What are the benefits of branding?
Well, Habragospod, let's talk about branding? Last time I was reproached that there are a lot of beeches, but there are no pictures. I meet the wishes of the readers. Today's article is illustrated by seals. The text is also slightly animated.
The key question from which the discussion of any cooperation begins: what benefit will we get from this? This issue is particularly acute with regard to marketing services and specifically branding. In this article, I will set out my vision of how you can get a direct benefit from the right branding. This article is addressed to entrepreneurs, business development directors, producers and investors.
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The more business customers have, the greater the profit. But in a competitive market, customers are never enough. Competitors are taking customers away from each other. As a rule, this happens because customers do not see the difference between the products - the products do not have individuality. Proper branding reveals the key needs of the audience and suggests how to translate them into the product and its image. The product with the help of branding can move to a qualitatively new level and earn the loyalty of the audience.
Let's take a travel startup as an example. They appeared lately a great many. In my opinion, they are not very different from each other. There is no clear leader among them. Moreover, the boom of travel services does not subside and every year more and more new players appear in this rather limited market.
At stake is a fat, solvent audience that can be monetized far and wide. However, now this audience is smeared with a thin layer on all these services, like butter on a sandwich. At the same time, no one deliberately smeared this piece of butter, it spread itself. The audience is in constant diffusion. The same person can today use momondo, tomorrow ozon travel, the day after tomorrow agent.ru. Such a person, for example, is me.
We are offered the same product a bit in different packaging. The interface and design of the market players take turns from each other. The only parameter on which there is a competition - the price. Who will show cheaper tickets today, that I love. A discounter-leader, for obvious reasons, in this market can not appear.
If any player could raise the product to a qualitatively new level, then a magnetic field would have arisen and free atoms, buyers, would begin to purposefully strive for this service. The benefits of such a qualitative leap are obvious. But how to implement it? Obviously, with the help of two canisters of nitroglycerin, a plastic bottle and Voodoo magic ...
Just kidding, of course - suddenly you are nodding. And here the most interesting begins. Since the article about branding means that in this place I have to solemnly announce that branding can help the business in moving to a better product. Solemnly announce - this is true.
But let's first remember what quality is. This is a relative property of the product. The same product can be for someone quality, but for someone not. The audience has a certain ideal vision of the product, which includes, among other things, the price. If the product meets this ideal vision, then it is quality for this audience.
It turns out that in order to create a quality product, it is necessary to get as close as possible to the ideal of the audience, which, by the way, is constantly changing. Remember how perfect your mobile phone was 10 years ago? And 5 years ago? And now? Approximately the same thing happens with travel services and in general with any dynamically developing product category.
And here a business that thinks not only about what other interface element to steal from a neighbor can get the opportunity for that very leap. Branding here acts as a driver. You just have to take a representative sample and with the help of Colt and a kind word, find out how she imagines the product for which she will throw all competitors to hell and love only you.
No, you can, of course, and without the Colt (do not sleep, hold on, soon the end). But you need to know the kind words, thanks to which the audience will open up and lay out everything honestly, frankly and voluntarily.
As a result, we will have the vision of the perfect product. And competitors, respectively, will not have such a vision. And even if it is, then it is necessary to decipher it, formalize it, translate it into technical tasks and correctly implement it in the product itself and in its image. It is difficult, but I am ready to tell how it is done. Contrary to stereotype, branding is not the highest mathematics. All the basic steps of proper branding are available to understand and implement in the "home" on their own. Without the participation of brand magicians, marketing gurus and PR fortunetellers.
What a business without branding does (the same travel services) is a guess and experiment. And let's stroke it like this, but let's scratch it here. This is also a path of development, but long and non-systemic. What happens at this time with the appearance of the product (design) cannot be described at all. He, the design, responds to these experiments least of all. It turns out that the product can and reaches some new quality, but outwardly it is not reflected in any way.
Branding in one fell swoop solves the problem of maximal approach of the product and its image to the needs of the audience. Branding determines what an ideal product should be and how it should look. But most importantly, these recommendations are not based on conjectures, but on the opinions of clients - the very people on whom the company's profit depends.
Without branding, you share customers with competitors. With branding, you take away all your customers.
The key question from which the discussion of any cooperation begins: what benefit will we get from this? This issue is particularly acute with regard to marketing services and specifically branding. In this article, I will set out my vision of how you can get a direct benefit from the right branding. This article is addressed to entrepreneurs, business development directors, producers and investors.
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If to explain the essence of the benefits of branding briefly
The more business customers have, the greater the profit. But in a competitive market, customers are never enough. Competitors are taking customers away from each other. As a rule, this happens because customers do not see the difference between the products - the products do not have individuality. Proper branding reveals the key needs of the audience and suggests how to translate them into the product and its image. The product with the help of branding can move to a qualitatively new level and earn the loyalty of the audience.
And now the details
The most important concept in marketing is the concept of a brand. If you are not a brand, you do not exist. Who are you then? You are a regular product.
© Philip Kotler
Let's take a travel startup as an example. They appeared lately a great many. In my opinion, they are not very different from each other. There is no clear leader among them. Moreover, the boom of travel services does not subside and every year more and more new players appear in this rather limited market.
At stake is a fat, solvent audience that can be monetized far and wide. However, now this audience is smeared with a thin layer on all these services, like butter on a sandwich. At the same time, no one deliberately smeared this piece of butter, it spread itself. The audience is in constant diffusion. The same person can today use momondo, tomorrow ozon travel, the day after tomorrow agent.ru. Such a person, for example, is me.
We are offered the same product a bit in different packaging. The interface and design of the market players take turns from each other. The only parameter on which there is a competition - the price. Who will show cheaper tickets today, that I love. A discounter-leader, for obvious reasons, in this market can not appear.
The brand is valued highly for one reason only. It dominates the category.
© Al and Laura Rice "The Origin of Brands, or Natural Selection in the Business World"
If any player could raise the product to a qualitatively new level, then a magnetic field would have arisen and free atoms, buyers, would begin to purposefully strive for this service. The benefits of such a qualitative leap are obvious. But how to implement it? Obviously, with the help of two canisters of nitroglycerin, a plastic bottle and Voodoo magic ...
Just kidding, of course - suddenly you are nodding. And here the most interesting begins. Since the article about branding means that in this place I have to solemnly announce that branding can help the business in moving to a better product. Solemnly announce - this is true.
But let's first remember what quality is. This is a relative property of the product. The same product can be for someone quality, but for someone not. The audience has a certain ideal vision of the product, which includes, among other things, the price. If the product meets this ideal vision, then it is quality for this audience.
There is no objective reality. There are no better products. There are no facts. The only thing that exists in the world of marketing is perception in the minds of consumers or potential customers. Perception is the reality. Everything else is an illusion.
© Jack Trout "Big Problems of Big Brands"
It turns out that in order to create a quality product, it is necessary to get as close as possible to the ideal of the audience, which, by the way, is constantly changing. Remember how perfect your mobile phone was 10 years ago? And 5 years ago? And now? Approximately the same thing happens with travel services and in general with any dynamically developing product category.
And here a business that thinks not only about what other interface element to steal from a neighbor can get the opportunity for that very leap. Branding here acts as a driver. You just have to take a representative sample and with the help of Colt and a kind word, find out how she imagines the product for which she will throw all competitors to hell and love only you.
Why do some prefer Jack Daniels, while others prefer Old Crow or Taylor. Maybe people can taste whiskey? Do not make me laugh. The essence of the matter is that each brand has its own appearance, and what one likes is not suitable for others. People choose not the whiskey itself, but its image.
© David Ogilvy, "The Secrets of the Advertising Court"
No, you can, of course, and without the Colt (do not sleep, hold on, soon the end). But you need to know the kind words, thanks to which the audience will open up and lay out everything honestly, frankly and voluntarily.
As a result, we will have the vision of the perfect product. And competitors, respectively, will not have such a vision. And even if it is, then it is necessary to decipher it, formalize it, translate it into technical tasks and correctly implement it in the product itself and in its image. It is difficult, but I am ready to tell how it is done. Contrary to stereotype, branding is not the highest mathematics. All the basic steps of proper branding are available to understand and implement in the "home" on their own. Without the participation of brand magicians, marketing gurus and PR fortunetellers.
Summary
I caught myself thinking that branding is not how you present yourself, but what you do. Because almost every product writes that it is the most convenient, fast, high-quality, but the units correspond to their description. Therefore, the characteristics that we derive in the course of branding will become a guideline in the work on the project.
© Revelation of a familiar startup who discovered the right branding
What a business without branding does (the same travel services) is a guess and experiment. And let's stroke it like this, but let's scratch it here. This is also a path of development, but long and non-systemic. What happens at this time with the appearance of the product (design) cannot be described at all. He, the design, responds to these experiments least of all. It turns out that the product can and reaches some new quality, but outwardly it is not reflected in any way.
Branding in one fell swoop solves the problem of maximal approach of the product and its image to the needs of the audience. Branding determines what an ideal product should be and how it should look. But most importantly, these recommendations are not based on conjectures, but on the opinions of clients - the very people on whom the company's profit depends.
Without branding, you share customers with competitors. With branding, you take away all your customers.
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/158419/
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