The ad warsAt the one extreme, there are theadvertising types, whose value hasdeclined with the rise of holisticbranding approaches. In a desperatestab at credibility, they — particularlyin their large, conglomerated forms —claim an exaggerated, even magicalcreativity that then leads to all sorts ofauthority over branding by extension.

For example, WPP promotes ‘TheBrand Union’ (http://www.wppdirectory.com/company.jsp?company_id=246). This ‘union’ includes notonly powerhouse Enterprise IG (whichapparently is not powerful enough tohandle the job) but others includingAddison Corporate Marketing, BDGMcColl, BDG Workplace, BPRI,Coley Porter Bell, Dovetail, and manyothers.

Let us look at the list of services‘The Brand Union’ provides under thebranding umbrella. For its part, En-terprise IG is ‘one of the world’s lead-ing brand and identity consultancies’,so with it we have brand and identity,and they are both apparently the sameas (or close to) branding. The othercompanies ‘provide a wide range ofservices including strategic marketing,specialist research, corporate marketingand environmental design’.

So if I need branding but notstrategic marketing, I call EnterpriseIG? Or how about strategic marketingwithout being a brand?

There is more. The customer canalso choose from: ‘corporate brandconsulting’, ‘corporate reputation re-

Despite all that has been written aboutbranding, despite all the conferences,speeches, industry articles, magazinesand journals with ‘brand’ in theirnames, there is still massive confusionas to what a brand is, what you cangenuinely expect from it, and how tomake it more profitable.

This paper aims to demonstrate firstthat there is confusion, so that secondlywe can finally agree it is unproductiveand unnecessary, and finally get thediscipline moving forward in a moreorderly and intellectually productivefashion. It also aims to resolve some ofthat confusion, with the understandingthat genuine resolution will requiremuch more than this short article.

TURF WARS CONTINUE, MASSIVECONFUSION RESULTSWe can argue among ourselves aboutwhy this confusion exists. Writingin Marketing Management, marketingprofessor Don E. Schultz1 partly blamesour ‘lack of viable brand knowledge’on ‘the lack of cohesion in theexploration of brands and branding’. Inother words, we agree to disagree, andthat is that.

I agree with Schultz but see thesituation he describes as the symptomrather than the cause. The root of theproblem is that branding is the subjectof an economic turf battle. Brandsmean big bucks, and whoever is anexpert on the subject stands to elbowa lot of other people out of the way inpursuit of the pay-off.

HENRY STEWART PUBLICATIONS 1350-231X BRAND MANAGEMENT VOL. 11, NO. 3, 177–179 FEBRUARY 2004 177

Editorial

For the end of brand balderdash —and the beginning of a real future

tiveness’, ‘marketing strategy’, ‘pricing’and ‘sales and channel management’.

Can I get ‘brand analytics’ atMcKinsey? No? Maybe I’ll just settlefor ‘marketing spending effectiveness’instead.

The brand consultantsIn the middle of this tug-of-war thereare brand consultants. This group triesto balance image-building activitieswith business and organisational im-peratives. But often it is unclear whatthey actually can do.

For example, BrandSolutions, Inc.tells visitors to its home page(www.brand.com) that ‘Branding —the careful selection and use oftrademarks, images, and messages — isthe most powerful tool in thecommercial world’. OK — that wasthe image part.

The site goes on: ‘BrandSolutionsdoesn’t build brands based on hype orexaggeration; we build ‘Trustmarks’,brands based on shared values andethics. BrandSolutions specializes increating strategic ‘brand solutions’designed to increase stock price andcompany valuation.’ Just in case youmissed it, those were the organisationaland business parts.

A discussion of brand-oriented pub-lications could take us further alongthis road, but you get the idea.

WHERE DOES THAT LEAVE US?At this moment we do not all share asingle definition of brand. But weshould. And that view should incor-porate all the directions in whichbranding has evolved:

— The ‘image’ school of branding is

search and tracking’, ‘brand analytics’,‘consumer brand consulting andpackaging’, ‘environmental and retaildesign’, ‘workplace design’, ‘brandtraining’, ‘internal marketing’, and soon. Are you confused yet?

The management gurusAt the other extreme, there aremanagement gurus who say theirmanagement genius is what it isall about. For example, McKinsey(mckinsey.com), ‘a management con-sulting firm advising the top manage-ment of leading companies’ yieldsmany ‘hits’ when you type ‘branding’into its search engine.

On the first such ‘hit’(http://www.mckinsey.com/practices/marketing/casestudies/branding.asp), Ilearned that the company helped a‘consumer durables manufacturer’ whosought to ‘leverage its core brand andenable it to sell equipment at lowerprices through the mass channel,without damaging its reputation’. OK,so brand is sort of like reputation —right? And there is a ‘core brand’ thatrelates to ‘equipment’ and a ‘masschannel’. This does not sound at allcreative. Yet, apparently, the strategyworked as it ‘generated US$200m inincremental sales, as the primary masschannel partner tripled its productofferings’. What?

If you read the whole thing, it getsno more comprehensible. Look on thelower left of the screen to seea host of other case studies (ormaybe case study categories) that coversuch topics within branding as ‘cus-tomer insights’, ‘customer loyalty’,‘customer relationship management’,‘marketing organisation and capabilitybuilding’, ‘marketing spending effec-

178 HENRY STEWART PUBLICATIONS 1350-231X BRAND MANAGEMENT VOL. 11, NO. 3, 177–179 FEBRUARY 2004

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— Facilitate a shared definition ofbranding. Mine has evolved and isnow ‘a set of consistent processes,aimed at a specific purpose, thatdefine, differentiate, and add valueto the organisation’. We can debateit. But we have to come upwith one. The old Coca-Cola-typedefinition — trademark, logo, andso on — is no longer enough. Andbrand is not at all reducible to anyother single factor.

— Develop a brand-building modelthat is driven by interdependenceamong brand professionals and thatdiscourages turf wars. Let’s face it:everyone is good at what they aregood at, and nobody is good ateverything. Ad people are notqualified to handle change-manage-ment initiatives. Change-manage-ment specialists have no businesstrying to figure out distributionstrategies. And valuation specialistsshould keep far, far away from thelogo team.

Now is the time. Branding is smartbusiness — and businesses know it.Enormous amounts of brain power, notto mention money, have been devotedto it. In short, all the ingredients arethere to harness its massive potentialand build a well-defined, structureddiscipline. Do we have the will tobuild it?

� 2004 Dannielle Blumenthal, PhD

Dannielle BlumenthalEditorial Board

Reference(1) Schultz, D. E. (2003) ‘So you want to be a

brand guru’, Marketing Management, Vol. 12,No. 2, p. 8.

there to get the word out. Here arethe advertising, marketing, PR andother such professionals. Their jobis to deliver a message to the out-side world. Period.

— The ‘organisational’ school ofbranding is there to make surethat employees are committed todelivering the brand message.Here is leadership development,management training, organisationaldevelopment, and so on.

— The ‘business’ school of branding isthe machine that keeps the brandrunning. It is here to make sure thenumbers support the brand-buildingmessages and organisational effortsbeing undertaken. Here are revenuemodels, valuation approaches, pric-ing strategies, distribution channels,and so on.

If I were the leader of the free brandworld, here is what I would do to fixthings:

— Partner with graduate schools aroundthe world to institutionalise theabove framework. This would bedone through graduate-level brandtraining programmes. All prospectivebrand professionals would pursue adual-track educational program. Halfof it would consist of general brandtheory and practice. The otherwould consist of one of thespecialisation areas above.

— Start an independent, internationalprofessional association whose mis-sion it is to unite brand professionalsin developing common stan-dards, benchmarks and educationalmaterials related to branding. Ideallythese standards, and the debatessurrounding them, would be sharedfreely via the internet.

HENRY STEWART PUBLICATIONS 1350-231X BRAND MANAGEMENT VOL. 11, NO. 3, 177–179 FEBRUARY 2004 179

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