Zen and the Art of Brand Management

When you own a business, it’s important to establish a brand for yourself.  Your brand is your company’s identity, the face you present to the world.  But maintaining a brand doesn’t stop once you make a name for yourself.  To be truly successful in the long term, you’re going to have to master the art of brand management.

Brand management refers to something that is broader and more strategic than the marketing strategies you may be using.  Brand management includes marketing strategies such as advertising and creating a digital presence, but it’s something more than that.  So important is brand management that it often falls to the company’s CEO to see it through.

What exactly does brand management mean?  Essentially, brand management is the collective act of instilling confidence in your brand in the minds of your customer base.  It is about becoming and maintaining top-of-mind presence and assuring your customers that the level of quality service and products they have come to expect from your company will continue.  

Further, brand management is about actively positioning your product in a favourable position against its competitors.  In a marketplace that is saturated by so many products and services it is absolutely essential to stand out in the best way possible.  Brand management is about showing customers why your product is a better choice than the others.  To do that, you’ll have to actively monitor your product’s position in the marketplace and devise strategies to respond to your product’ changing position.

A company with successful brand management strategies will be able to check certain boxes.  These include:

• Protection for their products under trademark law
• Easy recognition and identity associated with certain products and a high level of quality
• Easily remembered name and/or logo (think of the power of those famous golden arches!)
• A name that is easily pronounced in any language, so your brand will be recognized outside of your country’s borders

photo/ Michael Jarmoluk via pixabay.com

Brand management is essential for every company, but it is particularly useful when your company owns several different brands offering a varying range of products.  This scenario can make brand management more challenging, but at the same time, if done effectively the company can gain the confidence of its customer base across all of its product lines.  If you can convince a current buyer of one of your products that your other products have grown out of the same business acumen, commitment to quality and high standards, there’s good chance that those same customers will turn to your company’s offerings to meet other needs as well.  

The result is a successful company across all of your brands and a favourable position within the marketplace.

A successfully managed brand will gain the confidence, support and ultimately the business of consumers who are looking for products that meet a particular need.  Done well, brand-management strategies will inspire confidence in consumers, compelling them to purchase products based on faith in the company’s ability to deliver high-quality products that are going to deliver reliably.  It is for this reason that companies spend millions of dollars every year in an attempt to place their brand front and centre.  It’s no accident that when you think of certain products or services, certain brands come to mind.  That is the result of brand management.

When you start out on a new business venture, one of your first orders of business is to establish your brand and find ways to gain brand recognition.  As your company grows, however, it’s important to take up the task of maintaining your brand through the implementation of brand-management strategies.

____________________

Author Bio

Kashif Raza is an SEO expert, digital analyst and entrepreneur. Throughout his years of cutting-edge work in the internet marketing, SEO, PPC, web design and tech start-up fields, he has successfully developed multiple business ventures of seo in Montreal and become an authority on search engine optimization and SMO.