How to Start This Strategy to Boost Your Brand

What makes the world’s most recognized products so attractive?

The product itself has to be of quality, of course. But quality alone does not guarantee success. The best products in the world have something else on their side: the global branding of their products.

Product branding is an essential element to consider as part of a broader branding strategy because it gives your products a life and personality of their own.

Excellent product branding attracts customers and keeps them coming back.

A poorly crafted product brand, on the other hand, is confusing — at best — and can even be off-putting, actively harming sales and awareness .

Let’s discuss product branding together: what it is and how it can benefit your business. In this article we’ll tell you:

What is Product Branding?

It is the application of the principles telegram number list of brand strategy to a specific item or product . It is the association of a symbol, name and design with a product to create a recognizable identity for that item.

Product branding can be deeply complex, with focus groups, multiple rounds of designs, etc. But it can also be as simple as designing a logo , choosing a name, and choosing a packaging color.

Corporate Branding vs. Product Branding

Product branding is a type of brand, but security in transactions it differs in several key ways from the company’s overall brand. Company branding remains static and should convey the full scope of a company’s identity and may even hint at its values.

In parallel, a product brand is much more specific. It distinguishes a single product (or a family of products, such as Lay’s potato chips) from competing products and other offerings from the same company.

Sometimes, the branding of the product is different from the branding of the company that manufactures it.

Let’s stick with our previous example. Who makes Lay’s potato chips? Ultimately, it’s PepsiCo. But doesn’t it feel a little strange to buy (let alone eat) Pepsi Chips?

Pepsi is already so strongly identified as a beverage product brand that it somehow contaminates the idea of ​​the potato chip brand.

On the other hand, PepsiCo is still a popular, recognizable and well-positioned brand, so switching to something more generic (like Funtime Snacks and Drinks) would be a dangerous move.

So what is the solution? Product Branding.

PepsiCo can make potato chips, granola bars and breakfast cereals all day long. But they have to do it with distinct product brand identities, and that’s exactly what they do.

This chart illustrates the extent of this strategy across the world’s largest brands. In some cases this was through acquisition, not through the branding of an organic product. But the principle applicable to marketing is the same.

Is it worth investing in Product Branding?

Yes, absolutely: it is worth investing south africa numbers in product branding. Why? Because you want to sell more! The purpose of product branding is to distinguish your product from the competition.

It’s also creating or narrowing the market to exactly the people you want to impact.

If you don’t invest anything at all in product branding , you’ll end up with a sea of ​​bland, poorly defined products. And your sales will show it.

The real question is not whether it is worth investing, but how much you should invest in product branding.

And that will largely depend on the size of your company and your brand’s margins. This part isn’t rocket science:

• Global mega-companies spend a lot on their product branding. Start-ups spend much less.

But we’ve all seen examples of brands that should have spent more, right? We’re talking confusing and vague product names with amateurish-looking logos.

What makes a strong product brand?

Creating a product brand isn’t difficult or complicated. Creating a great one? That’s a different story. There are a lot of intangibles at play in the area of ​​product branding, just as there are with branding strategies as a whole.

There is no compelling reason, for example, why Amazon or Google would do particularly well. Those terms tell us nothing about what those companies do and barely hint at anything tangible.

But we’d be foolish to say that Amazon and Google aren’t effective brands. They certainly are. So there are some intangibles at play here.

We have identified several principles that we will tell you below. Their implementation will help you get on the path to creating successful and memorable product branding.

1. Strong product branding sets you apart from the competition (even internally)

First, strong product branding creates differentiation. When you see any Pepsi product (the family of soft drink product brands, not the parent company), you instantly know it’s a Pepsi product.

Even if it’s that weird new Zero Sugar Mango or the failed Crystal Pepsi, within seconds we know they’re Pepsi drinks. We’re not confused for a second that Pepsi is a Sprite or a Coke or a beer.

This differentiation is essential compared to the competition. If you are creating a new cola, you wouldn’t think of using a red can with a cursive font, right?

But this is also important within the brand itself. Let’s look at OtterBox, for example. The company’s main product area is phone cases.

Their first two popular product brands were OtterBox Defender and OtterBox Commuter.

We think both are very solid product brands. The Defender is the bulky, ultra-rugged case that protects phones from just about anything.

The Commuter is a slimmer protective case, but it’s designed primarily for (can you guess?) commuters. Consumers don’t usually get confused.

But from there, things fell apart a bit. Later series include Symmetry, Aneu, Figura, and Lumen. You can guess what some of those are, but none of them speak with the clarity of the original two. The differentiation isn’t as strong.