 |
|
|
Branding
Our seasoned professionals are well versed in the art of branding. (See the case history, Building Brand from the Bottom Up, for a specific example of our brand work.) We can help you define your brand, name and position it, design its look, and sell it through with strategic marketing strategies and targeted communications.
Don’t know the first thing about brand? Excerpts from a recent article we wrote on brand may help.
What Is Brand?
The American Marketing Association defines a brand as a “name, term, sign, symbol or design … intended to identify the goods and services of one seller, or group of sellers, and to differentiate them from those of other sellers.” To translate, ”Kleenex” (both the word and its design) is a brand for facial tissues from Kimberly Clark. The Marlboro Man (both the visual and the phrase) is a brand for cigarettes from Philip Morris. And that graphic of the apple with the bite out of it? That’s the brand for Macintosh computers. Even the shape of the Coke bottle is a brand. And you can probably think of hundreds of other examples, too.
But Wait ...
Some experts say that brand is more than the concrete symbols of name, logo. slogan and design. They believe brand is the emotional connection a customer feels towards a product, service or company; a feeling, association, or expectation created by the customer’s accumulation of experiences with that product, service, or company. Think “wonder” for Disney, “reliable” for FedEx, and “it never fails to make me feel better” for Bayer aspirin.
What's It Matter?Why should branding matter to you? Because that’s how you create relevance, differentiation, energy, leverage, and clarity for your product or service in the marketplace. In other words, branding is how you break through the clutter and get somebody to recognize the value of what you’re selling and buy it.
What Can You Brand?
Pretty much anything. We’ve already talked about products, services and companies, but you can also brand teams (how about the Lakers, or Mary-Kate and Ashley), destinations (can you say Disney Land), a service or maintenance agreement (i.e., Applecare Protection Plan), a program (Continental OnePass), even a person (think LeBron James). Heck, you can even brand a number – as in the case of LeBron’s, which we all know is 23! |
|
