A friend remarked yesterday, seeing a hoarding of David Beckham endorsing the new “snake-skin” feel MotoRzr V2 (thats a mouthful), “I wonder who buys products because a particular person endorses them”. True. I don’t know anybody who does. And I know a lot of people. Perakath seems to be most suceptible, but being a lawyer he doesn’t sway easy. Though he has a weakness for celebrities.
Which brings me to this:
Branding is utter bullshit.
Ah. I feel so free now. I was scared of writing this post while I was in my job, considering I earned my salary making corporate identities and doing branding for Indian SMEs. But this fact kept nagging me.
Somewhere in all the lure and the Landor, the companies forgot what they were all about. Good products. In the eternal spotlight of the manegerial mind, there are these a fixed set of rules and opinions. I met dozens of middle aged men, who spoke of brand value, positioning and markets. They were distinctly uncomfortable. They knew that despite all their well judged singles, in the end they needed some pinch hitting.
I’ll try and put it more systematically. The scenario I speak of is valid for India only.
1. Branding usually comes under the departments of business development, marketing and corporate communications. It is up to the former two to decide what kind of brand they want, which will create a niche for them in their current market. The latter is meant for the dissemination of the brand message across various channels within and outside the company.
2. The mass media holds undeniable sway over the minds of the decision makers. Their perception ofthe outside world is made through the newspapers, TV and the internet. Based on these, they formulate certain benchmarks in their heads. That is why during discussions with the design/ branding company, there are dialogues like “The way Sony is showing the future” or “The aesthetics provoked by Volkswagen”.
3. In recent times, there is a clear shift in corporate thinking. I frequently hear guys say, if you make anything at all today, it’ll sell. This is attributed to the growth in the middle class, purchasing power and increase in chimpanzee literature. Conveniently, the focus is now on what “Image” your company portrays. The product has become secondary. A very senior strategist once remarked “Technology is a no-brainer”. I beg your pardon?
4. Being an MBA is a dangerous thing. You have absolutely no knowledge of how the thing you are selling (whose sale is responsible for your 1000 buck haircut) works. This discomforts you, so you talk about “Image”. Honda even today has heads of marketing who have made their way from the shop floor into the boardrooms. Seems to work for them. You cannot just have branding out of randomness. Most people who ask us to help tell us “make us beautiful”. A new logo, some ads in the paper, nice stationery and boom! the company has reinvented itself. I beg your pardon.
5. I ask people why they want to undertake a branding exercise in the first place. In the discussion that follows, all our paths become clear. Branding is a way of defining your objectives, not a way of shouting louder than the other guy. Increasingly, corporate India will realise this. A brand helps define you, introduce you to a potential consumer. It seeks to make a bond with them. A good product lies at the heart of this effort. Innovations that make your product easier, better, cleaner, smarter are more precious than a pompous Preity Zinta.
I don’t think I have been very systematic. Maybe I’ll edit this post later. Maybe I won’t. The feeling that something deep down is very wrong with the process, still nags me. An immediate, well-defined solution may not be visible now, but will get clearer. I feel that inherently, there is rationality and logic in the way the system behaves. Monopolies in the media have left people with no choice but to embrace convention. Moreover, there is a great degree of honesty and sincerity in Indian companies. They have worked for years to perfect aproduct, and now that they have it, they enter uncharted waters. The shift from sellling to retailers to selling to consumers is one that they are not prepared for. And that is where they are exploited by ad firms, design studios, consultants and the media. It hardly seems fair.
