February 2017

Relevant emotional associations make the first ingredient that creates your brand story. For a brand to prosper you have to ensure that it has the right weapons in the form of emotions.

It is disastrous for a brand to copy another brand and there is nothing as annoying as a copycat, whether a person or a brand. But what if your story and your associations are so strong that copying the brand would be perceived as impossible. What do Nike and adidas have in common? The product, not the brand. The weirdest part of branding is that you can easier copy the product than the brand story.

What if you were targeting women who didn’t feel like moving from their couch, have a memory of their strong legs and muscular arms because they used to do sports, they have the drive in them, but their motivation got lost on the way of becoming a mom and/ or satisfying ambitions at work – well, then you need to get them into “JUST DO IT” mood.

I have, I wonder if you have. Have you ever thought a brand was created for you, especially for you, and if not for you the way you are, well then for you the way you want to be. Brands inspire us, they make us work, they make us eat/wear/drive/use them. You get the point. We are motivated to want to become a part of their story.

Let’s say you have an incredible product and good distribution but you don’t have the emotion the brand needs to communicate. Then, I have no idea what you will communicate. I hope you won’t talk about the good quality only, because that’s boring and unoriginal. Boredom is a brand killer. You have to tell people the reasons why they should pick you and not some other brand.

Do we need to say that inaccessibility is the death of the FMCG brand, yet over accessibility is pointless for a luxurious brand? Everyone knows that, and still accessibility, as an ingredient is so not talked about. But in the online era, one wonders about the utility of real stores.

Without value or good quality there’s no brand. If your brand does not have quality, don’t do the branding because branding cannot mask bad quality. Your consumers won’t come back to you if you have disappointed them with bad quality.

What brings about the creation of the relevant share in the minds of the consumers? A unique and pertinent story invites the consumer to take part in that story. That is why the brand creators have to be great storytellers because without the story the brand is plain boring. What is a brand without a good story? It is not a brand at all. It is not a brand that will create loyal followers or drive sales long-term.