The Complexity of Branding

You are not a brand unless other people think you are. People have to connect with your brand on an intellectual and emotional level. A logo is not a brand but the story behind it is.

Strong brands create a subjective emotion with a product, a company or even a person. Thus, you can only be a brand if you are able to reach people and create an impression and an experience. The essence of a brand lies in people’s unique, subjective interpretation of the brand in conjunction with their personal conception of the world. It is therefore clear that you need to know your audience before you can communicate the right way with them through branding. You need to be able to engage and influence your audience and design the right experience that will meet their needs and desires. There are different ways of connection: people can interact with a brand, behave like a brand, aspire to be like a brand, admire the brand, trust or become a part of the brand. Now the main question is: how do we do that?

These days, there are so many ways to communicate that you need to use more to stand out. It’s more than just a choice between creating a website, a flyer, a commercial, organising an event, or using mobile as a communication channel.  It’s about the way you communicate because most off the time you need to use all the channels. The way that you communicate has become a crucial part of branding. You need to differentiate yourself from your competitors. That is why you need to create an experience behind your brand.

To experience, you need to smell, see, hear, taste or feel something. The brand experience it is all about charisma and memorability. Before you can create an experience you need to understand people, know how you can create a connection to get in touch with their five senses. How do you know how to do that?  There are many strategies and theories about how to get there, but none of them will exactly tell you what fits your brand best. It is a psychological process you need to fulfil to really be successful. Of course knowledge is a part of the process because it will help you to get there on a more efficient way. Besides that every brand need to create an own specific and unique way.

Brand