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Old October 31, 2013, 02:32 PM
Dien Rice Dien Rice is offline
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Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 3,358
Default Branding and identity...

Quote:
Originally Posted by Ankesh View Post
1. Apple's Think Different campaign is mis-attributed. It is not a branding success story. Its a PR success story. They received a lot of free press because they did something different. It was similar to Apple's 1984 ad - that ran just once. The main purpose was to create a buzz - not to build a brand.

Similar to godaddy's first super bowl ad.

Or to the stunts Richard Branson performs. Its not to build a brand - but to build buzz. Do something so different that people have to talk about you.
Hi Ankesh,

I think the "Think Different" campaign is quite different from the GoDaddy SuperBowl ads...

I'm no expert in the GoDaddy ads, but they seem to me to be controversial simply for the sake of "buzz"... Specifically, they are "sexually" controversial, pushing the envelope in a sexual way, in order to try to get banned, and give people something to talk about...

I see "branding" as also being something people want to identify with. Unless people want to identify with being a stripper, I don't really see the GoDaddy ads as real "branding" ads...

(You can see the GoDaddy ads here - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O5WwnQ0Mh6Y )

Apple's various ads, since Steve Jobs took over Apple again in 1996, anyhow, are quite different.

The "Think Different" ads - people want to identify with that... Even the "I'm a Mac/I'm a PC" ads make people want to identify with it, because the "Mac" person is hip, cool, young, happening - as opposed to the "PC" person, who is square, a fuddy-duddy, conventional, boring. Most people would rather be the "Mac" person than the "PC" person in those ads...

As for superior products - the "Think Different" campaign started in 1997 (one year after Steve Jobs returned to Apple). At that time, Apple's products were not considered to be crash-hot, they just had a very public, 10-year-long failure with the Apple Newton... Steve Jobs' first product was the iMac (which was essentially a computer which came in 5 different colors), which then came out in 1998. This was well before the much more ground-breaking iPod (2001), iPhone (2007), and iPad (2010).

Yet the iMacs (with 5 different color options) of the late 1990s were a success! I wanted one at the time. Why? They were cool... hip... an image certainly helped by the "Think Different" ads!

Of course, you have to have products which back up your brand image, but good products are usually not enough in themselves, I think, to truly build a brand...

Quote:
2. Lets define branding. A brand is something that does your customers thinking for them. Its a trust mechanism that enables automatic decision making. Want to buy the safest car? You can opt for Volvo without reading 40 pages on car safety.

Quote:
Apple didn't build a brand because of their ads. They built a brand by constantly providing products with better design and interface than others.
I think that's part of a brand. But a brand can also be something you, yourself, identify with.

I was reading about the building of the Tag Heuer watch brand (in the book "How Disruption Brought Order" by Jean-Marie Dru - his company, TBWA, were behind that as well as Apple's "Think Different" campaigns)...

I'm sure TAG Heuer watches are great watches in a technical sense. However, their "brand" came about by "marrying" an image of sports with the image of mental strength, and the tag line, "Don't Crack Under Pressure" (according to Jean-Marie Dru). He says before the branding campaign, Tag Heuer watches sold for an average price of $600; 3 years later, their average price was $1,500... TAG Heuer was not a new company - it started in 1860. What was new was the explicit branding...

My point with this is, branding can also be something people want to identify with, it can also help to broadcast to others something of your own identity...

Wearing a TAG Heuer watch could broadcast to others that you are "action"-oriented, as well as being mentally strong... You won't "crack under pressure" - just like the watch!

(Without negating your points, too!)

Quote:
3. Personal branding.

i. Determine what you won't do. Let people know what you stand for.

ii. Determine how you will wow people. What will you do to go beyond their expectations.

iii. Create a mailing list so that you can constantly stay in touch with your folks and repeat your message.
I think personal branding is very important... I plan to post more on this later...

Best wishes,

Dien
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