brand management Articles
Congruent Brand & Culture
With globalisation, Brands are so much more than just products and logos. They’re channels of self expression which transcend the label of ‘commodity’. Avenues through which most people express their personalities, attitudes, likes, dislikes and association to certain groups and communities. Brand is strategic, a long term imperative requiring Leadership to carefully consider and manage it across the entire organisation. This usually takes a collaborative effort involving both the HR, and Marketing Departments, which is best achieved through forming a Brand Steering Committee which can strategically understand the whole of business requirements.
Minimising Brand Risk
Brand equity moderates the impact of marketing initiatives upon consumer actions and represents one of many factors contributing to overall Brand Value. Most people relate to the benefits of a relatively strong brand (greater loyalty, premium pricing of products/services, ability to attract and retain the best talent, higher stock price etc) yet the reality is that this information hasn’t hit home to motivate and generate similar interest in the safeguarding of the Brand.
Brand equity represents what a Brand means to the consumer – loss of that brand equity makes organisations vulnerable. This can be brought on by activities such as focusing the brand into too many product areas; changing the name / face of a brand or its highly recognised visual brand elements; and especially through loss of consumer trust in services or products offered.
Brand Management – too important to be left only to the marketing department!
It is becoming common knowledge that strong, well leveraged brands add significant value to an organisation and produce higher returns for shareholders. Given this, the question begs, how much focus and what resources are organisations throwing at brand management and is it being taken as seriously as other business practises?
If your brand directly impacts on your shareholder value, then one could argue that branding and brand management are in fact a CEO responsibility. Why is it then that the responsibility of ‘brand’ so often lies within the discipline of ‘marketing’, who are considered the primary custodians? Click Here To Read More