rants of the day: …on the death of Branding

Good day everyone. I’d start my post with an upbeat sentence but I’m just too sad and overwhelmed to do that. Today is the day of “Branding”’s death.

No, really. Brian Phipps at Brands Create Customers is declaring that today branding is dead, gone forever. Whether we agree or not to the post, it is definitely a post to consider for its importance and relevance.

I personally don’t think branding is dead. I -actually- will go on and suggest we stop killing stuff. We don’t have to always keep on re-naming practices over and over. It started as plain old marketing, moved on to brand marketing for some, brand management for others, and recently to “branding”.

Why do we have to keep on re-naming things, killing the last noun? Is it the need to feel on top of things? to keep up with trends? or is it just that our attention span is so short and tiny we need to move from one thing to the next to not loose focus?

Branding, for me, is alive and kicking. Many people might feel insecure and in disgust with several branding tactics employed by managers worldwide; but the reality of it is that branding cannot be dead; not now, and probably not for a long time. The essence of branding is very alive in companies around the globe. What I think we should be asking ourselves is not what the new word for this “essence” is, but what we can do to make it better. A revolution of action, not wording.

Many marketing teachers and consultants keep on preaching on how a brand must be kept consistent and persistent to achieve goals. Likewise, let’s not only talk the talk, let’s walk the walk. I propose we stop killing and renaming things, and we just start acting. Act up, it’s what can be measured and at the end of the day is what makes you or breaks you. Let’s leave the wording part for another -not so thrilling- times.

Ciao,

Ron.

Technorati : brand marketing, branding, marketing