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WHAT A BRAND IS
A brand is the sum of the good, the bad, the ugly, and the off-strategy. It is defined as your best product/service as well as your worst. It is defined by award-winning advertising as well as by the god-awful ads that somehow slipped through the cracks. It is defined by the accomplishments of your best employee–as well as the mishaps of the worst hire that you ever made. It is defined by your receptionist, the music your customers are subjected to while on hold, and even the smell of your office/store. For every grand and finely worded public statement by your leader to the idle chatter in the breakroom to the social world of Facebook and Twitter. Brands are sponges for content, images, and fleeting feelings. They become psychological concepts held in the hands of the public, where they may stay forever. As such you can’t entirely control a brand. At best you can only guide and influence.
Branding Signals
The actual expressions of a brand that generate feelings and opinions about it and create the experience of the brand.
- The name of the brand, colors, taglines, music, and all marketing communications
- Package design, product functionality, and product design
- Retail environments, online experiences, websites, customer care
- The behavior of the people who work for the brand
- The service a brand provides is a signal
- Anything that makes you feel something about a brand
Brand vs Branding
A brand is what your product or service stands for in people’s minds; it might be an image or, perhaps, a feeling.
Branding is the process of executing and managing the things that make people feel the way they do about your brand.
Business Strategy vs Brand Strategy
BUSINESS STRATEGY: The plan you have to sell a product or service. How your company makes money.
BRAND STRATEGY: The plan you have to use your brand idea to deliver on your business strategy. A brand strategy necessitates understanding what branding signals will best reinforce your brand idea.
WHAT A BRAND ISN’T
LOGO DESIGN VS. BRAND EXPERIENCE
At Digital Marketing Sapiens, we realize that your brand is only as strong as your customer perceives it. So we don’t just design logos. We create #winning brand experiences on the regular. If you think all you need is a logo or you have an idea and you just need someone to execute it, then we’ll give you some sound business advice. Hire a freelancer and become you’re very own art director for what will probably be the most important business decision you make. Ever. Until you decide to hire us for the full monty in a few years. (That’s the full brand monty, get your mind out of the gutter)
On the other hand, if you realize that a logo is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to your brand identity, and that there are many other things that will ultimately shape the success of your brand, then we already like the way you think. Even if we just put that idea in your head. It shows that you are already becoming an expert in getting the most out of your brand by thinking about having Digital Marketing Sapiens engineer an engaging experience. That’s right, the process starts way before any concepts are designed and ideas come to fruition. So if you have that thought in your head and you’re wondering what Digital Marketing Sapiens can do for your brand…
HUMANS AREN’T PRACTICAL
If we were practical, we wouldn’t buy Ferraris, $5 cups of coffee, or $3k purses. Why do we buy (or at least want to buy) those things? Simple. Emotion (and then we back our decision with rationale). Or if you believe that emotion is just for girls (or the weak), then call it instinct, intuition, or “gut feeling”…we’re talking about the same thing in this instance.
Human psychology is a fascinating science. That’s why Digital Marketing Sapiens is constantly studying the latest in neuromarketing. Customers make decisions based on a large number of factors and although it is impossible to influence them all, we try to strike a balance between appealing to BOTH the emotional and rational sides of your target audience’s brain.
EXPERIENTIAL BRANDING
A powerful brand is one that can be more than just seen—it can also be smelled, tasted, touched and heard and is expressed at every touch point. An experiential brand creates a much deeper level of engagement because it creates a complete experience that envelopes its audience.
Smell
Smell is arguably the strongest of senses. There are more connections between the olfactory region of the brain to the place where emotional memories are processed than any of the other senses we have. 75% of our emotions are generated by smell (women are more sensitive to smells than men).
Call Us @ 210-582-5842 for your graphic design and branding needs in San Antonio.
