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THE TRUTH ABOUT BRANDING

Written by: David Warshawski

Article Overview: Brand. Brand. Brand. Every company today wants to be a brand company. “We are a brand experience company,” or “we have just completed a rebranding campaign” seems to be the new, must-have mantra of organizations. This trend is almost overwhelming and far too often severely misguided.

THE TRUTH ABOUT BRANDING

Brand. Brand. Brand. Every company today wants to be a brand company. “We are a brand experience company,” or “we have just completed a rebranding campaign” seems to be the new, must-have mantra of organizations. This trend is almost overwhelming and far too often severely misguided.

Out of the woodwork are coming so-called brand experts telling people how to “brand themselves.” The end result – an incredible amount of misinformation and unclarity about how a great brand works. Lots of people are talking about it and trying to do it, yet few are succeeding.

First, let’s clarify what a brand is not. A brand is not your logo, your collateral material, your packaging, or your tagline. Having an agency create great collateral, or having them create strong advertising is not branding. It may support your branding efforts, but it is not branding.

In fact, too often these types of marketing activities are pursued before a company’s brand is clarified. This is the epitome of putting the cart before the horse.

Only once you have internally articulated your brand so it is crystal clear not only for the company’s leadership, but for every employee, can you begin discussing what your logo, collateral material, or advertising campaign should look like.

So what is brand? Simply stated, it is the fundamental emotional experience that you want consumers to have every time they come in contact with your company, product, or service. Brand is not based on a logical equation. For example, Starbucks is not successful because it offers the fastest service, the most inexpensive, the most geographically convenient, or even the best tasting coffee for many consumers. These would all be logical reasons for people to buy their coffee at Starbucks.

Yet, last year 25 million consumers per week were willing to drive further, pay considerably more, and wait in line longer for the opportunity to buy their cup of coffee at Starbucks. Why? The answer is the strength of Starbucks’ brand. The emotional connection that Starbucks tries to make every consumer feel resonated strongly enough that Starbucks had sales of $3.3 billion last year.

Starbucks wants you to feel sophisticated and feel like you are part of what many brand experts refer to as a “coffee house” community. That is the Starbucks brand -- sophistication and community.

That is why every store calls their cup sizes Grande and Venti, not medium or large. It is why every store has a “barista” personally making the coffee fresh for you at a separate counter, never behind a wall or out of sight from the customer. It is why every store has tables and chairs for congregating and many have plush sofas and arm chairs. It is why they encourage people to read or work at the store and have even installed wi-fi in their stores so people can surf the Internet all day long. The ways in which Starbucks expresses its brand go on and on.

Now think about Starbucks’ largest competitor, Dunkin’ Donuts, which sold more than 985 million cups of coffee last year. They are both good at selling coffee. So why did you choose to buy your coffee, more often than not, from one and not the other? The answer is because they have very different brands and you connected with one more than the other.

The power of a strong brand is incredible. According to Interbrand, one of the most quoted sources on the subject, the top 10 global brands account for nearly $387 billion in value. And according to Ernst & Young’s classic “Measures That Matter” study, 35 percent of a company’s value is attributable to non-financial intangibles, primarily brand issues.

Or as David D’Alessandro, CEO of John Hancock, expresses it in his recent book Brand Warfare, “…if a company is going to be successful in the long term, the CEO’s first concern has to be the brand. Brand has to trump even short-term financial questions, because all the financial measures, everything from market capitalization to margins, are directly affected by the health of the brand.”

It is this understanding that is leading more and more CEOs to search for people who can help them understand, clarify and harness the power of their brand. Sadly, many of these CEOs are often left scratching their heads in frustration as they receive half-answers, misguided counsel, or poor implementation. However, the CEOs who find an agency that truly understands the fundamentals of branding enjoy a new-found clarity about their company. They also reap the financial and the emotional benefits that come along with being a powerful brand-oriented organization.



David Warschawski is founder and president of Warschawski (www.warschawski.com), a full service PR, marketing and branding agency based in Baltimore. In the past five years alone, Warschawski has won more than 100 industry awards for its work and has been voted “Boutique PR Agency of the Year.” For four years in a row Warschawski has been ranked as one of the top 15 “Best PR Agencies to Work For.” Warschawski clients include Fortune 500 and Inc. 500 companies.

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