Question

Topic: Branding

Barq Asks: What Is Branding?

Posted by Anonymous on 4/20/2007 at 6:06 PM ET 1000 Points
Today, with 6,142 Expert Points, and 8,400 Question Points, I broke the top 100 MarketingProfs expert list threshold. To celebrate, I will be transferring at least 2500 of my Expert Points to ONE of you by 5/4/07. The rest of this question’s points will be distributed evenly among all respondents.

QUESTION:
What does branding mean to you?

[This is one in a series of 6 questions I am posing to those who are not advertising or marketing AGENCY staffers, but who are responsible for selling or marketing a product or service for your company. I will also consider comments from agency people, as long as you speak from a strong position of the marketing buyer’s insight. The questions will be posted in several MarketingProfs subject categories, so if you wish to respond to all questions (and qualify for the points), please click on my “Posted by” name (BARQ) and choose from my “Recent Questions” list. The last question will be posted by 4/30/07 in the “Just For Fun” category.]

BARQ
SELMARQ Brands’ Best Friend

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RESPONSES

  • Posted by Peter (henna gaijin) on 4/20/2007 at 9:12 PM Accepted
    A brand is what people expect from a company. What type of quality, price, level of service, how the company interacts with the community, etc. that the people expect are all part of this.

    The term 'people' is vague on purpose, as it is not just customers or prospects, but also employees, suppliers, the community, etc.

    So branding would be the process of trying to change these people's perception of the company.
  • Posted on 4/20/2007 at 9:12 PM Accepted
    Branding is everything you do to create a set of impressions that your public will sense (see, hear, smell, feel, or taste) every time they see your name, logo, or product.
    Hazel Wagner
  • Posted by Ali Mustafa on 4/22/2007 at 5:42 AM Accepted
    Branding a business small or big is the same, small business has a small market share and large business have a larger market share and reach. Branding is all about choice and creating choice in the minds of customers, so they pick your products from many similar products

    For me it’s a combination of name, logo, colors, and theme
    Suppose you want to create your own private label clothing brand, you decide first the name, logo, color and the theme, the theme where you decide weather you want to make it a sports brand, casual or formal and under it what you offer like shirts, socks ect.. Is called your offerings, through your offerings customers will distinguish your brand from other similar brands in the market.
  • Posted by Deremiah *CPE on 4/22/2007 at 1:11 PM Accepted
    Hi Barq,

    hope you're having a great day & a wondeful life!

    So you want to know what branding means to me the Customer Passion Evangelist. Well I'll have to begin with what my good friend Bennamin Garth Siddhartha Mack aka Ben Mack, or for those of you who need to get to know him personally "BEN MACK-A-LICIOUS" author of "Think TWO PRODUCTS Ahead".

    "Branding is often discussed as irrelevant to small business marketing. That's bunk! If you are running a con-game, then branding is irrelevant. However, every form of legitimate business will benefit from branding. Branding is often described in absurd and outlandish ways.

    For the record, branding is not:

    * an exact discipline.
    * about always using the same logo or colors.
    * about limiting yourself.

    You don't choose whether you want a brand--you can only choose how you manage it.

    Brands are bigger than advertising.

    Brands should not be confused with brand names or logos. The logo and the brand name are physical manifestations of a brand, but they are not the brand; they are accessories.


    ***Your brand is the culmulative story of your product, company, and users.***


    Your brand is the origin of your legend. It is the never-changing, nonnegotiable essence of the company from which your legend is born."
    ...Ben Mack


    NOW to me branding means:

    to offer YOU an Exuberant experience full of Insatiable Emotional Value daily...by ***PLEASING YOU*** right where you are, THE WAY YOU LIKE IT, EVERY SINGLE TIME. By GIVING you ---The GREATEST, Unbelievable, Unforgettable, Inspirational "SERVANT EXPERIENCE" which reaches deep down into the Spiritual Stream of your PASSIONATE SOUL.
    ...by Deremiah, *CPE

    That's what branding means to me.


    To find out what Branding use to mean to me (click this link below from an earlier Mprofs question).
    https://www.marketingprofs.com/ea/qst_question.asp?qstID=3858

    Thanks again Barq for asking such a wonderful question. You don’t have to give me any points at all because I participate for the love of the experience. I like making people happy. Now if there is anything I can do for you or anything I can do to make you happy please feel free to contact me. REMEMBER... our only real problem in life is our failure to be "MORE Creative" than we’ve ever been. If you “Invent” your opportunity YOU WILL most definitely create your future. I'm only an email away from you if you need my help Steve. Is there anything else I can do for you?

    Your Servant,

    Deremiah, *CPE (Customer Passion Evangelist)

    *Caring Promotes Exuberance
  • Posted by Deremiah *CPE on 4/22/2007 at 2:32 PM Member
    Hi Barq,

    SURE.

    THERE ARE RESPONSE MECHANISIMS...
    The goal is to get it down to a response. That's why although some have argued with me in an effort to render applied methods of logic over my commentary about the power of Emotions I just count it that they are inexperienced in this arena of thought.

    NO CONSCIOUS THOUGHT NECESSARY...
    But our responses are purely emotional. When something is an emotionally triggered no conscious thought is necessary. The emotions are locked with in or embedded in our autonomic nervous system. Through sight, sound, touch, taste, smell or imagined we trigger the emotions that cause us to react without even having to think. Some artist like myself have been trained on the covert triggers by being a part of certain circles of artist who communicate about these things only in the most private settings.

    Your Servant,

    Deremiah, *CPE (Customer Passion Evangelist)

    *Caring Promotes Exuberance
  • Posted by Deremiah *CPE on 4/22/2007 at 4:06 PM Member
    Hi Barq,


    From:

    "The Owners Manual For The Brian"

    "emotions precede cognitions."

    The word EMOTION comes from the Latin emovere (e = away, movere = to move), which means to move out of or agitate.

    The etymology of the word is closely related to that of motivation. Both suggest action, in the sense of a state that is the opposite of ***standing still or being calm and laid-back.***

    This action is related to an individual's goals:

    motivation is action in pursuit of a goal, while

    emotion is action resulting from situations that enhance or threaten a goal.

    Hence to the degree that I'm motivated, I'm pursuing a goal. To the degree that I'm emotional, I'm perceiving either a threat to my goal (negative emotion) or significant progress toward my goal (positive emotion).


    "Reason generates
    the list of possibilities.
    Emotion Chooses
    from that list."
    ......by Richard Wrangham and Dale Peterson


  • Posted by telemoxie on 4/23/2007 at 7:57 AM Accepted
    Branding is the personification of a company's offerings.
  • Posted by Deremiah *CPE on 4/24/2007 at 4:07 PM Member
    Hey Karen,

    Kiss who ever came up with "Everyone Sells" bcause that's exactly how Harvey Mackey, Author of "Swim with the Sharks" proclaims he made his company a huge success.

    When I worked for SecurityLink From AMERITECH/SBC, we focused on Points of contact as real valuable ways to perceive how we could impact the customer and sustain the quality Image of the Brand.

    BRANDING SHOULD BE ELECTROMAGNETIC...
    Everyone does sell, EVERYONE does impact the "INFLUENCE of a Sell" or aid in the motivational stimulation that touches the inner most part of ***Raising the hairs on the back of a Customers Neck ***. When was the last time your customer HUGGED you, gave you a HIGH-FIVE or PRAISED the High-Heavens out of you because you helped to INFLUENCE their desire to feel LOVED, RESPECTED, NEEDED, GOT to have YOU as my Customer. This is Electrified Branding at it's best.

    JAMES BROWN registers as the #1 dancer on the planet why because James Brown had PASSION, James Brown "GOT SOUL"...

    And equally important is when INTERNAL Customers or what I like to call the EVANGELIST of the organization get "FREE In the Spirit" to live out the love language of a company, the true guts of an organization, then we can start talking about the TALENT your company possesses that makes your organization ...sought out>>>>by Customers that are HUNTING for something ORIGINAL, something Geniunely AUTHENTIC...

    Does your company have that?...because customers want to feel good when they release the denaro, those greenbacks, the Euro dollars. This hits the very essence of Tom Peters desire for people to stop hiring anyone and hire TALENT. Why because The Talent of your organization (read CAPITAL "A") ADDs value in ways that makes your organization Look GREAT! BRANDING IS SPIRITUAL in that it can charge the atmosphere of your customers like electricity moves in the unseen realm but effects the natual physical conditions of things to the degree it leaves a trace of it's existence. The question is can we (you & I) harness the electric essence of Branding so that we too like Benjamin Franklin develop a lightning Rod to control and consistently direct it for a greater good for all man kind.

    I love the POWER and EXCITEMENT ---Encouraging--- brings to the work atmosphere. This is a very important part of creating a new surge of energy with in the company that makes those who feel seperated a part of the oneness of an organization. GREAT input Karen, EXCELLENT commentary on the hosting part Barq. Is there anything I can do for anybody? I just love to serve, to help to inspire to encourage.

    Your Servant,

    Deremiah, *CPE (Customer Passion Evangelist)
  • Posted on 4/25/2007 at 2:26 AM Accepted
    Anyone read Eating the Big Fish?

    Brand has 4 condition:
    1)Something that has a buyer and seller
    2)Something thats has a differentiating name/symbol/trademark
    3)Something that has positive and or negative opinions about it in consumers minds for reasons other than its literal product characteristics
    4)Something that is created rather than naturally occurring.

    I like this analogy:

    A can of coke on a desert island is just an aluminum can full of sugared water.
  • Posted on 4/25/2007 at 3:58 AM Accepted
    We seem to be discussing branding as related to products and a complete product experience. What about services?
    Although the principles for branding of goods and services are generally the same there occur some differences. These arise from the different natures of both categories. The main differences that influence branding policies are that services
    · have a changing level of quality,
    · the consumer has to become involved in the consumption of a service actively,
    · they are intangible and not storable.
    When a brand in general gives the consumer more confidence in his choice this is even more important for services. Their quality and other features are more difficult to asses. Because of their intangibility and complexity it is harder for the customer to distinguish between the offers from the wide range of service companies operating in the market place.
    This especially applies to the market of accounting, auditing and consulting where consolidation and globalisation increase competition. In an FT-article about branding accounting services (Kelly 1998) a branding expert states that “more than 70 % of the Fortune 500 companies ...said branding is increasingly important in helping them to choose where to get a service. They want to be able to tell who is good at what.”
  • Posted on 4/27/2007 at 4:02 AM Accepted
    When one seamlessly creates an impression wherein the emotional attachment to, & rational benefits of, a product or service is effortlessly grasped by the target audience....one has just created a brand.

    To me a brand, is just that...a lasting impression on the IQ & EQ!

    Cheers,
    Steve
  • Posted on 4/27/2007 at 10:46 PM Accepted
    Branding today is more about the bundle of product and experience, delivered consistently and expected, than anything else. You can get more information about branding in the Business category of www.research-resource.com. Consumer behavior has changed as media and marketing has expanded; branding is basic identification - people trust you and your brand if you deliver what you claim you offer. It does not take long to destroy brand equity, but if you look at companies like McDonald's, a strong brand can survive a downturn and come back stronger in the environment of a strong economy, combined with good memory experiences and re-visits. Some cannot, or will take longer (think the finger in the Wendy's chili, which gave everyone a strong case of the 'yucks' even though it was not the company's fault) - and it must be done correctly (again, Wendy's offered free frosties as a goodwill gesture to get folks back into the restaurants, but it didn't really address the problem and failed).
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