What are the benefits of branding?
Well, habragospoda, let's talk about branding? Last time I was reproached that there are a lot of beeches, but there are no pictures. I am going to meet the wishes of readers. Today's article is illustrated by cats. The text is also slightly animated.
The key question that begins the discussion of any cooperation: what will be the benefit to us from this? This issue is especially acute in relation to marketing services and specifically branding. In this article, I will outline my vision of how you can directly benefit from the right branding. This article is addressed to entrepreneurs, business development directors, producers and investors.
The more customers the business has, the greater the profit. But there are never many customers in a competitive market. Competitors take 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 identifies the key needs of the audience and tells how to translate them into the product and its image. A product with the help of branding can go to a whole new level and earn audience loyalty.
Let's take a travel startup as an example. There have been a great many of them lately. In my opinion, they are not very different from each other. A clear leader among them is not observed. 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 up and down. However, now this audience is smeared with a thin layer of all these services, like butter for a sandwich. At the same time, nobody deliberately smeared this piece of oil, it spread itself. The audience is in constant diffusion. The same person can use momondo today, tomorrow ozon travel, the day after tomorrow agent.ru. Such a person, for example, I am.
We are offered the same product in slightly different packaging. Market players in turn tear apart the interface and design from each other. The only parameter by which there is competition is price. Who today will show cheaper tickets, that I love. And the discounter leader, for obvious reasons, cannot appear on this market.
If a player could raise the product to a qualitatively new level, then a magnetic field would arise and free buyer atoms would purposefully strive for this service. The benefits of such a quality spurt are obvious. But how to implement it? Obviously, with the help of two cans of nitroglycerin, a plastic bottle and the magic of Voodoo ...
Just kidding, of course - suddenly you are biting your nose. And then the fun begins. Since the article is about branding, it means that in this place I should solemnly announce that branding can help businesses in the transition to a better product. Solemnly declare - it really is.
But let's first remember what quality is. This is a relative property of the product. The same product may be of high quality for some, but not for some. The audience has a certain ideal vision of the product, which includes, among other things, price. If the product meets this ideal vision, then it is quality for this audience.
It turns out that in order to create a high-quality product, you need to get as close as possible to the ideal of the audience, which, by the way, is constantly changing. Remember what the perfect mobile phone was for you 10 years ago? And 5 years ago? And now? Roughly 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 which interface element to steal from a neighbor can get an opportunity for that breakthrough. Branding here acts as a driver. You just need to take a representative sample and, using colt and a kind word, find out how she imagines the product, for the sake of which he will beat the hell out of all competitors and will love only you.
No, you can, of course, and without Colt (we do not sleep, hold on, soon the end). But you need to know kind words, thanks to which the audience will open up and post everything honestly, openly and voluntarily.
As a result, we will have a vision of the perfect product. And competitors, accordingly, will not have such a vision. And even if it does, then we still need to decipher it, formalize it, translate it into technical specifications and competently embody it in the product itself and in its image. It’s difficult, but I’m ready to tell you how to do it. Contrary to stereotyping, branding is not the highest mathematics. All the main stages of proper branding are available for understanding and implementation in the "home" on their own. Without the participation of brand magicians, marketing gurus and PR fortunetellers.
What a non-branding business does (the same travel services) is speculation and experimentation. Let’s stroke it like that, and let’s scratch it here. This is also a development path, but a long and unsystematic one. What happens at this time with the appearance of the product (design) cannot be described at all. He, the design, responds to these experiments the least. It turns out that the product can and achieves some new quality, but outwardly this is not reflected in any way.
Branding in one fell swoop solves the problem of bringing the product and its image closer 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 guesswork, but on the opinion of customers - those very people on whom the company's profit depends.
Without branding, you share customers with competitors. With branding, you take all the customers to yourself.
The key question that begins the discussion of any cooperation: what will be the benefit to us from this? This issue is especially acute in relation to marketing services and specifically branding. In this article, I will outline my vision of how you can directly benefit from the right branding. This article is addressed to entrepreneurs, business development directors, producers and investors.
Briefly explaining the benefits of branding
The more customers the business has, the greater the profit. But there are never many customers in a competitive market. Competitors take 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 identifies the key needs of the audience and tells how to translate them into the product and its image. A product with the help of branding can go to a whole new level and earn audience loyalty.
And now the details
The most important concept in marketing is the concept of brand. If you are not a brand, you do not exist. Who are you then? You are an ordinary commodity.
© Philip Kotler
Let's take a travel startup as an example. There have been a great many of them lately. In my opinion, they are not very different from each other. A clear leader among them is not observed. 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 up and down. However, now this audience is smeared with a thin layer of all these services, like butter for a sandwich. At the same time, nobody deliberately smeared this piece of oil, it spread itself. The audience is in constant diffusion. The same person can use momondo today, tomorrow ozon travel, the day after tomorrow agent.ru. Such a person, for example, I am.
We are offered the same product in slightly different packaging. Market players in turn tear apart the interface and design from each other. The only parameter by which there is competition is price. Who today will show cheaper tickets, that I love. And the discounter leader, for obvious reasons, cannot appear on this market.
The brand is highly regarded for one single reason. He dominates the category.
© Al and Laura Rice “The Origin of Brands, or Natural Selection in the Business World”
If a player could raise the product to a qualitatively new level, then a magnetic field would arise and free buyer atoms would purposefully strive for this service. The benefits of such a quality spurt are obvious. But how to implement it? Obviously, with the help of two cans of nitroglycerin, a plastic bottle and the magic of Voodoo ...
Just kidding, of course - suddenly you are biting your nose. And then the fun begins. Since the article is about branding, it means that in this place I should solemnly announce that branding can help businesses in the transition to a better product. Solemnly declare - it really is.
But let's first remember what quality is. This is a relative property of the product. The same product may be of high quality for some, but not for some. The audience has a certain ideal vision of the product, which includes, among other things, 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 perceptions in the minds of consumers or potential customers. Perception is the reality. Everything else is an illusion.
© Jack Trout “Big Challenges for Big Brands”
It turns out that in order to create a high-quality product, you need to get as close as possible to the ideal of the audience, which, by the way, is constantly changing. Remember what the perfect mobile phone was for you 10 years ago? And 5 years ago? And now? Roughly 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 which interface element to steal from a neighbor can get an opportunity for that breakthrough. Branding here acts as a driver. You just need to take a representative sample and, using colt and a kind word, find out how she imagines the product, for the sake of which he will beat the hell out of all competitors and will love only you.
Why do some prefer Jack Daniels, while others prefer Old Krau or Taylor. Maybe people discern whiskey for taste? Do not make me laugh. The essence of the matter is that each brand has its own image, and what one likes is not suitable for others. People do not choose whiskey itself, but its image.
© David Ogilvy “Secrets of the Advertising Yard”
No, you can, of course, and without Colt (we do not sleep, hold on, soon the end). But you need to know kind words, thanks to which the audience will open up and post everything honestly, openly and voluntarily.
As a result, we will have a vision of the perfect product. And competitors, accordingly, will not have such a vision. And even if it does, then we still need to decipher it, formalize it, translate it into technical specifications and competently embody it in the product itself and in its image. It’s difficult, but I’m ready to tell you how to do it. Contrary to stereotyping, branding is not the highest mathematics. All the main stages of proper branding are available for understanding and implementation 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 units correspond to their description. Therefore, the characteristics that we will 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 non-branding business does (the same travel services) is speculation and experimentation. Let’s stroke it like that, and let’s scratch it here. This is also a development path, but a long and unsystematic one. What happens at this time with the appearance of the product (design) cannot be described at all. He, the design, responds to these experiments the least. It turns out that the product can and achieves some new quality, but outwardly this is not reflected in any way.
Branding in one fell swoop solves the problem of bringing the product and its image closer 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 guesswork, but on the opinion of customers - those very people on whom the company's profit depends.
Without branding, you share customers with competitors. With branding, you take all the customers to yourself.