one more time with feeling: what's more important? the brand or the product?

i was emailing with my old friend phil yesterday who noted that while sony’s graffiti--their brand--got negative reactions, they got reactions nonetheless. and this, sometimes, is all it takes for a product to succeed.  or, as the old adage goes: any ink is good ink ... 

is this the case anymore? can a product succeed in fair weather and foul? perhaps, as in sony's case, if it can hold its own. but a brand alone? puh-leeze.

case in point, a million years ago wired told us to "Look at Nokia. In 2002, it had the sixth-most-valuable brand in the world, valued by the consultancy Interbrand at $30 billion. But the very next year, Nokia made a simple mistake: It didn't produce the clamshell-design cell phones that customers wanted. Did consumers stick around because of their deep emotional investment in Nokia? Not a chance. They jumped ship, and the company's sales tumbled. As a result, Nokia lost $6 billion in equity."

brand loyalty? pttthhhht. brand love? no. with nokia, as is so often the case, the loyalty was in a product they loved. here, the brand was just the sexy outfit on date night. the product was the person they wanted to wake up with in the morning.

this is not a new idea. hugh and others have been talking about brand death for years; marketing renegades are building the brand guillotine as we speak. but is this the answer? for a marketing gal who finds value in evolution, i don't think so. brand death is just another crop of negativity and petty fighting over words. change the system, boys, and the language will change with it. reframe your focus and the folks will follow. cultivate the product and brand goodness is there from the inside out.

like, for instance, with the great biohaus currently being built at concordia language villages. in the Passivhaus style of architecture, the building is--right off the bat--85% more energy efficient. this is creating brand goodness from inside out.

or take give us wings, a non-profit that--right off the bat-- has their beginnings in pulling away from corrupt group-mentality 'help' into real person-to-person solutions. this is building brand goodness from the inside out.

or take black spot sneakers, the sneaker that--right off the bat--has a cruelty-free design and an anti-big-guy message built right in. it’s con-brand stance is a pro. and its audience is LOYAL. this is unearthing brand goodness from the inside out.

so go ahead, i say, put all the time you want into brand equity. just be damn sure that time is based on growing a product and forum and environment that helps your customers (and employees) love you. inside and out.

the long and the short of it: be transparent. be real. be you. it's what your mama's been saying all along.

Comments

[hugh macleod]

When I talk about "Branding Is Dead", I'm talking about the death of "Brand as useful metaphor".

Too often, thinking about "Brand Essence" is just a crutch. We like our crutches- they save us having to think properly about the real issues.

But that will always come back and bite us in the arse eventually...

Happy New Year =)

[Elissa Gjertson]

here here. i hear you. the crutch is a nasty habit. and i'm with you on tossing the whole "essence" idea and getting to the core of the issue. most definitely, as of now, branding is often just slapped on top of something mediocre to make it pretty. this is what's kicking mad-ave's ass and where i lean toward changing the entire system. possibly, then, branding will inherently change with it.

for this change, your cartoon/chant/poetry/manifesto "the market for something to believe in is infinite" becomes my mantra. when we start with something people can believe in, the right personality (aka 'brand') is organically encapsulated. it becomes a 'before' thought. not an 'after.'

happy new year to you, hugh. and thanks for the post. you made my day.

keep on rockin' in the free world,
e