Elements of Branding. BS 7
Elements of Branding. BS 7
Elements of Branding. BS 7
ELEMENTS OF BRANDING
SUBMITTED BY
SUBMITTED TO
SIR SABAHAT ALI KHAN
DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE
UNIVERSITY OF KARACHI
BRAND
The word “brand” isn’t always well understood. Some people use the term
interchangeably with “company” as a kind of shorthand term. A “brand” is actually
something very specific. It is, in essence, a promise to the buyer about the kind of product
or experience they are purchasing, and how they will feel when they use it. Coca-Cola is a
well-known brand name. Coke’s brand tells you what to expect from the experience of
drinking a Coke and differentiates it from similar products. The phrase “have a Coke and a
smile” defines the Coke brand in the minds of many consumers as an experience that will
make them happy.
ELEMENTS OF BRANDING
1. TARGET AUDIENCE
In B2C, the target audience or market for your brand is the person who is most likely to
buy your product. In B2B, your target audience is still the most likely buyer for your
product or service, but because the nature of the purchasing process is more complex in
B2B, you’ll need to be looking not just at which companies are likely to buy from you, but
at who within those companies is going to make those decisions.
2. BRAND PROMISE
The brand promise is the message that speaks to your target audience. It tells them what to expect
from purchasing your product.
3. BRAND PERCEPTION
You’ll want to take a look at what the perception of your brand has been in the past, what
it is now, and what you want it to be in the future. One way to do this is to survey your
current customers to find out what they think of your brand. Do your target customers
know your brand? What do they think of yo u? What do you want them to think
of you? Understanding how your brand is perceived is especially important if you are
looking to change your business strategy: maybe you’re looking to enter new markets, or
you’ve been known as the low price provider in the past, and you are looking to move up
market.
4. BRAND VALUES
Clearly define what guides your company’s decision -making. These are the core values
that your brand seeks to embody.
5. BRAND VOICE
How does your brand "speak?" What is its personality? Is i t buttoned down and serious, or more
playful and fun? The answer to these questions will depend the audience you are trying to engage,
and there should be a fit between your audience and the voice you use to speak to them.
6. BRAND POSITIONING
Brand positioning is defined as the position that a brand holds (or wants to hold) in the
mind of the customer. It can usually be boiled down into a one or two sentence
“positioning statement” that defines the target audience, who the brand competes against,
the benefits of using it, and a statement of proof for the brand promise. It tells you what
the brand’s position in the market is relative to its competitors, and what sets it apart from
the rest.
6. BRAND EXPERIENCE
Brand experience is a combination of everything that a customer goes through while purchasing and
using that brand. For example how does one feel while ordering food and eating at KFC? How does
the staff behave and how fast do they deliver and of course how did the food taste? Also, since it has
many outlets all over the world, all of them are expected to maintain uniform standards of
experience.
7. BRAND DIFFERENTIATION
Differentiation, as the word suggests is how a brand stands out in the crowd. For instance Dell
Computers lets people choose their components and assemble their own system, thus making it
different from others who just sell readymade machines at the shop with no scope for customization.
8. BRAND COMMUNICATION
Brand communication is the message it delivers through various sources like adverts, brochures,
punch lines and hoardings. If the brand has to grow, it must be able to clearly communicate its core
benefits to the customers.
9. BRAND GAP
Brand gap is the difference between what a brand promises to deliver in its communications and
what it actually does. For its own sake, the gap should not be very high. A successful brand must be
able to deliver what it promises. No amount of advertising or content marketing efforts can save a
bad product.
Brand extension is basically the idea of going beyond ones origins and exploring newer fields. For
example Google started as a search engine. But now it provides many other services including
emails and mobile operating systems. This is how it has extended the brand but it must be done in a
manner so that the existing operations complement the newer initiatives. Google gained market
intelligence through its search operations and this is what enabled it to develop other services.