Branding. What is it?

Brand

A brand is the consumer’s anticipation for a unique and defined experience, or for a certain unique benefit obtainable solely through consuming/owning a specific product/service manufactured/ offered by a specific company. A familiar name or logo - do not suffice to make for a strong brand.

Why do you need branding?

Branding makes the company. It separates you from the crowd and makes you stand out. It defines the uniqueness of your services and products. It informs people who you are, quickly. It is how you are perceived by others.

For these reasons you need to protect our identity and work to make it strong. To protect your identity you need to make sure you're consistent in what you produce, in how you use your logo and how you talk about the company as a whole. To make it strong, you need to make sure you have a unified look and feel, and are sending out the same message, whether it is in an email, a memo, a phone call, a client visit or an event.

What are the benefits to me?

Branding helps you become unified and inspired by a common sense of purpose and identity. It brings you together and aims your company at a common goal and helps you to identify with each other, to find a common ground where none may exist. Every associate is key in building a brand image through their verbal and written communications, execution of business processes or business development efforts.

You are the organization. You are the ambassadors of the company as you meet and interact with colleagues, customers, suppliers, competitors and industry experts. As well as interacting with a number of people totally disconnected to the corporation in the form of family members, friends, former colleagues and many others.

What are the benefits to the company?

The benefits for a company are many. It helps to differentiate your company from others. Branding helps to create added-value to the products and services you market and it helps to maintain customer relationships to prosper in a competitive and changing global market.

Branding also creates a unified look which helps to create a positive perception about your company in the minds of your associates, customers and prospects, leading to increased new business and stronger client relationships.

The cornerstone to a strong brand is consistency in…

• Graphics Standards
• Written and Oral Communication Standards
• Business Cards & Stationary Standards
• Endorsement of Image Attributes
• Strong, Simple and Consistent Messages
• Internal Branding

Today, brand building no longer constitutes a mere manipulation of the consumer’s perceptions and desires, but it is a creation of a system that on the one-hand makes promises and arouses anticipations, while on the other-hand it delivers and realizes the promises that it makes.

– Dan Herman, PhD, owner and CEO of Herman – Strategic Consultants