B2B BRANDING

A brand is the idea or image of a specific product or service that consumers connect with, by identifying the name, logo, slogan, or design of the company who owns the idea or image. Branding is when that idea or image is marketed so that it is recognizable by more and more people, and identified with a certain service or product when there are many other companies offering the same service or product.

Advertising professionals work on branding not only to build brand recognition, but also to build good reputations and a set of standards to which the company should strive to maintain or surpass. Branding is an important part of Internet commerce, as branding allows companies to build their reputations as well as expand beyond the original product and service, and add to the revenue generated by the original brand.

Car manufacturers are experts at combining the rational and emotional. BMW and Mercedes for example, are all about build quality and engineering excellence. BMW however focuses on performance while Mercedes focuses on reliability. They have built brand strength by leveraging their functional excellence into an emotional resonance in the minds of consumers. How do they do this? BMW transforms performance into a form of emotional aggression. Mercedes translates reliability into a form of emotional reassurance.

These functional and emotional associations which are assigned to a brand by its customers and prospects are known as brand attributes. Brand attributes can be either negative or positive, and can have different degrees of relevance and importance to different customer segments, markets and cultures.

Branding Attributes
Brands have intrinsic and extrinsic attributes. Intrinsic attributes refer to functional characteristics of the brand: its shape, performance, and physical capacity.

Extrinsic attributes are features like the price, their packaging, the brand name, and mechanisms that enable consumers to form associations that give meaning to the brand.

Benefits Derived From Branding

Functional benefits are based on a product attribute that provides the customer with functional utility. The goal is to select functional benefits that have the greatest impact with customers and support a strong position relative to competitors.

Emotional benefits provide customers with a positive feeling when they purchase or use a particular brand. They add richness and depth to the experience of owning and using the brand.

Self-expressive benefits provide an opportunity for someone to communicate his or her selfimage. They heighten the connection between the brand and the customer by focusing on something linked to his or her personality. Self-expressive benefits focus on the act of using the product, as opposed to the emotional benefits associated with the result of using the product.

Internal branding

Internal branding is the process of a company educating, indoctrinating, and training its employees. This training not only enables workers to know the philosophy of their company, but also encourages and empowers them to live it out on the job and be loyal to the company they work for even in their personal lives. It attempts to infuse the company's products, staff, and environment with the pulse and reflection of the company's leadership and direction. Internal branding stems from the belief that every aspect of the place of business should move in the same direction. Just as external branding can build the awareness and loyalty to a certain company or brand, so too can internal branding. When employees feel more connected and proud of the company they work for, they will generally spread the word to others. Loyal employees are also likely to perform much better on the job than those who feel no pride in their work or loyalty to their company.

Rather than just informing employees about sales goals or marketing plans, internal branding emphasizes the employee's role within the company's success. When a company is able to capture its mission and motive for business and successfully convey it to its employees, the results can be significant. Customers may gain confidence in the company and, therefore, trust that the quality, service, and outcome of their consumer experience will always hit the mark, regardless of the location.

Integrated Marketing Communications (IMC)

Integrated Marketing Communications is a simple concept. It ensures that all forms of communications and messages are carefully linked together. At its most basic level, Integrated Marketing Communications, or IMC, as we'll call it, means integrating all the promotional tools, so that they work together in harmony.

IMC has an increasingly central role to play in today's marketplace, because it offers companies a way to strategically coordinate messages and establish a meaningful dialogue with customers. In short, IMC provides organizations with a strategic method for both establishing and maintaining relationships with key stakeholders. And that's essential for marketing success in the twenty-first century.

The marketplace is changing. What was once a single audience has fragmented and companies have to establish and maintain brand relationships with a variety of groups of people-customers, as well as other stakeholders, such as employees, investors, suppliers and distributors, local communities, and the media.

Organizations now have to communicate with these groups using a wide variety of media. Consequently there are more kinds of messages than ever before and inconsistency can become a company-wide problem. That is why IMC is also needed to coordinate communication consistency.

Because the mass media now have considerably less importance than they have had in the past, dialogue is becoming increasingly critical in this marketplace. That means that companies can no

longer rely only on one-way communication targeted to large groups of customers. To be successful now, organizations must not only be able to target messages to individual customers, but also to listen and respond to all their stakeholders. That means they must know who these people are, and the key to that is database-driven communication.

Channel-based marketing communications

Communication can be described as the glue that holds together a channel of distribution. The role of communication within marketing channels is an important issue from both a managerial and a theoretical perspective. Communication in marketing channels can serve as the process by which persuasive information is transmitted.

Communication Facets
We discuss the relationships between the facets of communication and the various channel conditions. The implicit assumption in developing the ties between channel conditions and communication facets is that no interactions occur between channel conditions. We define combinations of the facets of communication as communication strategies, and then explore the channel outcome implications of channel conditions and communication strategies.

Frequency
Frequency refers to the amount of communication and/or duration of the contact between

companies.

Direction
Direction of communication focuses on the patterns of contacts between organizations and can be unidirectional and bidirectional.

Modality
Modality or medium of communication refers to the method used to transmit information.

Content
Content of communication relates to the message or type of information that is transmitted.

 Channel Structure
Channel Structure One way to view channel structure is in terms of how exchanges between parties are patterned. We can describe the communication facets in the light of channel structure, channel climate and power.

Channel structures
Channel structures can be distinguished by the nature of the exchange relationship between parties-relational or discrete. Relational ex-changes involve joint planning between parties; the relationship has a long-term orientation and interdependence is high. Discrete exchanges are the relationship between par-ties has a short-term orientation and interdependence is low.

Channel Climate
Climate sometimes is viewed as being similar to culture. Climate is viewed as a representation of the organizational member's perception so f the work environment, including such aspects as characteristics of the organization and the nature of the member's relationships with others.

Power
Power conditions within the channel can be either symmetrical or asymmetrical.

Symmetrical With power balanced between parties. Under conditions of symmetrical power, a high frequency of communication occurs and flow is both up and down. As power is dispersed, the volume of communication increases, under symmetrical power conditions are associated with higher frequency of communication.

Asymmetrical With a power imbalance. Under conditions of unbalanced power, communication frequency is low, with primarily unidirectional flows. Authority, or the centralization of decision making,

serves to economize on the trans-mission and handling of information, and thus communication is less frequent.

Channel Communication Strategies

The facets of communication are combined to form communication strategies. Here The term "communication strategy refers to a particular combination of the facets of communication. For example, a possible communication strategy might consist of a higher frequency of communication, with more bi directional flows, informal modes, and indirect content.

Collaborative communication strategy

The first combination includes higher frequency and more bidirectional flows, informal modes, and indirect content. This combination is likely to occur in channel conditions of relational structures, supportive climates, or symmetrical power. Use of this combination of communication elements is called "collaborative communication strategy."

Autonomous communication strategy

The second combination of communication elements includes lower frequency and more unidirectional communication, formal modes, and direct content. This combination is likely to appear with channel conditions of market structures, unsupportive climates, or asymmetrical power. Its use is labeled "autonomous communication strategy.

Timing of the flow

Simultaneous
In simultaneous flow of communication message or information are distributed in such a war that all members receive at the same time.

Serial
In serial flow of communication message or information distributed by a preselected number of network members who then transmit to others at lower levels the network.