You may have heard something about marketing “branding,” but maybe you don’t truly understand what that that means exactly.
Some people think branding is like positioning, but it is actually different. The main difference is that positioning is a fluid concept. In other words, you can position yourself at different times in different markets as different things. Branding is more set in stone– it’s a hard-core recognition factor.
Branding is more about following rules because if you don’t follow those rules, things don’t look the same and people won’t remember you. When you put out your marketing pieces, you want to create a similar look and feel so that people remember you. And you want that similar look and feel on every piece you put out.
The good thing is that you get to make the rules… colors are the same, style of lettering is the same, logo, etc. However, there is some flexibility as long as you follow the rules. You can’t go too far out of bounds, but you can change some things within the framework of what others can still recognize.
Branding in your marketing has to make you feel something. A technology company can’t have an old-style font — you might not think that they are very advanced.
A brand consists of eight basic building blocks:
The name
The logo (brand icon)
The brand’s colors
The slogan and brand messaging
The sound of the brand
The overall look and feel = the brand’s position
Packaging the brand
The brand experience
A brand is a greater sum of its parts. It is always more than just the nuts and bolts, the pieces; great brands are always the result of the whole equaling more than the sum of its parts.
Branding is about making the consumer or buyer more hip, more in the “know,” more cool than anybody else. We are a generation and a nation wanting to be special. We want to be richer, more beautiful, better dressed, and more effortlessly gorgeous than any other generation that we know.