Branding: what is it, what is it not & why a no-name brand never wins in the long run.
With more and more options available to consumers to choose their product and service providers, it has become crucial for businesses to build a strong brand – a business’s brand is one of the most critical components when establishing and maintaining a competitive advantage in the market. It’s no coincidence that the most successful organizations have managed to build themselves empires that don’t waver even in difficult times and they get chosen by their target audience time after time.
When branding is mentioned, many tend to think of logos, slogans, colors, and fonts, but is that truly everything a brand represents? Well, I hope you don’t think so. Because the concept of the brand includes so many more aspects of a business than that. In this blog post, I’ll clarify what branding is, and what it is not. I will introduce thoughts about why it is so important to have a strong brand in 2023 (and beyond), and what kind of steps you could take when building one. You should also notice that this blog post will solely focus on branding from a company point of view, even though many of the introduced aspects can also be applied to personal branding.
What branding is not…
Firstly, we should establish what branding is not.
1) Choosing a color you like and splashing it around
Yes, most well-established brands can be associated with a specific color or an array of colors, but do you think they picked the color by chance and use every shade of it? No, that’s not the case. Every color represents or awakens certain types of feelings or mental associations within the minds of people. For example, blue, especially navy blue, is often associated with trust whereas orange is the color of joy. All colors also bring out negative associations, so when choosing the colors you should also take that into consideration. The common rule of thumb is to choose a few (2-5) colors to be used to distinguish the brand. This means that there should be 1-2 main colors and a few supporting colors. Most companies include a color usage guide in their brand manual to clearly line the way the selected color(s) should be used: which exact color(s), in which instances and elements, and in what ratio. It is important to stick with what’s been set in order to build a strong, memorable, and distinguished brand image through different elements.
2) Coming up with a catchy phrase that doesn’t add or communicate value.
It might be tempting to create a fun, somewhat catchy phrase to use in marketing. Or even multiple. But the best slogans, brand promises, and value propositions are well-thought, well-formed, and they deliver and communicate the value, vision, or mission of the business. The slogan, if used, should be profound and planted in or derived from the company’s culture or mission so that it will be relevant for a long time and can be recognizable to consumers on a long-term basis.
3) Marketing “here and there” using “this and that”.
While it is important, especially for a new business to put the offer out there no matter what, as soon as possible and almost in whatever way ever possible, branding is not. Branding and marketing walk hand-in-hand, and therefore the way the brand is promoted is closely related to the brand and how customers perceive it. A marketing strategy that’s about being visible in any possible way, is not a good strategy. There is a cliché saying “There’s no bad PR”, which in a sense is true, but THERE IS such thing, as worthless marketing – not utilizing and presenting the brand in a strategic and impactful way is almost as relevant as no marketing at all. Before implementing any marketing plan, you should make sure the form and content of it are set for communicating the brand properly.
4) The sole company name or the product you deliver.
Your company name and the product or service you offer are parts of the brand, yes, but they do not form the whole of it. A brand is a much broader concept than just a few things it entails. Creating a strong brand requires more than just a memorable name or a top-tier offering. We all know Nike, but we don’t perceive it by its name. If we had never seen its logo, tried on its shoes, or visited the stores, we wouldn’t recognize it as it is. Imagine what Apple made you feel if everything you knew about the brand was its name. You wouldn’t have an idea of whether they sell fruits or innovative electronic devices.
…and what is it instead?
1) Creating a combination of visual elements such as the name, logo, colors, package design, and other visible characteristics
While none of these elements alone make up the brand, all of them together make up the very key part of it. For a brand, visual elements are important for the sake of distinguishing themselves from other businesses out there and being remembered. According to the Social Science Research Network, 65 % of people are visual learners, which also means that they better remember visual things. This is more than enough of an assurance that the visual elements of your brand are very important, and they should be well-thought and most often based on market research and from there designed by a professional.
2) Brand Identity and Brand Equity
I don’t blame anyone for thinking the logo makes the brand since I sometimes see the terms “brand identity” and “brand equity” used interchangeably. But they ARE NOT the same thing. Brand identity is essentially formed from all the visual elements of a brand (which most of were mentioned above). Hence it is the identity of the brand, the way it is identified – the tangible elements of a brand.
Brand Equity is the intangible side of things. It consists of the overall brand value and strength, which again are formed based on a collection of things such as customer loyalty and perceived value, associations and feelings towards the brand, as well as general recognition toward it.
Therefore, Brand Identity is almost like a part of Brand Equity, and they are both at key roles when it comes to building a brand. But what needs to be remembered, is that Brand Equity isn’t created by the company, it is created in the minds of the customers based on what the company has created, while Brand Identity is completely up to the company to decide and create. If you think about it, Brand Equity is the reaction to the company’s actions. The final position of your brand on the market is not dictated by what you do as a business as much as it has to do with how your customers feel about it.
3) Not only the products or services themselves, but the way you provide them.
In addition to the visual elements of your brand, and the product or service you provide, the way you provide them is a vital aspect in the formation of a brand image and the growth of equity. It is sometimes difficult to comprehend that something intangible has such a major effect on a company’s success and the brand’s strength, but it is true because it affects the customer’s experience and feelings toward your brand, and therefore directly affects the brand equity.
So next time you wonder what things you could affect in terms of making your brand more memorable and distinguishable, think outside the container where you carry your items, and start steering the focus on how and where the container travels: the delivery process of your products, customer support, and additional services.
Why does branding matter and why a no-name brand never wins in the long run?
Well-branded businesses don’t only get to raise their prices due to the higher value they have in their customer's minds, but they will also establish a larger market share, and ideally, be the first business a person thinks of when they’re about to purchase something specific. And this is where most of the benefits of a brand come from: you need to spend less and less money and effort on actual marketing and sales operations as your brand becomes more recognizable and desirable.
Well-established brands are also known to survive in turbulent environments better than companies with little to no branding. Consumers often tend to lean towards brands and companies they believe will last and survive for the years to come. If the company has a strong brand, it will help the customer believe that the company is stable and worthy of spending money on. This is especially true for service-based businesses if the service is provided long-term, as it minimizes the amount of effort and troubles the customer must go through when working with the brand. An example could be electricity providers, coaching, and consulting services. It is also quite valid for product-based companies that offer product support or warranties for products that should last long. For example, some types of home electronic devices, cars, or commodities that have a long user life cycle.
And what’s the deal with the no-name brand then? Well, they have their time and place and their own audience. No-name brands will have to keep their prices lower because many times consumers associate strong brands with higher prices, and that ties to higher quality. A no-name brand is most often considered to be lower in quality and therefore must be lower in price to be worth of purchase. This is why no-name brands require higher sales volumes to stay profitable, whereas branded businesses can establish high-ticket prices, and therefore require less sales. As a business requires less sales, they are less likely to be affected by lowered purchasing power in the market due to inflation or unfavorable economic times for example. You get the gist, right?
What concrete steps should you take when designing your brand?
Designing a brand from scratch can be challenging and many suffer from “writer’s block” or the “blank page syndrome”. Where to start and what must be considered? Here are some of my tips to begin with:
Think about the product or service you provide in relation to your customers: what kind of problem does it solve for them, what kind of things are your customers looking for and what do they value? If you don’t know exactly, you should implement some market research.
Somewhat simultaneously, determine your product/service offering based on step 1, and your business’s goals, values, mission, and vision.
Do your competitor research: investigate (almost as “stalk” 🧐) some similar companies, potential competitors, and companies you admire in terms of the branding work they’ve done. Look for things that have done well, try to implement them in your own branding, and also keep an eye out for things that should be avoided. Remember to do everything in your own unique way, NEVER copy anything directly from anyone!
Plan for your brand identity (the visual elements): how will you communicate the things your brand represents to your target audience? How will you communicate the brand and the value it offers? What kind of image and visual elements does that require? Think in colors, fonts, brand voice, creatives, and your logo as well.
Create, execute, monitor, adjust: you should never get too fixated on certain aspects of your brand if you notice they don’t resonate with your audience or they create negative associations or feelings. However, you should never make vast changes in your brand suddenly or frequently, which is why pre-planning for the brand is equally important, or even more important than the actual work after the brand has already been designed and launched. It might be a good idea to consult an external branding professional before adjusting your brand, as they can offer you beneficial and worthy information before making any costly errors.
Conclusion
A brand is not a single separate element but it is a collection of them and more so, how those elements make the customers feel and act. Branding as the act of creating and communicating a brand needs to be well-thought and done with clear, long-term goals in mind.
