Comments on: branding is dead

By: d2 - for love.

d2 - for love. — Sat, 05 Nov 2005 17:50:31 +0000

Hi, I’m TM

By: The Newest Industry

The Newest Industry — Tue, 10 May 2005 21:15:53 +0000

Mmmm…let’s call our customers dinosaurs…part 3

Oh look! Brand managers think that the Dinosaur campaign is a clear and concise way to break through the clutter…[here]
…and insult users who have a perfectly functional piece of software (Office 97, 2000, XP) by calling them dinosaurs.
Hugh …

By: AdShift

AdShift — Fri, 22 Apr 2005 03:28:49 +0000

Branding is dead, long live branding

If branding is dead, like it’s aging philosophical brothers government and finance, it remains a force in the world, because for better or worse human beings take time to adapt.

By: studio2f

studio2f — Mon, 07 Mar 2005 20:10:12 +0000

Reading Assignments

There’s a couple of memes I’ve been following for the last month or so that some one may find interesting.

By: Chris Garrett

Chris Garrett — Fri, 19 Nov 2004 22:56:28 +0000

To me “Brands” are what people think, “branding” is thinking about what people do/might think and attempting to get people to think favourably. This has always existed and will never go away, the terms used may change though ;O)

By: Jalpuna!

Jalpuna! — Wed, 10 Nov 2004 02:36:48 +0000

Branding isn’t the least bit dead. The problem is that, more often than not, the brander forgets the most important fact of all when it comes to advertising: the product IS the brand.
Companies talk about branding in terms of advertising. Advertising helps to create the image of what the product IS, but, once someone has sampled the product, they decide what the product really is. You can tell someone that a product is the best thing ever, but once someone tries it and decides that it’s crap, branding becomes more akin to lying.

By: Jason

Jason — Sun, 07 Nov 2004 02:42:34 +0000

Hugh — I normally love your stuff, and I’m willing to give you the benefit of the doubt, but on this one I just don’t get it. Remembering that I had read it on your site, I flippantly commented to my wife (a marketing student) that “branding is dead”. When she very politely challenged me on that statement, I found that I could not substantiate it. So I came back here looking for your supporting arguments, and found that there aren’t any.
Microsoft doesn’t need to brand because they are a monopoly. If you want to discuss the dichotomy between Apple (well branded) and Microsoft (weakly branded), you have to take into account that Microsoft is branded *by proxy* as the alternative to Apple — even though they don’t need that branding by virtue of the fact that they really don’t face any real competition.
None of the companies that Doc named as being well branded appear to me in any danger of going out of business, and all of them are supported by their well recognized brands.
So, please explain where exactly branding is dead, and why? Sorry, but I just can’t accept “because Doc and Hugh say so” as a good enough answer.
Thanks for the great blog!
Jason

By: basil

basil — Thu, 04 Nov 2004 21:40:56 +0000

sure branding is dead but don’t you just love cheap mass manufactured plastic toys
because they take some generic idea of cuteness (usually from an asian perspective)
reproduce it in plastic and hey it defies all idea of branding and goes straight for consumer experience,

By: john (unbranded/untatooed)

john (unbranded/untatooed) — Wed, 27 Oct 2004 05:18:06 +0000

Sorry John, I’m not sure if you’re free or a social lemming.
Of course branding is dead. In fact it was never alive, it was just P & G’s differentiated name for marketing .
I went through business school in the mid 80s and it was never mentioned as a verb. It’s just in the past decade that it became a ubiquitous term to justify the extortionate invoices of people classifying themselves as brand consultants or the enhancement of the balance sheet by monetising intangible assets.

By: john (unbranded/untatooed)

john (unbranded/untatooed) — Wed, 27 Oct 2004 05:16:56 +0000

Sorry John, I’m not sure if you’re free or a social lemming.
Of course branding is dead. In fact it was never alive, it was just P & G’s differentiated name for marketing .
I wnet through business school in the mid 80s and it was never mentioned as a verb. It’s just in the past decade that it became a ubiquitous term to justify the extortionate invoices of people classifying themselves as brand consultants or the enhancement of the balance sheet by monetising intanagible assets.

By: alan moore

alan moore — Fri, 22 Oct 2004 21:22:20 +0000

I agree with Rich w. Kids and people don’t describe things generically they often talk through brands. And people like to define themselves through brands.
Apple is successful, I suggest because, the iPod revolutionised the way we consumed music, and created meaning and context and delivered a great user experience. The purpose of the ads for iPod which are as iconic as the product, reinforce that great user experience.
There is a lot of bollocks written about brands. What we have witnessed is the fragmentation of media, the empowerment of the consumer and a ever increasing documentation on both sides of the atlantic of the failure of interruptive communications.
For sure brands are not in control as they once were, and recognise, well the smart ones recognise that, they have to put the customer at the beginning of the value chain and not at the end. Customers these days are more promiscuous. And might even argue that communities dominate brands?
In 5 years time marketing/brand — communications will look very different. Marketers worth their salt must recognise this and act decisively, helping their clients become relevant again. Post-Big Brother, it is obvious that people want to interact with brands, even co-create them.
Conventional branding, image advertising, the new junk mail of the 21st Century. TV advertising the silent movie of the 21st Century. The days of the breathless hype of Madison Avenue or over. Blogging, moblogging, vlogging, the mobile phone, iinteractive TV, and Tivo have all contributed to this.
The message couldn’t be simpler for any business. Engage or die.

By: RichW

RichW — Fri, 22 Oct 2004 09:51:39 +0000

yeah... what Alain said! I've been noticing on a number of blogs that kids don't say "I went out for coffee," or "I shopped for some socks," they say, "I went to Starbucks," or "I was at Target," as if those brands help define them. And maybe they do. I was out to dinner last week and stepped outside for a smoke. There's a great little indie coffee shop one block south and a Starbucks three blocks north of where I'm standing. A young couple comes out of the pizza joint next door and he says, let's go over to to Crazy Mocha. She says, no, let's go to Starbucks. He says, why - they have better over here and it's closer. She says, yeah, but it's not Starbucks. And so they headed north. We have a new generation gap. It's not wired vs. unwired. It's followers vs. leaders. Brand may be stronger than ever.

By: Terry Heaton

Terry Heaton — Fri, 22 Oct 2004 00:59:13 +0000

In my opinion and experience, there is a difference between a brand and branding. The former is determined by the market. The latter is an entire industry built around the “manufacture of consent” theories of the early 20th century.
“Brand management” is an oxymoron, because it assumes a brand is determined from the top-down. It isn’t. In that sense, branding is not only dead; it was never alive.
Transparency is replacing blue smoke and mirrors, and I think this is the real issue here. We’re drowning in marketing in the U.S., and the lifeboat is that wonderful, bottom-up place we call the Internet.

By: Charles

Charles — Fri, 22 Oct 2004 00:08:32 +0000

You should check out Dave Hyatt’s blog, Surfin Safari, you might be surprised. He’s the lead developer for the Safari browser. Hyatt constantly experiments with visual features on his blog, Safari supports new HTML extensions that are not supported in most browsers, so he plays with them and solicits feedback, and offers multiple style sheets so you can change the blog’s visual appearance. He doesn’t update the blog often, but has a vigorous discussion on most topics, with extensive trackbacks.

By: Charles

Charles — Thu, 21 Oct 2004 11:33:18 +0000

Unfortunately, your whole premise is wrong. There ARE Apple employees who blog about company issues, with official sanction. Dave Hyatt and Bill Bumgarner come to mind, I could probably dig up a few others.