Brand Brouhaha

To me, Branding is the most important aspect for a product. All said and done, a Brand is a Brand is a Brand as it is often said. There are no two ways about it. We all need brands. Brand is that luxury you would want to have and rest in once you earn high through hard work and persistence. We inch up organisations, our products inch up consumer minds, we want to translate that success into acceptance and the fallout is BRAND.

Many people often regard Branding as an exercise that just happens, and do not give any importance or relevance to it. However, these people are talking of brands, not Brands. To make Surf is one thing, to make Surf a synonym to detergent and erasing the mention of detergent powder in a billion Indian minds is another. Just any name would make a brand, but a firm commitment, belief, trust and faith maketh a Brand. Yet, people think Branding is something very simple and nothing very important.

For all those people, Branding Asia puts things in perspective. The homepage itself tells how rigorous a Brand Building process is, and how objective and quantifiable it is. From building Brand Equity to identifying Reputation Drivers for a brand, the article covers it all and so well. It is a must-read! However, it is their methodology. So dont blame me if you were looking for a generic methodology.

Coming to Brands again, the same site lists down The Great Asian Brands. It is a disappointment to see not many Indian companies in the list. There are many companies from Singapore. Considering many cities in India are larger than Singapore, I think it is high time we realised how important Brand Building is for us. According to me, one factor why Indian companies haven't been too active on the global front, save for a few exceptions of late, is that there are no strong Indian Brands. Today, when Vodafone comes to India, we welcome it with both hands open for we know Vodafone is a reputed brand.

In this list, there are two Indian companies, Wipro and Hindustan Unilever Limited. HUL, as a die-hard fan like me would say, is the mother of all Indian companies in Branding. As mentioned in the same post earlier, Surf is the biggest of all Indian brands according to me. The order of the day needs to be more companies focussing on Branding like HUL, I guess. One look at the businesses of both these companies throws up a good number of common businesses, especially in the initial days of Wipro. So, does that mean Branding is business-specific? :S There is another viewpoint too, and that is the point that both these companies have been in operations for long, and have hit a chord with Consumers through Consumer Goods first. Does that mean time is also a factor for Branding?

Branding now seems like a never ending pot of questions... Try to find your own... Till then, Happy Branding! :)