The Origins of Branding

"You've made a name for yourself" - surely, you've heard this phrase more than once. The concept of building a brand is not new at all. However, today, more than ever, it is gaining significance and value. This is because, for each of us, a brand is the simplest way to make a purchasing decision.

You probably feel that the amount of information reaching us every day is enormous and continues to grow. According to Forbes, the average person is exposed to 5,000 marketing messages every day. This increases the complexity of decision-making, which is not helped by our constant lack of time. Additionally, Microsoft's research has shown that the average adult's attention span has decreased from 12 seconds in 2000 to just 8 seconds in recent years, highlighting the challenges in attracting and maintaining consumer attention. As a result, more and more decisions are made emotionally. And the key emotion in purchasing decisions is trust. No wonder, as it is the foundation of relationships and business.

Imagine a simple, private situation. Work, meetings, emails. At the end of the day, you're tired, and you remember that you need to buy a gift for your mother. You decide on cosmetics, nothing unusual. It should go smoothly because you know what scents she likes. You go to the perfumery and stand in an aisle as long as the tension building in Tarantino films. What do you buy? A bottle from the brand you saw on TV, the internet, or heard about in a conversation. You know this brand, you trust it. You choose its product over something new and potentially attractive but unknown. Why? Because you trust this brand, you believe you know what to expect from it. Why risk it with a new, unknown brand?

Due to such mechanisms, trust has become a central element of marketing. It is a currency of enormous value. You share it when you recommend someone, and you receive it when someone recommends you. It is also an investment because you build trust progressively, piece by piece, every day. And here is where brands come in. They gather trust, maintain it, and allow you to capitalize on that trust. All this is done by building awareness and increasing customer loyalty.

A strong brand leads to purchases even without knowing the product. That's how strong brands work—people line up for them.

Conclusion: The need for trust is the key reason we create brands - "We do branding."

What Branding Is Not

During a meeting with the management team, you might hear:

"To do good marketing, we need to have branding."

"Do we have a budget? Yes? Okay, let's make a logo, a website, and some basic materials," someone from the management responds.

I bet you've heard something similar or even said something like this yourself. Don’t worry, you're not alone. This happens because there is a lot of misinformation about branding that reaches us and, unfortunately, gets perpetuated by us. So, let's start with what branding is not.

Branding is not a logo (often misnamed, as "logo" is short for "logotype," but that's a topic for another article). A logo is very useful, even necessary, but it is not the brand itself—it is its symbol, a graphic shorthand.

Branding is not visual identity or brand identity. These elements are how your brand looks and communicates as a whole.

Branding is not a website or any of your materials. All these elements are touchpoints with the brand. Each one serves its specific communication role. They allow people to see and interact with your brand.

Branding is also not your product or service, although they are very important parts of the brand.

What Is Branding for a Business Owner or Manager?

From my experience, branding for C-level executives and business owners is often just a checklist of elements. It typically includes a logo, colors, photos, graphics, a website, and an email signature.

If we were sitting next to each other right now, and you asked me for one thing to remember from our conversation, my choice would be simple.

You need to know that as an owner or C-level manager, you are a key person for your company's branding.

Communication, sales, marketing, services, products, relationships, or organizational culture—if you influence any of these areas and want your company to succeed, you need to act consciously and consistently in the brand area.

The good news is that you don't have to do anything particularly new. You are already doing it. If you get to know branding a bit better, I guarantee you will achieve noticeably and measurably better results. Your business will become more recognizable and credible, leading to new inquiries and relationships, which in turn will impact your final results.

Is a Graphic Designer Enough for Branding?

You already know that branding is more than a logo, color scheme, website, or graphic materials. These are designed for us by internal departments, agencies, or graphic designers.

Why do I mention this? Because it’s important to understand that not every designer you might work with on your materials knows what branding is. And that's perfectly normal. Not every graphic designer is a brand designer. A designer is an important person in the branding process, but not the only one. Branding is the result of a team effort and starts with a brand that you can thoughtfully conceive and design.

As part of the Sharply brand project and implementation, we at Creanso designed the Brand Strategy, Visual Identity, and graphic materials. Sharply has written a beautiful story about the sale of the company, and CEO Daniel Mazurkiewicz openly says that the brand helped him in this process.

It is important to approach your branding with more than just the graphic design. Whether it takes the form of a brand logo, color scheme, or other visual elements, comprehensive branding goes beyond mere visuals.

What is a Brand?

Now we're getting to the core because branding is a process related to the brand. To talk about it, let's establish what a brand is.

“A brand is a result. It’s persons’ gut feeling of a product, service, or company.” - Marty Neumeier

You could say it's akin to a reputation. A brand is formed as a collection of experiences, resulting from your company's actions in all its areas—from initial communication to products, services, and organizational culture. Each recipient builds the brand individually in their mind (and ideally in their heart). Therefore, it is crucial that all experiences related to it are positive, consistent with each other, and aligned with what matters to your company. A brand is not what you say it is. It is what your audience says it is.

We already know that most of us make choices based on the brand and the trust capitalized within it, whether consciously or unconsciously. This is why a brand is an investment. You can design it, develop it, and manage it. And if you start doing it consciously, you will have an advantage over a significant part of the competition.

Why do I say that a brand is an investment? Because it has intrinsic value. And it largely depends on you how much value you can build. How much do you think Nike would sell their business for if it were just products without the swoosh, warehouses, logistics, and processes? How would the valuation change if they also sold the rights to the brand?

Did you know that in 2006, Coca-Cola was valued at $120 billion, of which $70 billion was the value of the brand alone? This means that the organization's structure and the recipe were worth only $50 billion.

What is Branding, Then?

Think back to your last collaboration, a major purchase, or a complaint submission. Something that took a bit longer and required several interactions with a company. What experiences did you gather? What did you see and touch? At what moments? Do you have a sense of what to expect from that company in the future?

The process you experienced was building the brand. It happens all the time, whether you want it to or not. Before the purchase decision, during the transaction, and after it. Every material, conversation, and product contributes to the impressions people associate with your company.

Branding is the process of building a brand.

It aims to build awareness, attract customers, and increase their loyalty. You can manage branding. However, for it to be effective, it requires discipline, planning, and conscious action. It starts with conscious leaders. The next step is a shared understanding of the basic assumptions and goals that the brand aims to achieve, including the necessity of building its value.

Every Spectrum Health employee, design consultant, agency, and supplier receives a copy of "One System. One Focus. One Brand." This is their "brand bible," which summarizes the organization's vision, attributes, and branding components. — Bart Crosby, President Crosby Associates. Spectrum Health diagram: Crosby Associates.

What Does Branding Consist Of?

Branding activities can be broken down into four simple steps:

1. Design the Brand

2. Implement it

3. Apply it (consistently)

4. Listen, measure, and react

Which elements should you focus on?

• During the design and implementation stages

  • Brand strategy

  • Product and service design

  • Visual identity

  • Basic communication materials

• After implementation

  • Tailored actions and communication

  • Ensuring positive customer experiences

  • Listening and engaging in dialogue with customers

  • Measuring results

TL;DR

Trust is the shortest path to a purchasing decision. In response to the need for trust, we create brands. A brand is not what you communicate about it; it is what its recipients feel about it. It is an individual perception of your entire company.

You cannot control the brand image that each person builds in their mind. However, you can consciously and consistently design its aspects, such as products, services, communication, and even the culture of your organization.

Branding is the process of building a brand. It encompasses everything you have done and will do in its domain. From the first contact with the client to post-implementation support, including how you communicate and present yourself.

Remember, a brand is a promise you must keep. When customers trust you, they choose your products over the competition's. With each step, your success increasingly relies on your reputation. Therefore, build a brand that reflects the actual values and practices of your company, so you can create expectations that you can meet.

Everything starts with you and your brand strategy. It provides the central idea around which you will conduct practically all marketing, sales, and business communication activities.

Now, take one action

Ask yourself: What reputation have you built for your company (through your image, messages, culture, delivered services, and relationships)? Are you satisfied with it, or should it change.