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Across Multiple Platforms Give Insight Into This Issues, Offering Tips On How

This document discusses product branding strategies across multiple platforms. It explains that branding a product was easier in the past when there were fewer media platforms, but now companies must brand their products consistently across websites, apps, games, social media, and more. It provides examples of how three major companies - Sesame Workshop, Activision, and Coca-Cola - have effectively maintained their branding across numerous extensions and hundreds of licensees.

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0% found this document useful (0 votes)
110 views17 pages

Across Multiple Platforms Give Insight Into This Issues, Offering Tips On How

This document discusses product branding strategies across multiple platforms. It explains that branding a product was easier in the past when there were fewer media platforms, but now companies must brand their products consistently across websites, apps, games, social media, and more. It provides examples of how three major companies - Sesame Workshop, Activision, and Coca-Cola - have effectively maintained their branding across numerous extensions and hundreds of licensees.

Uploaded by

itchie
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
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Product Branding Strategy Across Multiple Platforms

What is product branding? Simply put, it is how a product interacts with its
consumer audience through design, logo, and messaging. It is difficult to
settle on one product branding definition because branding triggers an
emotional connection in consumers. If done well, product branding can be
maintained and produce a solid, well-connected connection throughout the
life of the product. The challenge, however, lies in new media, licensing and
social media, where the message might be communicated via the
audience and not the expert branding professionals.

Branding a product was much easier when there were no websites, smart
phones, interactive games or social media. Today, creative teams are
required to seamlessly brand products across multiple media, using the same
voice, design and messaging, often with different creative teams and
designers creating separate brand extensions. Product Branding Strategies
Across Multiple Platforms looks at three top companies Sesame Workshop,
Activision and Coca-Cola and how their creative teams worked together in
branding a product so that its messages were clear and its design
interconnected via numerous platforms.

Although the product branding definition hasnt changed, the process of


connecting consumers with products has. Product branding has challenged
creative teams over the past decade as they work to deal with website
content, package design, television shows, commercials, events,
sponsorships and more. How do top companies like Coca-Cola, Activision and
Sesame Workshop allow hundreds of licensees to produce products and still
maintain the same concise product branding? Product Branding Strategies
Across Multiple Platforms give insight into this issues, offering tips on how
strong, accessible brands are maintained in the marketplace and consistent
messaging even is realized even with hundreds of licensees and multiple
brand extensions that can dilute messaging and continuity.
The HOW Brand is synonymous with design, inspiration, creativity and
lifelong learning. The printed publication offers how-to columns on ways to
build a freelance career, expand marketing efforts and generate more leads
and inquiries. The community is made up of top designers, agency

executives and in-house creative teams. Sign up for enewsletters to expand


your experience in the design world.

Branding a Product:
Sesame Workshops
Sesame Street
Sesame Workshop, the parent
company of Sesame Street, is
a 40+ year-old company with
over 700 consumer product
licensees worldwide, a
television show, website and
more. How does has this
company manage their product
brand with as many as 18,000
consumer products going
through the approval process
each year? Well tell you how.
Product Branding Strategy:
Activisions Guitar Hero
As Guitar Hero launched new
titles, branding products
followed Guitar Hero World
Tour, Guitar Hero Smash Hits,
and Guitar Hero Metallica.
Eachtime an ad campaign
launched, new micro sites were
created as well, until the brand
became so fragmented, a
redesign was needed.
Integrating social media into
the new Guitar Hero portal
catapulted the brands traffic
and increased online sales by
over 300 percent.

How to Brand a Product:


Coca-Colas Happiness
Factory 3
When one asks the question,
What is product branding,
many would look to the best
marketing and branding
company in the world CocaCola. The company built began
with one soda. Today it is one
of the worlds most valuable
brands and theyve done it by
integrating different
components into the marketing
mix, including animation.
When the companys
Happiness Factory moved into
phase 3, designers spent hours
with the characters, getting to
know them and how they
worked within the Factory
where Coca-Cola is created.
The American Marketing Association (AMA) defines a brand as a "name,
term, sign, symbol or design, or a combination of them intended to identify
the goods and services of one seller or group of sellers and to differentiate
them from those of other sellers.
The American Marketing Association (AMA) defines a brand as a "name,
term, sign, symbol or design, or a combination of them intended to identify
the goods and services of one seller or group of sellers and to differentiate
them from those of other sellers.
Branding is one of the most important aspects of any business, large or
small, retail or B2B. An effective brand strategy gives you a major edge in
increasingly competitive markets. But what exactly does "branding" mean?
How does it affect a small business like yours?
Simply put, your brand is your promise to your customer. It tells them what
they can expect from your products and services, and it differentiates your

offering from your competitors'. Your brand is derived from who you are, who
you want to be and who people perceive you to be.
Are you the innovative maverick in your industry? Or the experienced,
reliable one? Is your product the high-cost, high-quality option, or the lowcost, high-value option? You can't be both, and you can't be all things to all
people. Who you are should be based to some extent on who your target
customers want and need you to be.
The foundation of your brand is your logo. Your website, packaging and
promotional materials--all of which should integrate your logo--communicate
your brand.
Brand Strategy & Equity
Your brand strategy is how, what, where, when and to whom you plan on
communicating and delivering on your brand messages. Where you advertise
is part of your brand strategy. Your distribution channels are also part of your
brand strategy. And what you communicate visually and verbally are part of
your brand strategy, too.
Consistent, strategic branding leads to a strong brand equity, which means
the added value brought to your company's products or services that allows
you to charge more for your brand than what identical, unbranded products
command. The most obvious example of this is Coke vs. a generic soda.
Because Coca-Cola has built a powerful brand equity, it can charge more for
its product--and customers will pay that higher price.
The added value intrinsic to brand equity frequently comes in the form of
perceived quality or emotional attachment. For example, Nike associates its
products with star athletes, hoping customers will transfer their emotional
attachment from the athlete to the product. For Nike, it's not just the shoe's
features that sell the shoe.
Defining Your Brand
Defining your brand is like a journey of business self-discovery. It can be
difficult, time-consuming and uncomfortable. It requires, at the very least,
that you answer the questions below:

What is your company's mission?

What are the benefits and features of your products or services?

What do your customers and prospects already think of your company?

What qualities do you want them to associate with your company?

Do your research. Learn the needs, habits and desires of your current and
prospective customers. And don't rely on what you think they
think. Know what they think.
Because defining your brand and developing a brand strategy can be
complex, consider leveraging the expertise of a nonprofit small-business
advisory group or a Small Business Development Center .
Once you've defined your brand, how do you get the word out? Here are a
few simple, time-tested tips:

Get a great logo. Place it everywhere.

Write down your brand messaging. What are the key messages
you want to communicate about your brand? Every employee should
be aware of your brand attributes.

Integrate your brand. Branding extends to every aspect of your


business--how you answer your phones, what you or your salespeople
wear on sales calls, your e-mail signature, everything.

Create a "voice" for your company that reflects your brand.This


voice should be applied to all written communication and incorporated
in the visual imagery of all materials, online and off. Is your brand
friendly? Be conversational. Is it ritzy? Be more formal. You get the gist.

Develop a tagline. Write a memorable, meaningful and concise


statement that captures the essence of your brand.

Design templates and create brand standards for your


marketing materials. Use the same color scheme, logo placement,
look and feel throughout. You don't need to be fancy, just consistent.

Be true to your brand. Customers won't return to you--or refer you


to someone else--if you don't deliver on your brand promise.

Be consistent. I placed this point last only because it involves all of


the above and is the most important tip I can give you. If you can't do
this, your attempts at establishing a brand will fail.

5 min read
You Don't Create Your Company's Brand -- You Discover It.
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Over $500 billion is spent on advertising each year. The average American is
exposed to an estimated 3,000 ads per day. Fifteen minutes out of every
hour of television programming is devoted to commercials.
Branding: 2 Key Lessons in Brand Building
Thats a lot of marketing. And a lot of marketers. With six million companies
in the United States alone, that's a lot of people competing to get their
message out. How do you stand out from the crowd? How do you get
noticed?
This is where branding comes in.
What is branding?
Branding is the art of distinguishing a product or service from its
competitors. Its the term for creating a recognizable personality which
people will remember and react to.
A company with poor branding is throwing away marketing dollars. Why?
Because without a focused message, companies weak in branding
are invisible. Nobody remembers them and they blend in. They become just
another leaf swirling in the wind, amid all those marketing messages
consumers see each day.

In marketing, the point is to actually reach someone, to connect. The way to


do this is by focusing attention, not dispersing it.
Discovering your brand
Too often, people try to dream up a brand for their company. However, a
brand isnt something you dream up -- its something you discover.
Specifically, its something you have to discover about yourself.
True branding must be based solely on the mission and culture of the
organization. When people try to create branding separate from the
company itself, the result may be pretentious, clichd or ambiguous
marketing. It waters down the company's message.
Instead, a brand should reflect the companys business plan, its mission and
values. It has to be authentic. Therefore, when you brand a company (or
anything else for that matter), youre trying to capture its core identity. You
have to look past the clutter and opinion and distill its true essence. This is
what you convey to consumers -- your brand. And your fonts, your design,
your writing -- all aspects of your marketing -- should all align with that
central concept. Now, you have focus. Now, you have penetration, because
you've conveyed your company's identity by first discovering yourself.
Related: The Basics of Branding
The ingredients of a brand
While there is probably no foolproof formula for discovering a companys
brand, there are pathways to accomplish that. Consider the following points
the ingredients that go into making an authentic brand:

Company mission. This is the most important element of branding.


Your mission is the spirit of your company, its the beating heart of
what you do. In fact, your brand can be thought of as the outward
expression of your companys internal mission. Think of it this way:
Why does your organization exist? What is it there for? You have
assets, employees, vendors, relationships and internal systems. . . but
why?

Values. Whats important to your company? What do you stand for?


Every company has certain ideals that define what it is and does.
These ideals could be environmental, social or ethical or could be

standards of quality Whatever your companys values are, theyre the


very center of why youre unique and are a crucial part of your brand.

Culture. Each company in the world has its own ethos -- a particular
style or panache. Whatever you call yours, embrace it. There may be a
million competitors in your market space, but theres only one you.
Your companys group culture is part of the fabric of who you are.

History. Your history tells a lot about you. Look to the companys
founders to help define your identity today. What were their values?
What were they trying to accomplish? Every company came from
somewhere. Your roots are an integral part of your companys brand.

Plans. When you look at your next 10 years, where do you see
yourself going? Your business plan and marketing strategy both
influence how you present yourself and should be included in your
branding. If youre going after an entry-level market segment, dont
position yourself as a luxury brand. Your brand must encompass your
real-world objectives.

Consumers. This is really what its all about. Your customers are the
reason you exist. What are their needs? What do they think?
Understanding your customers is a vital part of branding. Because if
you dont know whom youre talking to, why bother to say anything at
all?

It might take a bit of soul-searching to get at the essence of what makes your
company special. The trick is to take a clear-eyed look and see whats
actually there. Because every brand is beautiful, every brand is inspiring.
Ten ways to build a brand for your small business

Branding is just as important for small


businesses as it is for big names. Indeed, many corporate brands try
to look more like small firms in order to appeal to consumers that

prefer to support independent brands. Dan Einzg of agency Mystery


explains how to develop your own brand identity
Many small business owners I talk to already understand that branding is
essential to their business, but a surprisingly high number of them don't
really know why.
They recognise the link between successful businesses and strong branding
and aspire to build a brand that emulates similar success for themselves.
And they understand that branding is not just a logo or how their business is
perceived externally. But too few realise that successful brands have this
branding at the heart of the business. So much so that in many ways you
could almost substitute the word brand for business.
Branding is a way of defining your business to yourself, your team and your
external audiences. It could be called the business identity, but only on
the understanding that it embodies the core of what the business is and its
values, not just what it looks and sounds like. Customers of all sorts of
businesses are so savvy today that they can see through most attempts by
companies to gloss, spin or charm their way to sales.
The benefits that a strategically defined brand can bring are the same as
when people fall in love with each other. When customers connect emotively
because they share the same values and beliefs of a brand it leads to
higher sales and better brand differentiation. It also leads to loyalty,
advocacy and can even protect your price in times when competitors rely on
promotional discounts to drive sales. It can also give you the ideal platform
from which to extend your offering or range.
Here are ten tips on how to successfully implement branding for your
business.
1. Start by defining your brand.
Review the product or service your business offers, pinpoint the space in the
market it occupies and research the emotive and rational needs and
concerns of your customers. Your brand character should promote your
business, connect with your customer base and differentiate you in the
market.
2. When building your brand, think of it as a person.

Every one of us is an individual whose character is made up of beliefs, values


and purposes that define who we are and who we connect with. Our
personality determines how we behave in different situations, how we dress
and what we say. Of course for people it's intuitive and it's rare that you even
consider what your own character is, but when you're building a brand it's
vital to have that understanding.
3. Consider what is driving your business.
What does it believe in, what is its purpose and who are its brand heroes.
These things can help establish your emotive brand positioning and inform
the identity and character for brand communications.
4. Aim to build long-term relationships with your customers.
Dont dress up your offering and raise expectations that result in broken
promises, create trust with honest branding be clear who your company is
and be true to the values that drive it every day.
5. Speak to your customers with a consistent tone of voice.
It will help reinforce the businesss character and clarify its offering so
customers are aware exactly what to expect from the product or service.
6. Don't repeat the same message in the same way over and over again.
Alternatively, aim to make your key messages work together to build a
coherent identity.
7. Dont try to mimic the look of chains or big brands.
Try and carve out your own distinctive identity. There is a big consumer trend
towards independent establishments, and several chains are in fact trying to
mimic an independent feel to capture some of that market. Truly
independent operators can leverage their status to attract customers who
are looking for something more original and authentic, that aligns with how
feel about themselves.
8. Be innovative, bold and daring stand for something you believe in.
Big brands are encumbered by large layers of bureaucracy, preventing them
from being flexible and reacting to the ever-changing needs of their
customers. Those layers of decision-makers can make it hard for them to be
daring with their branding.

9. Always consider your branding when communicating with customers.


Don't lose your pride or dilute your brand positioning with indiscriminate
discounting. Try offering more, rather than slashing prices. Promotions are an
opportunity to reinforce your brand mission.
10. The old way of stamping your logo on everything won't cut it.
The future of branding is fluid and engaging respect your customers'
intelligence by not giving everything away up front. Generate some intrigue
and allow them to unearth more about your brand for themselves. This is the
way to foster ambassadors who revel in telling other people what they have
discovered.
Building the Total Product
A major responsibility of marketing is to transform a basic product concept
into a total
product. Even when an idea for a unique new pen has been developed into
physical reality
in the form of the basic product, it is still not ready for the marketplace. The
total product
offering must be more than the materials molded into the shape of the new
pen. To be
marketable, the basic product must be named, have a package, perhaps
have a warranty,
and be supported by other product features. Lets examine a few of the
components of a
total product offering.
Branding
An essential element of a total product offering is a brand. A brand is a
means of identifying
the productverbally and/or symbolically. Small fi rms are involved in
branding,
whether they realize it or not. An entrepreneur may neither know nor care,
but his
or her company has a brand identity. Exhibit 14-4 depicts the components of
a fi rms
brand identity. The intangible brand image componentpeoples overall
perception of a
brandmay be even more important to acceptance of a fi rms bundle of
satisfaction than
the tangible brand mark and brand name elements. For example, prior to
2003, Martha
Stewart had arguably one of the strongest brand images in the marketplace.
However,

her personal legal troubles tarnished the Martha Stewart brand and even
resulted in a
temporary suspension of her popular home design/cooking show on national
television.
More recently, though, the Martha Stewart brand has recovered much of its
former glory
in the marketplace.
verbal and/or symbolic
means of identifying a
product
brand image
Peoples overall perception
of a brand

The tangible components of brand identity are brand names and brand
marks. A
brand name is a brand that can be spokenlike the name Dell. A brand mark
is a brand
that cannot be verbalizedlike the golden arches of McDonalds.
Since a products brand name is so important to the image of the business
and its
products, careful attention should be given to the selection of a name. In
general, fi ve
rules apply in naming a product:
1. Select a name that is easy to pronounce and remember. You want
customers to
remember your product. Help them do so with a name that can be spoken
easily
for example, TWO MEN & A TRUCK (a moving service) or Water Water
Everywhere
(a lawn irrigation business). Before choosing to use your own family name
to identify a product, evaluate it carefully to ensure its acceptability.
2. Choose a descriptive name. A name that is suggestive of the major benefi
t of the

product can be extremely helpful. As a name for a sign shop, Sign Language
correctly
suggests a desirable benefi t. Blind Doctor is a creative name for a window
blind repair business. The Happy Company is a great name for a small fi rm
producing
bath toys for young children. However, Rocky Road would be a poor name
for a business selling mattresses!
3. Use a name that is eligible for legal protection. Be careful to select a name
that
can be defended successfully. Do not risk litigation by copying someone
elses
brand name. A new soft drink named Doc Pepper would likely be contested
by the
Dr Pepper company.
4. Select a name with promotional possibilities. Exceedingly long names are
not, for
example, compatible with good copy design on billboards, where space is at
a
premium. A competitor of the McDonalds hamburger chain is called Bobs, a
name that will easily fi t on any billboard. Radar Ball is a good name for a
golf ball
implanted with a homing chip that sends a signal to a hand-held device,
allowing
the ball to be found when it is lost.
5. Select a name that can be used on several product lines of a similar
nature. Customer
goodwill is often lost when a name doesnt fi t a new line. The name Just
Brakes is excellent for an auto service shop that repairs brakesunless the
shop
plans to expand later into muffl er repair and other car repair services.
brand name
A brand that can be
spoken
brand mark
A brand that cannot be
spoken
How They See It: Intellectual Property
Winston Wolfe
I have frequently told my attorney friends that if I were a
lawyer, I would be in the fi eld of intellectual property. It is a
fascinating subject and can be critical for a new business.
It almost goes without saying that any entrepreneur
should be respectful of the patents and trademarks, etc. of
others. You should likewise demand that others respect your
intellectual property.
If your business is based on a product or process that is

unique, pursue a patent as quickly as possible! Keep in mind


that protecting intellectual property rights can make or break
a business. It is suggested that you work with an attorney
whose specialty is intellectual property.
You should strongly consider licensing a brand name if
you have a product for which there is an appropriate available
name. It cant be emphasized too strongly that the name
must be appropriate for the product and the market. Smith
and Wesson, for example, is a great brand name for shooting
glasses, but not for baby diapers.
Licensing the right name can be magic. It can separate you
from the crowd and give you a great sales advantage. It can
also allow you greater profi t margins, since most consumers are
willing to pay more for a brand name they know. Be prepared
for scrutiny from the licensor company. Part of being a successful
entrepreneur is having a good basic understanding of the
laws governing intellectual property and the opportunities that
marks widely associated with their owners. A small fi rms special
signature, or
logo, should symbolize positive images of the fi rm and its products. And if
you dont
get it right initially, consider a new design. This is what Penny Pritzker did a
few years
after launching the Parking Spot, an off-airport parking service, in 1998. The
original
logo on the companys shuttle buses and other sites refl ected a ho-hum
image. In
2000, the Parking Spot unveiled a new design sporting black spots of
different sizes
dancing against a vibrant yellow background.17 The company now operates
11 sites in
6 cities.
Another example of a successful logo change is provided by the privately
held shoe
manufacturer White Mountain Footwear, based in Lisbon, New Hampshire. Its
black-andwhite
logo in block lettering was judged to be dated and unrepresentative of the
fashionforward
image it was marketing. A new logo was designeda stylized W that refl ects
the letter M, like a mountains mirror image in a lake.18(Take a look at the
logo on the
companys website at http://www.whitemt.com.) According to Elinor Selame,
president of
BrandEquity, who designed the logo, The logo can be your companys
hardest-working

employee.19
Michael Bierut, a partner at the design fi rm Pentagram, offers the following
tips
about logo design:20
1. Be simple. Some of the best logos are the simplest. Target has made a red
circle
with a red dot in the middle seem the very essence of affordable, hip
practicality.
H&R Block uses a green square in association with its name. Simple things
are
easy to remember and tend not to become outdated quickly.
2. Leave it open to interpretation. Dont try to design a logo that will explain
at a
glance the complete nature of your company. A logo that raises a question
and is
open to interpretation is better than one that attempts to offer all the
answers.
3. Be relentlessly consistent. Companies with strong graphic identities have
built
those identities through years of use. Pick a typeface. Pick a color. Use them
over
and over again, on everything. Before long, youll fi nd yourself with an
identifi able
look and feel. Thats more valuable than a logo, and anyone can afford it.
4. Dont be embarrassed about design. Things like logos and colors are
considered
cosmetic, and businesspeople sometimes avoid focusing on them. But
most
design-driven companies got to be that way thanks to a highly placed
advocate,
such as Thomas Watson at IBM or Steve Jobs at Apple. For a design program
to
work, it needs to be seen to be championed by important people.
5. Get good advice. You can go pretty far with common sense. But sooner or
later,
youll need to hire a professional graphic designer. The website of the
American
Institute of Graphic Arts (http://www.aiga.org), the largest professional
organization
for graphic designers, offers information about how to fi nd and work with
experienced professionals.
6. Dont expect miracles. Your companys image is the sum total of many
factors.
Make sure that your company looks, sounds, and feels smart in every way,
every
time it goes out in public. That is actually much better than a logo.

Trademark and service mark are legal terms indicating the exclusive right to
use
a brand. Once an entrepreneur has found a name or symbol that is unique,
easy to
remember, and related to the product or service, an attorney who specializes
in trademarks
and service marks should be hired to run a name or symbol search and then
to
register the trade name or symbol. The protection of trademarks is discussed
later in
this chapter.
Packaging
Packaging is another important part of the total product offering. In addition
to protecting
the basic product, packaging is a signifi cant tool for increasing the value of
the total
product.
trademark
A legal term identifying a
fi rms exclusive right to
use a brand
service mark
A brand that a company
has the exclusive right to
use to identify a service
Consider for a moment some of the products you purchase. How many do
you buy
mainly because of a preference for package design and/or color? Innovative
packaging is
frequently the deciding factor for consumers. If products are otherwise
similar to competitive
products, their packaging may create the distinctive impression that makes
the
sale. For example, biodegradable packaging materials may distinguish a
product from its
competition. The original Leggs packaging designthe shape of an egg
containing ladies
stockingsis an example of creative packaging that sells well.
Labeling
Another part of the total product is its label. Labeling serves several
important purposes
for manufacturers, which apply most labels. One purpose is to display the
brand, particularly

when branding the basic product would be undesirable. For example, a


furniture
brand is typically shown on a label and not on the basic product. On some
products,

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