Brands Pull & Marketing Push

I like the way this article is written about branding and marketing. People in business needs to understand this.

Branding is what your persona says about your company. It maybe the look and feel of your product and your company or it could be the performance of your product. It also could be your visual, your story, your voice, and the impression people get when they experience your company. Why I say experience, is because the way your employees treat your customers reflects your brand. How your employees dress and perform also reflects your brand. How do each sales person greet your every customer?

And in each case, as you built and extend your brand, your brand can bring your company to different levels. Or bring it to a different category, which is relative to your target audience.

For example, when you are creating a brand extension, you already have a basic successful business towards a younger, mid-range target audience and your want more market share, hence, you extend your brand towards a higher income bracket group. You may still keep your existing brand and do another look and feel under the "same umbrella" towards a higher income market.

The idea of PULL... yes brand pulls your customers towards you. They are attracted to the product, the company, the service, the performance, or the price. When the buying experience is good, your customers will be brand loyal to your company and the products/services. Some will be your advocate or be compelled to write about you and some will recommend more business to you. And those are the results of having a good brand with good experiences.

Some examples of tangible brand identity are your website, your logo, your stationery, marketing collaterals, your location/interior, your store front, your employees, your business card, your products. Intangible branding is the persona of your company, it is also the voice, or how the content is repeated in a consistent manner, how and what your employees are talking about you, it is the culture, in some cases, it is the smell...

A great example is Singapore Airlines when you approach the counter, there is a certain scent and when you enter and leave the plane. The same scented fragrance lingers in the air that reminds you of the Singapore Airlines. No airline has that detailed branded touch.

Marketing, however, is indeed a PUSH, pushing your products and services out to the marketplace to get more customers to notice your company and products. There are many different ways to market your product and you have to consider what resources you have within the budget to manage the promotions. There is no one-way method of doing marketing.

The promotions involve social media marketing, trade shows, email marketing, campaigns, brochures/mailers, cross-sells, e-commerce sites, landing pages, white papers, magazines, radio ads, TV commercials, billboard ads and more.

Make sure you have a good brand to start with and then those will be the tools for you to market your company aggressively. The more targeted people know about who you are, the more return of investments there will be. Do not waste time on people who does not need your product. It is all about the right target and focus.

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