smartphones, and charity awareness via mobile bar codes printed on menus).

"Chili's has utilized the essential online branding tools of community management, customer service and content outreach to emerge as a leader in the full service restaurant category," said Gunther Sonnenfeld, Co-Founder and Chief Strategy Officer of Heardable, Inc. "Chili's understands that the value of its service product extends far beyond calorie counts, specialty food items and discounts -- it sees its business value in the direct relationships it builds with its customer base, and it shows. Congrats to the restaurant chain and its franchise owners."

The Top 100 Restaurant Chains

1. Chili's

2. Denny's

3. Olive Garden

4. Applebee's

5. Souplantation

6. Yard House

7. Texas Roadhouse

8. Red Robin

9. BJ's Restaurant

10. California Pizza Kitchen

11. Bob Evans

12. Red Lobster

13. Outback Steakhouse

14. Benihana

15. Carrabba's Italian Grill

16. Morton's

17. Joe's Crab Shack

18. The Cheesecake Factory

19. Capital Grille

20. McCormick & Schmicks

21. Bennigan's

22. Logans Roadhouse

23. Smokey Bones

24. Fazolies

25. Macaroni Grill

26. Houlihan's

27. FATZ

28. Sizzler

29. IHOP

30. Buffalo Wild Wings

31. Ruth's Chris Steak House

32. Steak N Shake

33 T.G.I. Friday's

34. Hooters

35. Brick House Tavern + Tap

36. Friendly's

37. Bertuccis

38. Earls

39. Buca Di Beppo

40. Maggiano's Little Italy

41. Ruby Tuesday

42. Bonefish Grill

43. Waffle House

44. P.F. Chang's

45. Fleming's Prime Steakhouse

46. Golden Corral

47. Fuddruckers

48. Cracker Barrel

49. Elephant Bar

50. Carrows Restaurant

51. Swensen's

52. The Melting Pot

53. First Watch

54. Roy's

55. Bubba Gump Shrimp Co

56. Elmer's Restaurants

57. Famous Dave's BBQ

58. Lone Star Steakhouse

59. Coco's Bakery

60. Acapulco

61. Marie Callender's

62. Village Inn

63. Perkins Family Restaurant

64. Rainforest Cafe

65. Tony Romas

66. O-Charley's

67. Mimi's Cafe

68. Chart House Restaurant

69. Bravo Cucina Italiana

70. Huddle House

71. Redstone American Grill

72. Quaker Steak & Lube

73. Max & Ermas

74. Claim Jumper

75. Ra Sushi

76. Big Boy

77. East Side Mario's

78. Biaggi’s Ristorante Italiano

79. Black Angus

80. Saltgrass Steak House

81. Le Peep

82. Shanes Rib Shack

83. Rock Bottom

84. El Torito

85. McGrath's Fish House

86. Don Pablos

87. Country Kitchen

88. Bakers Square

89. Cheddars

90. Copelands

91. Mitchell's Fish Market

92. Vic & Anthony's

93. Ponderosa Steakhouse

94. Shari's Restaurant

95. J. Alexander’s

96. Black-eyed Pea

97. Johnny Rockets

98. Ground Round

99. Shoney's

100. Rusty Pelican

A free 264 page research report profiling the Top 25 Restaurant Chains is available at:

http://heardable-reports.myshopify.com/products/the-top-25-restaurant-chains-in-america 

To learn more about the report, Heardable's methodology or get insights into other brands, contact marketing(at)heardable(dot)com or call 1-888-520-0034.

About Heardable

Heardable is the world's first and only real-time contextual brand analytics platform that measures the online health of brands across hundreds of business categories. With its Growth and Accelerator platform-as-a-service offerings, Heardable helps organizations make smarter, faster business decisions to impact tomorrow's quarterly results. With over 15 million brands profiled and 800 unique online variables capture per brand at various points in time, Heardable's "big brand data" repository can be utilized by any business looking for ways to optimize their online performance, boost brand awareness and increase revenue. Heardable, Inc. is a privately held company based in Southern California with an office in Singapore.

PetSmart was named the #1 online store brand for pet supplies with a brand health score of 725 out of 1000, followed by Petco at #2, PetFoodDirect at #3, Jeffers Pet at #4, and Pet Food Express at #5.

The Houston Texans were named the most effective NFL football team brand with a brand health score of 709/1000, followed by the Green Bay Packers at #2, Baltimore Ravens at #3, New England Patriots at #4, and the Washington Redskins at #5.

Los Angeles, CA (PRWEB) July 27, 2011

According to contextual brand analytics firm, Heardable, Texas sports teams are nothing to shake a stick at. The company has just released its ranked list of the most effective NFL football teams online and the Houston Texans outscored 31 of its competitors to be crowned the most web-friendly gridiron brand.

The Houston Texans outscored teams such as the green Bay Packers and the Baltimore Ravens to take the top position, which was calculated by a thorough examination of nearly 500 online brand variables. The Houston Texan's brand health score of 709 out of 1,000 beat its nearest competitor, the green Bay Packers, by a slim 2 points. Shockingly, the Houston Texan's outscored the last place Oakland Raiders by 151%.

So what are the Houston Texan's doing right? Lots of things:

- Mobile smartphone optimized website

- Social media presence, participation & followers

- Search engine optimized website

- Usable site experience (easy to engage, share & transact)

- Rich monitoring & optimization using web analytics software and other tools

When it comes to social media, the Houston Texans are doing well, but they are nowhere near leading the pack. On Facebook, for example, the #15 ranked Dallas Cowboys have an impressive 3,194,370 Facebook likes compared to just 319,364 likes for the Houston Texans.

And when it comes to social velocity, the Dallas Cowboys win hands down. They are gathering a staggering 500,000 Facebook likes per month compared to 20,000 Facebook likes per month for the Houston Texans. At the current run rate, the Dallas Cowboys will reach the 10 million Facebook like milestone in about 12-14 months.

Commenting on the NFL football team rankings, Jon Samsel, Chief Executive Officer of Heardable, Inc., said, "The Houston Texans deserve a lot of credit for boosting their online marketing efforts in spite of the recently player's strike and fierce competition from other football teams. It will be fun to re-examine the brand rankings at the close of the football season to see if the Texans hold on to their top position or fumble the ball."

32 NFL Football Team Brands, Ranked by Heardable Score (1000 points possible)

1. Houston Texans - houstontexans.com - 709

2. Green Bay Packers - packers.com - 707

3. Baltimore Ravens - baltimoreravens.com - 690

4. New England Patriots - patriots.com - 689

5. Washington Redskins - redskins.com - 675

6. Chicago Bears - chicagobears.com - 670

7. Atlanta Falcons - atlantafalcons.com - 668

8. Tennessee Titans - titansonline.com - 649

9. San Diego Chargers - chargers.com - 648

10. New York Giants - giants.com - 642

11. Cincinnati Bengals - bengals.com - 629

12. Pittsburgh Steelers - steelers.com - 620

13. Dallas Cowboys - dallascowboys.com - 618

14. Cleveland Browns - clevelandbrowns.com - 599

15. Arizona Cardinals - azcardinals.com - 592

16. Carolina Panthers - panthers.com - 590

17. Seattle Seahawks - seahawks.com - 584

18. Tampa Bay Buccaneers - buccaneers.com - 547

19. New Orlean Saints - neworleanssaints.com - 546

20. Philadelphia Eagles - philadelphiaeagles.com - 530

21. Indianapolis Colts - colts.com - 520

22. New York Jets - newyorkjets.com - 519

23. Denver Broncos - denverbroncos.com - 503

24. Minnesota Vikings - vikings.com - 491

25. Kansas City Chiefs - kcchiefs.com - 483

26. San Francisco 49ers - 49ers.com - 479

27. Buffalo Bills - buffalobills.com - 475

28. St. Louis Rams - stlouisrams.com - 464

29. Jacksonville Jaguars - jaguars.com - 437

30. Detroit Lions - detroitlions.com - 373

31. Miami Dolphins - miamidolphins.com - 317

32. Oakland Raiders - raiders.com - 282

Click here for the real-time ranked list of 32 NFL football team brands.

About Heardable:

Heardable helps organizations utilize contextual analytics to make smarter, faster business decisions in a way that impacts tomorrow's quarterly results. They are the leading online brand benchmarking and analysis platform that measures the brand health of business organizations across hundreds of categories. Capturing vast amounts of digital information makes it possible to do many things that previously could not be done -- such as spot business trends or unearth lost revenue opportunities. Data can be used to unlock new sources of economic value, provide fresh insights into business planning, even hold vendors accountable. With nearly 1.3 million brands and over 650 million data variables already stored in our database, Heardable's 'big data' repository can be utilized by any business looking for ways to optimize their online performance, boost brand awareness, and increase revenue. Heardable, Inc. is a privately held company based in Los Angeles, CA. http://heardable.com

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Pronovias named the most effective bridal dress making brand, followed by Alfred Angelo and Christina Wu.

100 Most Popular Brands on YouTube Unveiled, Results Confound Traditional Marketers

Heardable Releases List of the Most "Subscribed" Brands on YouTube: HIGAtv was Ranked #1 with 3,226,834 Subscribers, Followed by Smosh at #2, FredFigglehorn at #3, Machinima t #4, and MysteryGuitarMan at #5.

Los Angeles, CA (PRWEB) February 18, 2011

Which brand has the most subscribers on YouTube? The results may surprise you. According to brand analytics firm, Heardable, Inc. (http://heardable.com) HIGAtv was named The Most Popular Brand on YouTube with over 3.2 million subscribers to their video channel. The brand owner is Ryan Higa, a college student who writes, directs, and produces movie spoofs and other clever video originals. The brand's website address is HIGAtv.com (http://www.higatv.com). His YouTube page is nigahiga (http://www.youtube.com/user/nigahiga). His profile page on Heardable is HIGAtv.com (http://heardable.com/home.php?domain=higatv.com).

Large corporate brands comprise only 7% of the YouTube Top 100 list. A whopping 84% of the most popular brands on YouTube are a hodge-podge of independent talent comprised of comedy & variety acts, stuntpeople, musicians, and do-it-yourself hosts. The remaining 9% of the Top 100 brands on YouTube are musical recording artists such as Katy Perry (#98 on the list).

Well-known brands that made it into the Top 100 list:    

- Universal Music ranked #15 with 1,090,592 subscribers
- National Geographic ranked #77 with 367,593 subscribers
- CBS ranked #91 with 290,613 subscribers

Popular brands that did not make the Top 100 list:

- Bank of America with 13 subscribers
- Verizon Wireless with 619 subscribers
- Target with 3,725 subscribers

"When YouTube offered a free service to 'Broadcast Yourself' they weren't joking around," said John Sharp, Director and Co-Founder of Heardable. "It's exciting to see so many independent artists domimate the YouTube charts with their fan-favorite channels. The little guys are not only beating the big brands at their own game but they're changing the nature of broadcasting as we know it by experimenting with new content formats, integrated branding, and new monetization models."

Heardable's list of the 100 Most Popular Brands on YouTube is part of its new H-labs scoring technology which takes YouTube's API feed and maps the information received against Heardable's database of 1.2 million+ brands in order to rank order the most subscribed YouTube channels in the world. The list is updated in real-time whenever a brand is re-scanned on Heardable.com, or when our robots crawl our database of YouTube channel brands. Brands profiled on Heardable must have website domain registered to their brand.

"It's amazing how inept the world's largest brands are at syndicating video content on the web," said Jon Samsel, Heardable's CEO. "They are not posting very much material and the videos they are publishing are not very original. It's no wonder consumers are avoiding their channels. This is such a wasted opportunity for business organizations. Any brand not living in a cave knows that today's consumers aren't flocking to printed newspapers or waiting for the next billboard ad to be erected in their neighborhood. They're using their smartphones to watch and share millions of videos online."

Abbreviated List of The 20 Most Popular Brands on YouTube, Sorted by # of Subscribers

1. higatv.com - 3,226,834
2. smosh.com - 2,185,341
3. fredfigglehorn.com - 2,138,521
4. machinima.com - 1,818,621
5. mysteryguitarman.com - 1,723,171
6. annoyingorange.com - 1,639,494
7. collegehumor.com - 1,609,806
8. phillyd.tv - 1,468,189
9. davedays.com - 1,369,793
10. kevjumba.com - 1,368,816
11. failblog.org - 1,299,991
12. barelypolitical.com - 1,212,080
13. thekeyofawesome.com - 1,212,079
14. thekassemg.com - 1,194,384
15. universalmusic.com - 1,090,592
16. ijustine.com - 1,033,856
17. buckhollywood.com - 1,013,151
18. vprincess.com - 974,367
19. bieberfever.com - 961,876
20. householdhacker.com - 895,969

To find out what all the fuss is about, head on over to The 100 Most Popular YouTube Brands list yourself at:

http://heardable.com/top_100_brands_on_YouTube

About Heardable:
Heardable is the leading online brand benchmarking and analysis tool that measures the brand health of any organization in less than 30 seconds, allowing users to instantly compare businesses by industry or local zip code. Type in any URL and start your scan. The higher the score, the better you're doing. And yes, it really is that simple. With over 1.2 million brands and 700 million+ data variables already stored in our database, Heardable's 'big data' repository can be utilized by any business looking for ways to optimize their online performance, boost brand awareness, and increase revenue. Heardable, Inc. is a privately held company based in Los Angeles, CA.

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Heardable Releases List of the Most "Liked" Brands on Facebook: Zynga/TexasHoldEm Ranked #1 with 34,881,303 Likes, Followed by Facebook at #2, Michael Jackson #3, Lady Gaga #4, and Eminem at #5.

Los Angeles, CA (PRWEB) February 2, 2011 -- According to brand analytics firm, Heardable, it pays to be Liked! The company has just released its ranked list of the most popular brands on Facebook based on the total number of "Likes" the brand's Facebook page has received. The results may surprise you.

Zynga's Texas Hold Em was named The Most Popular Brand on Facebook.  Zynga is a software company that connects the world through gaming applications such as Farmville, Treasure Isle, and Cafe World. Texas Hold Em is the #1 online poker game in the world. The brand's website address is Zyn.ga and this is their Facebook page.

Corporate brands comprised only 24% of the top 100 list. A whopping 76% of the most popular brands on Facebook are musical artists, sports stars, and television/film personalities or properties.

A few corporate brands that made it into the top 100 list:    

- Disney ranked #27 with 16,514,605 likes
- Victoria's Secret ranked #48 with 11,277,756 likes
- McDonalds ranked #89 with 7,023,465 likes

Popular brands that did not make the top 100 list:

- Sony with 417,792 likes
- Vogue with 1,202,647 likes
- Nike with 3,830,993 likes

Heardable's list of the 100 Most Popular Brands on Facebook is part of its new H-labs scoring technology which takes Facebook's API feed and maps the results against a database of 1.2 million brands in the Heardable platform to rank order the most Liked brands in the world. The list is updated in real-time whenever a brand is re-scanned on Heardable.com, or when our robots crawl our database each day.

"They say life is not a popularity contest, but don't tell that to the world's most successful brands, most of whom have decided 2011 is the year to utilize Facebook as a serious social media marketing vehicle to capture customer feedback, generate buzz, expand awareness, and boost website traffic." said Jon Samsel, CEO of Heardable. "Thousands of brands will launch exciting Facebook promotions this year for the sole purpose of increasing their Like count. What's amazing is how quickly Facebook Likes have become one of the top metrics symbolizing online brand effectiveness. Of course, being Liked isn't the only metric that matters, but it's a social statistic than can be easily benchmarked against the competition and earmarked for improvement."

Abbreviated List of The 20 Most Popular Brands on Facebook, Sorted by # of Fans

1. Zynga/Texas Hold'em Poker - 34,881,303
2. Facebook - 32,990,850
3. Michael Jackson - 27,854,985
4. Lady Gaga - 27,247,541
5. Eminem - 26,737,337
6. YouTube - 26,414,309
7. Rihanna - 22,175,594
8. Coca-Cola - 22,121,765
9. Linkin Park - 21,883,019
10. South Park - 21,334,899
11. Megan Fox - 20,563,023
12. Vin Diesel - 20,339,675
13. Justin Beiber - 19,773,382
14. Shakira - 19,767,996
15. The Simpsons - 19,427,129
16. Starbucks - 19,391,045
17. Twilight - 19,134,438
18. Lil Wayne - 19,105,569
19. Cristiano Ronaldo - 18,915,131
20. Bob Marley - 18,903,061

To find out what all the fuss is about, head on over to The 100 Most Popular Facebook Brands list yourself at: http://heardable.com/top_100_brands_on_Facebook

About Heardable:
Heardable is the leading online brand benchmarking and analysis tool that measures the brand health of any organization in less than 30 seconds, allowing users to instantly compare businesses by industry or local zip code. Type in any URL and start your scan. The higher the score, the better you're doing. And yes, it really is that simple. With 1.2 million brands and over 650 million data variables already stored in our database, Heardable's 'big data' repository can be utilized by any business looking for ways to optimize their online performance, boost brand awareness, and increase revenue. Heardable, Inc. is a privately held company based in Los Angeles, CA.

Link to press release on PRWeb

Heardable Names Top 10 US Domestic Airline Brands Online
Delta Air Lines named the most effective domestic airline brand, followed by JetBlue and Southwest

Los Angeles, CA (PR-INSIDE) November 1, 2010 -- Delta Air Lines has been named the most effective domestic airline brand online by Heardable, Inc., a brand performance rating platform whose mission is to organize the world's brand data.

Delta beat competitors such as JetBlue and Southwest to take the top position, which was calculated by a thorough examination of hundreds of airline brand variables. Delta's brand health score of 580 out of 1,000 beat its nearest competitor, JetBlue, by 22 points. Shockingly, Delta's performance was 51% higher than United Airlines, whose score of 284 out of 1,000 did not even make the top 10 list.

"Delta really came out of nowhere and stole the crown," says Jon Samsel, Heardable's CEO. "JetBlue and Southwest had been outperforming Delta all year, but Delta's acquisition of Northwest seems to have helped Delta become more searchable. Delta's recent homepage redesign looks to have tipped the scales in their favor. Hat's off to Delta, a brand that's committed to conducting business online."

Heardable allows business operators and brand owners to understand how well their brands are performing online, relative to their competition. Heardable's unique ABLE engine analyzes 438 separate data points for each brand and its competitors, in real time, isolating those areas in which the business operator has an advantage over its competition, and which areas it needs to improve. It's like a FICO score for brands.

Delta's brand health score of 580 is comprised of six subscores:

Portable - 173 out of 200 points: Delta.com is optimized for the most popular mobile browsers
Sociable - 151 out of 200 points: Delta has a solid brand presence on the major social networks
Measurable - 40 out of 100 points: Delta tracks & optimizes online performance using various analytics tools
Actionable - 65 out of 150 points: Delta.com makes it moderately easy for site visitors to do business with them
Shareable - 20 out of 150 points: Delta.com's ability to share or embed content needs some improvement
Searchable - 131 out of 200 points: Delta.com is fairly well optimized for search engines

"Delta has obviously put in a lot of effort into social marketing over the past year, and that effort is now being rewarded," adds John Sharp, director of Heardable, Inc.  "You need to get a lot of things right to win the top spot in a competitive sector like airlines - their brand management team deserves high marks."

The top 10 most effective airline brands online in the US, ranked by brand health score:

1. Delta Air Lines - 580
2. JetBlue Airways - 558
3. SouthWest Airlines - 520
4. American Airlines - 498
5. AirTran Airways - 492
6. US Airways - 487
7. Alaska Airlines - 465
8. Continental Airlines - 410
9. Allegiant Air - 371
10. Virgin America - 341

A free PowerPoint summary report showcasing the top 10 most effective online brands online can be viewed or downloaded on SlideShare.

Heardable's industry report, Top 10 US Domestic Airline Brands Online, will soon be available for purchase on the company's website.

About Heardable, Inc:
Heardable's mission is to organize the world's brand data. Heardable.com can measure the effectiveness of any online brand in less than 30 seconds, in real-time, allowing users to instantly compare businesses by industry or local zip code. Type in any URL and start your scan. The higher the score, the better you're doing. And yes, it really is that simple. With over 1.2 million brand profiles already stored in our database and hundreds of new companies added each day, Heardable's vast data repository can be utilized by any business looking for ways to optimize their online performance, boost brand awareness, and increase revenue. Heardable, Inc. is a privately held company based in Los Angeles, CA.

Traditional book publishing turned on its head as Heardable, Inc. joins GoDaddy and 1800Flowers.com in an exciting cross-media sponsorship deal.

LOS ANGELES, CA (October 22, 2010) --  Heardable, Inc. joins GoDaddy and 1800Flowers.com in an exciting cross-media sponsorship deal for Lynn Isenberg's The Funeral Planner series. In one fell swoop, a trilogy of stories are released in multiple mediums (e-book, digital video and social media) at the same time -- with corporate sponsors like Heardable underwriting a portion of the publishing expenses via product placement advertising and ad inserts.

The Funeral Planner is a digital series and trilogy of novels that make you laugh and re-think how to celebrate a life. The hero, Maddy Banks, is a serial entrepreneur inspired by the lack of personalization at her best friend's funeral to launch Lights Out Enterprises™ to create meaningful Life Celebrations. The new Digital Series features Grammy Award-winning singer Joss Stone. The Book Trilogy features "The Funeral Planner" and "The Funeral Planner Goes to Washington" with "The Funeral Planner Goes Global" debuting this winter. And a new social media network has been launched to make it easy to honor loved ones on The Tribute Network. A feature-film in the works with award winning comedy director Donald Petrie (Miss Congeniality, How to Lose a Guy in Ten Days) and with Producer Karen Waldron.

"We are excited to support a transmedia narrative opportunity like The Funeral Planner that breaks from the traditional publishing paradigm and ventures into untested territory that empowers small publishers, consumers and sponsoring brands to participate in a new type of 'storyselling,' said Jon Samsel, Chief Executive Officer of Heardable. "The Internet makes it possible for the disconnected to become connected -- for small tales to bossom into large digital experiences that previously would not have seen the light of day due to the previously restrictive nature of traditional publishing. We are excited to support Lynn Isenberg and her efforts to promulgate great stories through diversified mechanisms of telling."

Isenberg's books and series are brought to you by the Dignity Memorial Network, Legacy.com, Eternal Image, SOYJOY; plus brand integrated ads, some with value added promo codes, featuring 1800Flowers.com, GoDaddy.com, Heardable.com, Forethought Financial Group, LLC, Echo Sign, National Hospice Foundation, DNA2Diamonds, First Capital Funding; and plot- related restaurants Got Kosher Inc., Andiamo's Italia, BTB Burrito, Eagles Nest, and Cadillac Travel Agency.

The Funeral Planner Digital Series featuring Joss Stone is available at Amazon.com. The Funeral Planner Novels are available at Amazon.com, Kindle, Scribd.com/FocusMedia, BN.com, and where Adobe eBooks are sold.

About Heardable, Inc.:
Heardable.com meaures the effectiveness of any online brand in less than 30 seconds, allowing users to instantly compare businesses by industry or local zip code. Type in any URL and start your scan. The higher the score, the better you're doing. And yes, it really is that simple. With over 1 million+ brand profiles already stored in our database and hundreds of new companies added each day, Heardable's vast data repository can be utilized by any business looking for ways to optimize their online performance, boost brand awareness, and increase revenue. Heardable, Inc. is a privately held company based in Los Angeles, CA.

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Los Angeles, CA (PRWEB) June 21, 2010 -- Heardable, Inc. (http://www.heardable.com) today announced that Jon Samsel has been named Chief Executive Officer of the company, the emerging leader in online brand measurement and optimization. Mr. Samsel will also join the board of directors. The appointment is effective immediately.

John Sharp, Chairman and Co-founder of Heardable, Inc., stated, "We are delighted to welcome Jon to our management team. I believe Jon's extensive leadership experience and proven accomplishments as a senior digital marketing executive will allow us to further build our momentum and maximize the value of our unique technology."

Mr. Samsel, 44, is a successful entrepreneur and Internet marketing executive with two decades of experience working with leading brands, including Apple, Bank of America, Countrywide, and Ford.

Most recently, Mr. Samsel served as Senior Vice President of Digital Marketing for Bank of America. Prior to Bank of America, Mr. Samsel was Founder and Managing Director of RoadLoans.com, which became a highly-successful, direct-to-consumer online finance division of Ford Motor Company, and he was a Senior eCommerce Consultant for Cognitiative, with client brands that included Cisco, Sun, Oracle, PreviewTravel, Saratoga Systems and Personic. Prior to working at Cognitiative, Mr. Samsel led the design and production of numerous projects for Apple's Worldwide Developer Program.

"I am thrilled to be working with the Heardable team on such an innovative and unique platform," said Jon Samsel. "Heardable's determination to demystify and simplify brand analytics is what brought me to the company. A Heardable Score is similar to a FICO score for brands -- it's a fast, easy-to-understand scoring system that ranks how successfully a brand is performing online. Heardable has the potential to become an industry standard for how brand effectiveness is measured online, which makes this an exciting opportunity."

Heardable's proprietary ABLE engine generates six unique subscores that track different aspects of online brand effectiveness, such as a brand's Actionable, Measurable, Portable, Searchable, Shareable and Sociable online strengths and areas of weakness. The Heardable platform looks at 438 variables to determine a brand's visibility across the web, and provides a standardized score out of 1,000, allowing marketing and C-level executives to easily benchmark brand performance and quantify marketing expenditure.

About Heardable, Inc.:

Heardable, Inc. is the world's first and only online brand optimization platform. Heardable allows anyone to measure, monitor, rank, and improve the effectiveness of their online brand using our real-time analytics engine to monitor over 438 unique variables. Type in any URL and start your scan. The higher the score, the better you're doing. And yes, it really is that simple. With over 1 million+ brand profiles already stored in our database and hundreds of new companies added each day, Heardable's vast data repository can be utilized by any business looking to aggregate brand performance data into their web services or back-end performance dashboards. Heardable, Inc. is a privately held company based in Los Angeles, CA.

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Heardable.com, The World's First And Only Online Brand Optimization Tool, Announces The Launch Of Its New Beta Website

The Heardable platform may just be the simplest and most effective way for companies to measure their online brand performance against the competition. It's SEO for CEO's. Online brand analytics made easy.

Los Angeles, CA (PRWEB) March 10, 2010 -- Measuring your online brand visibility just got easier, thanks to Heardable (http://www.heardable.com). In today's competitive marketplace, getting found, and being heard, is a marketing imperative. A Heardable Score is one way for a business to assess its online brand visibility and map out the necessary next steps for improvement. The higher the score, the better you're doing. And yes, it really is that simple.

Heardable is the brainchild of a group of technologists, private equity investors and brand marketers who saw a great need for actionable analytics that could tie together all the components of online outreach into a single framework, as well as give CEOs, CMOs, brand managers, brand strategists and account planners a means for evaluating a brand's performance against the competition. Heardable aims to pick up where sites like Compete.com and Alexa.com have left these stakeholders in a scrutinizing place by giving them the ultimate purview into the complex and interwoven digital landscape.

Co-Founder, Gunther Sonnenfeld, a long-time agency strategist and technology developer, describes Heardable as a potential bridge between predictive analytics and real-time brand monitoring.

"Brands have a dizzying array of monitoring tools and analytics platforms at their disposal, not to mention the fact that they are awash with reams of data, most of which don't lead them to the insights they need, or provide them with quick, actionable steps to improve their position. The Heardable product is literally a response to the needs and stringent demands of marketers who are not only under tremendous pressure to deliver results, but who must do so in relatively narrow windows of time. We've also had the luxury of testing our tool inside the walls of some of the most innovative strategic agencies and media companies in the world, and we will continue to improve upon our offering with their qualitative and quantitative input."

Currently, the Heardable engine uses 20 on-site and 20 off-site variables to determine a brand's visibility across the web, but will likely double these input and output values in a matter of a few months since the core algorithm is highly scalable. A truly holistic solution, Heardable provides a comprehensive diagnostic analysis of a brand in six key areas:

• actionable
• measurable
• portable
• searchable
• shareable
• sociable

Heardable Scores are comprised of six subscores that roll up into the main score of 1,000 possible points.

Not only can a user run a single scan on a brand's visibility, but the comparative analysis feature allows a user to compare a brand to others in a particular category. An example of this is a Heardable analysis of the automotive brands Toyota, Hyundai, Honda, Mitsubishi and Nissan; what makes this case study so compelling is that it shows the value of brand engagement versus product engagement.

As many consumers out there now know, Toyota is going though a significant product recall. And while many Toyota owners are very upset about what has happened, loyalty to the brand overall has not waned, in large part due to the use of social and search channels that disseminate key information about the recall that all tie back to its main website. Now of course, there is no question that Toyota could be doing a much better job with its outreach, but the point here is that the brand still has far greater visibility on account of its online presence than an automaker like Hyundai does with the quality of its product - which has won a number of awards just in the past year.

The grand takeaway for brand managers and agency strategists is that being heard is a function of monitoring all outreach efforts -- which now can be done using a single, unified tool. Heardable users also have the option of creating lists and sharing this dynamic data with other Heardable community members within a built-in social environment.

The Heardable 100 list (http://heardable.com/heardable_lists.php) is one of the top content areas on the Heardable.com website so far, profiling the top one hundred brands in the world, in real-time, based on the rank order of all Heardable Scores in the platform's database.

Another powerful feature of the Heardable platform is that it can evaluate sites that have been recently registered (6 months or less)...something that other platforms like Compete.com and Alexa.com cannot do due to their data collection methodologies. When you think about all of the start-ups and small businesses out there, you realize very quickly that Heardable addresses a need for brands of all sizes, niche or not, to be heard.

Co-Founder, John Sharp, a successful investor and serial entrepreneur, and Chairman of DealHorizon.com - one of the first social networks for VC and private equity groups - elaborates on Heardable's potential as a web application phenomenon:

"I've literally seen hundreds of technology and media products come across my desk over the last 25 years, and this is one of the very few that deals with a real need in the marketplace, at a time when the media business is transforming, and social technologies are converging. In fact, the value proposition was so compelling to me that I decided to become an active partner. I've always believed that a great product is the result of an adaptive framework that can improve upon itself at great scale, and in following the lead of innovators such as Adobe or Apple, allow the marketplace to vet out its true value over time."

Mr. Sonnenfeld adds that while Heardable uses a brand's website as the central vehicle for performance measurement, real visibility is ubiquitous, which is why the Heardable algorithm not only takes into account as many off-site variables as it does on-site, but why the Heardable team is developing a host of APIs to integrate the platform with other powerful monitoring and analytics tools.

"We have reached a formative tipping point in digital media, and are now seeing real parity across channels. The bottom line for any brand in establishing and maintaining relevance within a very fragmented landscape is to understand that search, content development, social communication, portability and all the respective outreach channels are inexorably linked and are a part of the same ecosystem. One hand literally feeds the other. If brands are not already thinking along these lines, our goal is to help them get there."

Mr. Sharp and Mr. Sonnenfeld will be running live demonstrations of the product in the coming months at premiere digital conferences such as SXSW (http://sxsw.com), Gulltaggen (http://gulltaggen.no) and Innotech (http://innotech.com). Heardable has also been entered into the inaugural Hive Awards show at SXSW interactive, a platform for the "Unsung heroes of the Internet", led by agency veteran Alan Wolk, and supported by a host of respected thought leaders including David Armano, Brian Morrissey and Ian Schafer.

Heardable is in public BETA - simply go to the homepage, register and experience its value for yourself.

• March 2013
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