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What brands do
Brands create consumer trust and emotional attachments. As a result, they foster relationships between consumers and products that withstand pricing wars, transcend offers from new competitors, and even overcome rare lapses in product or service excellence.
Great brands aren’t just known and trusted. They’re loved.
For examples of brands that enjoy strong bonds with customers, the next time you’re stuck in traffic, look at the logos posted in the windows of the cars around you. Each time you see a logo decal, try to think of that brand’s chief competitor. Then ask yourself “What’s the chance that a buyer of the competing brand would ‘wear’ the brand’s logo with such pride?” Only brands that strike deep emotional chords with customers make their way into hearts, minds, and car windows! Chapters 13 and 14 provide a playbook on how to develop a contingent of brand enthusiasts inside and outside your organization.
As you develop your brand and it gains strength and loyalty in your market area, look forward to reaping the following benefits.
Perception is everything
Many people think that the logo is the brand, but, in fact, the logo is just one representation of the brand. Your brand isn’t how you look or what you say or even what you sell. Your brand is what people believe you stand for. For example:
- Starbucks sells coffee. It stands for daily inspiration.
- Apple sells computers. It stands for thinking differently.
- Disney sells animated and amusement park family entertainment. It stands for making dreams come true.
Your brand lives in consumer minds, so branding is the process of developing consumer beliefs and perceptions that are accurate and in alignment with what you want your brand to be.
What Are Brands, Anyway?
Brands are promises that consumers believe in. Chapter 2 provides a complete definition of brands and branding, but if you remember nothing more than this three-word description — brands are promises — you’re well on your way to branding success.
As you venture into the world of branding, keep these truths in mind:
- You establish your brand by building trust in a one-of-a-kind promise about who you are, what you stand for, and what unique and meaningful benefits you deliver.
- You build your brand by living up to your promise every single time people come into contact with your name, your message, or your business. It makes no difference whether that contact comes through advertising, publicity, word of mouth, the buying experience, customer service, billings, returns, or ongoing communication.
- You strengthen your brand by constantly reinforcing your brand promise. If encounters with your brand are inconsistent or not in line with what people expected they could count on, you essentially break your promise, breaking your brand and risking your reputation and business as a result.
Building brands takes focus, passion, persistence, and diligence. Plus brand building requires effort and money. The payoff, and it’s a big one, is that strong brands build business and equity for their owners. The following sections shed light on what brands do and why they’re such a big deal.
Chapter 1: Branding ABCs
Maybe you’re launching a new company or a new product, and you want to establish a strong brand from the get-go. Or maybe you’ve been in business for a while, and you’re getting ready to do some brand repair, brand extensions, or rebranding.
Perhaps you’ve just joined the marketing team for an established business, and you want to come up to speed — in a hurry — on the whole topic of branding and how to do it best. Or, you may be among the many marketers who aren’t quite sure whether or not you even have a brand, but you’re pretty sure you need one, and you want to know which steps to take in order to end up with the brand you set out to build.
No matter your starting point, if branding action is on your agenda, this chapter gets you going in the right direction. It provides an overview of the reasons that brands matter, why you need one, and how building a brand delivers value that far exceeds the time and effort you invest.
