2010, The Year of Branding & Brand Management

So you’ve come up with your brand, polished it, and are now sharing it with the world in all the traditional marketing avenues, as well as the new ones (i.e. social media).

As you move forward in 2010, keep in mind:

Branding starts internally, but is ultimately determined by your customers and the masses.  You may have what you consider great branding, but it’s how people perceive it that give your brand its true meaning, and in turn, true worth.

Marketing avenues, such as social media, allow you to keep an eye out for what people are saying about your brand and engage with them.  With a good product/service and great customer service, hopefully all that will be said will be good.  This allows you to further strengthen your brand.

In the instance that something negative is said, you now have more control than ever to approach the situation and diffuse it.  Show people that your company takes an active interest in improving and engaging with customers and prospects.

The #1 way to face negative comments about brand is to engage in order to rectify the issue or negative experience.  Social Media has allowed for companies to monitor and manage their brand.

One example of this brand management is with Dominos.  The pizza chain was listening when people spoke negatively about their pizzas.  They took action and created the New Pizza.  You can learn more about this at: http://www.pizzaturnaround.com/

Like the New Pizza or not, one thing is clear, Dominos is working on brand management.  But as I mentioned in the beginning, it’s how people perceive your brand.  You can try to “re-invent” pizza, but if it’s still a not-so-great pizza, the negative brand recognition will come back to haunt you.

You have to start by making sure your product/service lives up to the branding you have created.

It’s a fluid process of creating your brand, living up to it and interacting with people about it in order to reinforce it.