Branding is Bogus

How can any self-respecting marketing person write "Branding is Bogus"?

Branding has been written about in many major, respected business journals such as INC, SALES & MARKETING MANAGEMENT, FORBES as the marketing strategy of the new millennium. The writers and editors of these fine publications aren’t at fault. They’re just reporting what has been fed them by new-age marketing and promotion gurus who were out touting branding as the latest Marketing Magic in a Black Box.

And these branding gurus are just doing their best go dress up a difficult-to-sell business process. Most owners and executives are so busy with the day-to-day problems of running a company, they’re looking for easy answers to difficult problems.

So, increasing sales and profits via the magical branding process does have its appeal.

But, a brand is more than merely gaining name recognition. While name recognition is good, a brand it does not make. It is relatively easy to gain name recognition through massive spending on advertising, promotions and public relations strategies and tactics. The business landscape is littered with dead "dot.coms" who spend investor’s dollars on ad campaigns to sell services the public apparently didn’t want.

A brand does not guarantee unconditional business success. For example: What name comes first to your mind when you think of the word, "coffee"? Chock-Full-O-Nuts? Folgers? Maxwell House? These coffee producers have spent millions of dollars over the past decades to establish their brands. Yet, most people think of Starbucks when they think of coffee!

Sure, the other brands are on the grocers' shelves, but Starbucks has grabbed people’s attention because of their unique distribution strategy. While not making a value judgment regarding having a Starbucks store on almost every city’s street in America -- they certainly have done a good job of busting the dominance of traditional coffee producers.

"Branding" your company or products will not overcome internal problems of insufficient capital, poor financial controls, unfocused workers or other labor problems; or external difficulties such as a downturn in the economy, changes in import/export laws or energy prices or availability.

Truth of the matter

Branding is not a process.

A brand is established as the result of a traditional marketing process.

A brand is like a mark of trade; an image of ownership of certain qualities of a product or service your customer desires, wants or needs. A brand is created when one plans for marketing success, and follows that plan. How to you plan for success? Check out MARKETING’S GREATEST SECRET here at this site.

In some ways, a brand does come magically into being.

A brand appears when an organization:

1. Understands the wants, needs and desires of consumers;
2. Creates niche products or services which fulfill those needs;
3. Persuasively informs target consumers of how their offerings fulfill their wants, needs and desires;
4. Creates distribution channels to make it easy for customers to fulfill their wants, needs and desires with those offerings;
5. Establishes a simple, effective feedback system to ensure their offerings continue to match customer’s wants, needs, and desires;
6. Consistently makes a practice of this process, and does so on a profitable basis.

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