Your brand is more than your logo, name or slogan — it’s the entire experience your prospects and customers have with your company, product or service.
- What Is A Brand Promise
- What Is A Brand Ambassador
- What Is A Brand Representative
- What Is A Brand Manager
- What Is A Brand Mark
Your brand strategy defines what you stand for, a promise you make, and the personality you convey. And while it includes your logo, color palette and slogan, those are only creative elements that convey your brand. Instead, your brand lives in every day-to-day interaction you have with your market:
Brand-new definition is - conspicuously new and unused; also: recently introduced. How to use brand-new in a sentence. Brand Inspection Division 305 Interlocken Parkway Broomfield CO 80021. Phone 303.869.9160 Fax 303.466.1429. Hours: 6:30 am to 5:00 pm Monday-Friday Office visiting hours: 8:00 am to 5:00 pm Monday-Friday. Positioning of a Brand. The positioning of a brand or product is a strategic process that involves marketing the brand or product in a certain way to create and establish an image or identity within the minds of the consumers in the target market. Market positioning of a brand or product must be maintained over the life of the brand or product. Brand campaign, project, tradeshow and event executed all over the world. Sony Square Shibuya Project On the ground floor of Shibuya MODI, inspires visitors by offering new surprises through Sony's products, technology and entertainment. Your brand is the image customers have of your business, so take the time to define it thoughtfully and early, before the market does it for you. That way, your company’s image will be what you intend it to be. It should be strategic and intentional. Discover how to get your business to stand out from its competitors in a positive way.
- The images you convey
- The messages you deliver on your website, proposals and campaigns
- The way your employees interact with customers
- A customer’s opinion of you versus your competition
The Value of Creating a Defined Brand Strategy
Branding is crucial for products and services sold in huge consumer markets. It’s also important in B2B because it helps you stand out from your competition. Your brand strategybrings your competitive positioning to life, and works to position you as a certain “something” in the mind of your prospects and customers.
Note: Check out our brand strategy toolkit — for step-by-step guidance while designing your brand strategy.
Think about successful consumer brands like Disney, Tiffany or Starbucks. You probably know what each brand represents. Now imagine that you’re competing against one of these companies. If you want to capture significant market share, start with a strong brand strategy or you may not get far.
In your industry, there may or may not be a strong B2B brand. But when you put two companies up against each other, the one that represents something valuable will have an easier time reaching, engaging, closing and retaining customers.
Successful branding also creates “brand equity” – the amount of money that customers are willing to pay just because it’s your brand. In addition to generating revenue, brand equity makes your company itself more valuable over the long term.
Does your company follow a defined strategy for your brand? Which case do you fall under?
| Best Case | Neutral Case | Worst Case |
|---|---|---|
| Prospects and customers know exactly what you deliver. It’s easy to begin dialogue with new prospects because they quickly understand what you stand for. You acquire customers quickly because your prospects’ experience with you supports everything you say. You can charge a premium because your market knows why you’re better and is willing to pay for it. | The market may not have a consistent view or impression of your product and company, but in general, you think it’s positive. You haven’t thought a lot about branding because it doesn’t necessarily seem relevant, but you admit that you can do a better job of communicating consistently with the market. You’re not helping yourself but you’re not hurting yourself either. | You don’t have a brand strategy and it shows. It’s more difficult to communicate with prospects and convince them to buy. They don’t have an impression of your product/service or why it’s better. What you do, what you say and how you say it may contradict each other and confuse your prospects. Competitors typically have an easier time acquiring customers. |
Access detailed step-by-step plans in our new marketing website.
The TM and ® marks on the Mc Donald's and Starbucks images below means that the company has claimed rights to the image (the symbol or word or combination of both).
You can use TM on any design that you wish to designate as a trademark. The use of the symbol may be governed by local, state, or foreign laws and the laws of a pertinent jurisdiction No registration is required in the US. In most states this will actually give you some 'common law' trademark rights.
You can use the ® mark in the U.S. only after you obtain a federal trademark registration from the US Patent and Trademark Office.
Copyright (the © mark) is different. It means that the original author or creator of any creative work (writing, images, music, software, etc. etc.) has the sole right to copy (distribute, publish, sell, copy) that work for a set period of time unless he or she explicitly hands over that right to someone else. Most governments enact this law.
Another example is the Color Matters website. All the articles and images in this web site are protected by copyright.
What is protected when a brand image is registered or has a trademark symbol?
The ® (REGISTERED) mark in these examples protects the brand image - not the color or color combination. In other words, you can use the same yellow and red colors as McDonald's for your business. However, if you used the same design - the yellow arch on a red background - with your business name, you'd be in trouble and even more so if it's for a hamburger restaurant.
The TM (TRADEMARK) symbol on a brand image means the same thing. It protects the design and does not give legal rights to the colors alone.
About Color Trademarks
A color trademark is different. In this case, the color is the brand. The use of the color in a market sector is protected by trademark. For example, when you see chocolate candy in a purple wrapper, you know it's Cadbury: when you see a turquoise box for jewelry, you know it's from Tiffany & Co.
However, Cadbury's purple is protected by trademark only for chocolate products. Anyone else can use the color purple. For example, Royal Motor Oil and Nexium (pills) use purple in their brand.
Until the 1980s, U.S. law refused to recognize a single color as a brand. However, color combinations, had long been protectable. This changed when Owens-Corning launched the 'Think Pink' campaign for its fiberglass building insulation. Cara download game naruto p2 2.9. In 1985, a U.S. Court of Appeals in Washington ruled that the company had the right to prevent others from using pink for insulation.
What Is A Brand Promise
Years later, in another case, the U.S. Supreme Court reiterated that a single color can indeed be a brand, so long as the public strongly associates the color and the specific product and that the color is in no way functional.
Pink insulation is a good example of a color that is protected by trademark. When consumers see pink insulation products, they know it's Owens-Corning. The color pink doesn't symbolize anything in home construction. In fact, it's not even a very masculine color.
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Trademarks Today
Color trademarks apply to unique situations because it's not possible to permit every business to own 'their color' today. Otherwise there would be 'color depletion.' In other words, there are a limited number of colors.
Tiffany Blue is another example of a color trademark. It's important to understand that they only own that blue in situations where it could be confused with their products. Tiffany only owns 'robin's egg blue' for its boxes and bags.
You can paint your house that color, for example, without having a problem. Given the wide range of products Tiffany sells, and the uniqueness of their shade of blue, they are protected from other jewelers who would use the same color for boxes or packaging. Otherwise, there would be brand confusion.
A number of companies have failed to protect single colors. Pepto-Bismol couldn't get pink and Good Humor failed to protect the color white for its trucks and uniforms. On the other hand, UPS has protected brown for its trucks and uniforms and 3M 'canary yellow' for its adhesive notes.
What colors cannot be trademarked?
One of the basic principles of color trademark laws in the US is that a functional color cannot be trademarked. In other words, if a company makes lawn mowers, they can't 'own' green because green is the color of lawns and is therefore a functional color.
What Is A Brand Ambassador
Does John Deere Own Green?
Contrary to the color myths, John Deere does not own green. They have trademark protection for the image of the deer on a yellow background but not the colors per se. Competitors are allowed to paint their equipment green or use green in their brand design because green is a functional color. It symbolizes vegetation – grass, fields, farmlands, etc. – and that's where you would use a John Deere tractor or any other Deere product.
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On the other hand, Qualitex registered the color green as a trademark for their dry-cleaning pads. In this case, green was a 'secondary' color. It The idea is that if you use a color in such a way that your brand is totally identified with it – and there is no functional implications, then perhaps you should have the right to trademark the use of that specific color in that specific market.
(More trademark color myth: Barbie does not own pink; Mattel does not owns G.I. Joe green.)
What Is A Brand Representative
Color War: Louboutin Shoes and Red Soles
The issue of color rights surfaced in a recent dispute between two well-known design houses — Christian Louboutin and Yves Saint Laurent. Louboutin has used a red lacquered outsole on its highly priced women's shoes since 1992 and is suing for trademark protection. In the meantime, the trend is growing fast enough to make paint sales spike.
What Is A Brand Manager
What do you think? Is imitation flattery, infringement, or just trend following?)
What Is A Brand Mark
Links to other articles on this topic:
Color Matters Blog - Color Infringement: Microsoft vs. Google - 2009
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