Branding.

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4 Part I Branding. The symbol as argument In this part of the report we outline the development of the branding phenomenon from marketing to corporate branding - a holistic management and communication discipline where ethical responsibility has supplemented the company's traditional aesthetic and emotional self-reflection. We provide a comprehensive view of branding today and show how it is possible to consider the future through scenarios based on central uncertainties
5 From market to company. From company towards the world Branding is today's buzzword in organisations and companies. Most of us know intuitively what the concept covers - even though marketing and advertisement agencies collectively try to blur the image with each their own patented and unique expression of the concept. Brand Positioning programme, Brand Building System, Corporate Religion, you name it. Paradoxically for a field that otherwise makes its living from creating clarity and visibility, but also a sign that branding has become established everywhere. Even companies and organisations that normally live well and hidden have become aware of the necessity of communicating and acting consistently in an information-dense world. In its origin, branding is a marketing tool, and the goal as such is to create a preference for one product compared to other products in the same category. To create immaterial added value and hence cancel an otherwise generic product or performance situation where the only alternative is competing on price. Price competition can be a good thing, but generally speaking it is only fun for the one that in fact is cheapest. When speaking of branding, it isn't uncommon to draw parallels all the way back to how the Vikings and potters branded their swords and jars. The goal here was to distinguish the products from each other so that a sword wasn't just a sword, but a very special one (differentiation). Branding is often also compared to the cattle raisers' red-hot branding of cows, where the object was to visually mark ownership of a herd in relation to other cattle raisers (property rights). Another obvious analogy must be the branding of human beings, which several Western nations have practised through various historic periods. Today, of course, branding isn't of the flesh, but of the mind: the influence over consumer behaviour that can be realised at the moment of purchase or over an extended period. Thus, in marketing circles people speak of owning the relation to the consumers and hence owning the market, just as people through storytelling as a communication tool seek to construct an image of reality through stories. A GENERIC PRODUCT is a product that is a copy of or interchangeable with another product. E.g., pharmaceuticals with the same active ingredients can mutually replace each other. The idea is that a product contains a sum of technical and physical traits that serve to fulfil a function with a specific quality and value to the customer. Electricity should come out of our outlets and make our lamps shine, mineral water should slake our thirsts, etc. The brand as interface Working with brand name goods originated with the transition to the 20th century. Up to then, most daily shipping took place at the local grocery store. Face to face, the grocer guaranteed the quality of the anonymous goods. But with the advent of the logo and the brand name, this 'significant meeting' was replaced by a constructed interface between the customer and the anonymous product. We began trusting in Uncle Ben and Jack Daniel's. With an accelerated pace from the 1950s to today, product branding has been developed to its utmost. From trust to demand, from demand to dream and objects of desire. Several theoreticians e.g. describe how the great producers of brand name goods in the 1980s realised that the production of physical products and specific services simply was a subordinate part of their companies, while other companies founded at this time already from their inception freed themselves from the physical realm and solely sold shows and dreams. In both cases we experience that the product at times is reduced to an emblem that follows this dream and that philosophy, which the brand represents when we buy it. Just do it! The real thing! Connecting People! Signs to navigate by in a fragmented and individualised world where pre-formulated vigour, a claim of originality, and a dream of togetherness can sell shoes, soft drinks and mobile phones. "Some of the logic, terminology and value perception that has been operative for branded goods, can through corporate branding be transferred to the company itself. The company itself becomes a brand." Majken Schultz & Mogens Holten Larsen in "Den udtryksfulde virksomhed"
Page 2 and 3: Contents: Part I: Branding. The sym
Page 6 and 7: 6 The brand as corporate metaphor T
Page 8 and 9: 8 Two central uncertainties for bra
Page 10 and 11: 10 and adventure. Services that ver
Page 12: 12 The precise future to come may n
Page 15 and 16: 15 1. Create and Brand Yourself Lif
Page 17 and 18: 17 ability of the individual and on
Page 19 and 20: 19 personal and the unique. All thi
Page 21 and 22: 21 extended family. However, we are
Page 23 and 24: 23 designer'. Trend spotting is of
Page 25 and 26: 25 moving from being a citizen to b
Page 27 and 28: 27 sure time is corroding. Values a
Page 29 and 30: 29 4. The Logic of Great Solutions
Page 31 and 32: 31 tools, it has become possible to
Page 33 and 34: 33 Personal branding on the wane Th
Page 35 and 36: 35 H. Lundbeck A/S (2003) Lundbeck

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