Branding 101; Branding, the Image of A Business
When you think of Amazon, Apple, Rolls Royce, Nike or Coca-Cola, what comes to your mind? That feeling, thought and image is what these companies spend millions of dollars to build.
Customers must recognize that you stand for something. – Howard Schultz, Starbucks
In the world of business, creating a company isn’t enough, in other to always have a place in the heart of your customers, branding is necessary.
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Why Branding
Branding is the uniqueness between two company selling the same product. It is a combination of Name, logo and purpose into a single place. Branding is what gives a business uniqueness in the market, it is the identity of a business. Branding is the scent to a business, it makes a business stand out among other business and in the industry.
Creating a brand requires proper thinking about the business, the customers and what they want to see. A business’s name, logo, slogan, location, pricing and even customer satisfaction depends on the business branding. The difference between Aldi and Target is their brands and that is what they build their businesses on.
In creating a brand, certain elements are important and they are;
Name
The name of a business has much to do with how far your business goes. In naming a business, it is advisable to choose a name that explains your business offers or choose a name that has nothing to do with your business at all. Majority of the big businesses brands today use the later. Names like Xerox, Amazon, Apple, Microsoft, Starbucks, McDonalds, etc. for small businesses that do not have enough money to push their brand, it is advisable to use the former. Adding the business purpose to the business. Example Ben mart, Suffy Lube and so on. When naming a business, it is important to consider the image and brand you want to create as well as indicate the benefit so customers.
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LOGO
In choosing a Logo for a business, it is essential to represent the company’s target. When choosing a logo, it is essential that it is the graphical representation to the world and industry the business is into. The logo is often a short graphic design with either the company name or a design but not a sentence. When creating a logo and putting a slogan, always be watchful of the font to use as well as the color, Use a color that speaks your business. As a change in color of business often means rebranding.
Branding goes beyond the name and the logos, it goes down to customer service, product uniqueness and values. The business branding goes down to making customers happy and one thing that customers remember or make reference to when the business makes them smile is the Name, logo and the slogans which is what makes you unique. Developing a specific identity in the industry and to the world, and communicating that identity consistently in your actions, is what gives you a brand.
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Hi appreciated @gbenga.
I believe that imposing a feeling on the consumers of a product is the most difficult goal to reach when we talk about Branding.
This is a very complex process in my opinion. In most cases this level is not achieved.
These brands you mentioned are trade giants and in the case of McDonalds for example, it is a company with more than 70 years of history. Then we can imagine how difficult it can be to reach these milestones in brand establishment.
Thank you for sharing this valuable article in Project Hope.
Your friend, Juan.
You are right @juanmolina, it could takes years to impose a feeling about a product or company to customers as getting to know a brand is like getting to trust them.
A few companies were able to make this impression and gain trust in shorter years. Like Alibaba, Amazon and a few others.
@tipu curate
Upvoted 👌 (Mana: 15/20 - need recharge?)
To talk about brand is to talk about something distinctive within a specific industry, or at least that's how I see it.
It goes far beyond a nice design. I have read that they include many times, the big companies, scholars of the areas of psychology and sociology to carry out their campaigns and have a greater impact.
Interesting your publication @gbenga, so many things that one does not know.
Thanks a lot @josevas217 for reading and commenting on my post. Truthfully, branding is of two aspect; the physical and the psychological. Physical includes name, logos ans trademarks why the psychological includes believed taste, sense of belonging etc.
That's a nice distinction @gbenga. It allows us to see both aspects, how the physical influences the psychological.
I know I can always count on your post for gaining knowledge, thanks a lot for being detailed about branding.
I already started the process of branding for my business, but we are only undergoing some hiccups at the moment but I know we will get out of it very soon and branding, here we come with full force.
Haha.. i am glad to hear you talk with a very strong energy and will. I hope it pulls through.
Thanks for reading my post.
Brand image is the current view of the customers about a brand. It can be defined as a unique bundle of associations within the minds of target customers. It signifies what the brand presently stands for. It is a set of beliefs held about a specific brand.
@henry-9ja, thanks for taking time to read my post and adding valuable contributions.
For a while now I have envisioned blockchain advancing social media influencers into empowering brands. But more than that, everyone who uses money that is on a blockchain should eventually develop a history akin to that of a business track record where there actions combined with artificial intelligence into something of a brand. This would replace the digital identities owned by companies like Amazon, Facebook, and government agencies. How far we are away from this probably is dependent upon a few years of development following mass adoption.
Having this is dependent on mass adoption of the blockchain. A lot of people do not know about the blockchain, some are sceptical about the underline use of cryptocurrency on the blockchain and so on.
True. Looking forward, I already so many corporations valuing blockchain as a need for their supply chains and logistics that sponsors will do a lot of work toward promotion. This might come when they think their is control via a managed blockchain service to supersede dChains, but we could also witness economic motivators.
Forbes has a Blockchain 50 list
https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaeldelcastillo/2019/04/16/blockchain-50-billion-dollar-babies/#74034cec57cc
and I believe Fortune might as well
https://fortune.com/2019/02/28/blockchain-technology-business-uses/
Hard to imagine it's not just a matter of time before agents recommend this to their influencers and everyone else follows suit with tokenizing the important things in their lives as digital assets.
Branding and brand is very imperative like you've actually mentioned. I definitely feel that it's imperative businesses understand that branding helps to create a long lasting image in the mind of a final consumer. I enjoyed reading through. I'm a PR person and this is one of the biggest factors to consider when building a business
I tell people this a lot. I will not go to a salon names poor style salon when there is another named classy salon. Branding is the footprint you leave in your customers heart.