A Company Brand and the Loyalty Factor

What exactly is a brand? It’s a question that has confounded the academics for decades and eluded the most erudite of scholars. So, coming from the trenches of the real world of branding, we’ve defined the term and given it a comprehensive meaning. Something that relates a little more to the real world business owners that we are.

A brand is the greater sum of its parts. It is always more than just the nuts and bolts, the pieces; great brands are always the result of the whole equaling more than the sum of its parts. Basically, a brand consists of eight basic building blocks:

1. The Company Name
2. The Logo (brand icon) – Is your logo simple and memorable? Think about logos like Amazon, FedEx, and Coca-Cola; world recognized professional brands that are simple and easy to read.
3. The Brand’s Colors – The color of psychology is REAL. We will delve more into this during next week’s blog.
4. The Slogan and Brand Messaging – Are you getting your vision across to your customers?
5. The Sound of the Brand – Are you resonating with the customers you want to resonate with?
6. The Overall Look and Feel = The Brand’s Position – How do you compare to your competition?
7. Packaging the Brand – You know the saying… Don’t judge a book by its’ cover. Well, that’s simply not gunna happen, you’re going to be judged, so make sure your packaging and branding is clear, concise, and professional.
8. The Brand Experience – Are your customers getting the best experience with your brand?

Branding is about making me, the consumer or buyer, more hip, more in the “know,” more cool than anybody else. We are a generation and a nation wanting to be special. We want to be richer, more beautiful, better dressed and more effortlessly gorgeous than any other generation that we know.

We want everything to mean more. We want everything to have meaning. That’s why we flock to the reality shows. We crave authenticity in this age of fabrication and falsehood. We “just want to be real.”

We want to be able to trust what we buy and whom we buy from. That’s why Coke is still the number one brand in the world. The more we know about a brand, the more we trust it. The more we trust it, the more we buy it and continue to experience it. The more we experience it, the more loyal we become.

Loyalty is the currency that cannot be traded for dollars. What is your brand saying about you? Let us know what you think in the comments!