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Latest blog posts from Branding Strategy Insider

One Fighter Brand Strategy That Just Might Work
The marketer who is bored with the world's 4th largest retailer is bored with life. If you have been into a Tesco store recently, you will already have seen a new line gracing its aisles. The 'discount brands at Tesco' range has been hailed by chief executive Terry Leahy as the biggest change in...
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Published a day ago

Blazing Trails to Brand Leadership
How come some brands are great, while others just manage to be good? Is there a trick up the sleeves of those great brands �" a trick that good sustainable brands can adopt to become great household names? The answer is yes.Happily, the financial investment required to adopt this trick is...
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Published 2 days ago

David Ogilvy: Direct vs Creative
One of the greatest advertising geniuses of the 20th century was David Ogilvy.Although he was the head of a Madison Avenue advertising agency, he sided firmly with direct advertising over creative advertising.Here is an excerpt from a speech he gave to advertising executives in Paris where he...
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Published 3 days ago

Price Reductions Threaten Brands
Price is often the enemy of differentiation. By definition, being different should be worth something. It's the reason that supports the case for paying a little more for a product or service. But when price becomes the focus of a message or a company's marketing activities, you are beginning to...
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Published 4 days ago

Scent Marketing Success: Step 6 of 10
Our series on scent marketing continues with number 6 - Finding the right delivery technology.The end product of any perfumer’s creative process is an oil �" sometimes called “Fragrance Oil” or “Essential Oil”. Now you need a way to get it out into the open, either rather restricted at...
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Published 5 days ago

The Right Brands Will Die
There was a fascinating moment of business drama last week in Washington, DC. Three of the most important chief executives on the planet met leaders from the US Senate and House to plead for extra public funds. General Motors' chief executive Rick Wagoner, Chrysler's Robert Nardelli and Ford's...
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Published 6 days ago

The Brand Proficiency Indicator
It is extremely difficult to identify which companies are good at branding. One common mistake is to assume that the ownership of strong brands indicates equally strong brand management. In reality, the two very rarely go hand in hand. Take Coca-Cola. While Coke is unquestionably a power brand,...
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Published a week ago

Country of Origin: A Brands Best Friend?
A multiple choice question: is Land Rover British, German or American? Or none of the above? That’s right - it’s Chinese. The Shanghai Automotive Industry Corporation (SAIC) recently acquired the brand and the rights to all its past models for US$140 million. The acquisition sends a clear...
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Published a week ago

Beware of Commodifying Promotions
There are two kinds of brand management: intentional branding and holistic branding. Intentional branding is all about what brand managers intend to do with the brand. Usually, this involves a list of the traditional activities associated with branding - everything from logo design to integrated...
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Published a week ago

Wal-Mart Learns A Branding Lesson
It has been a gloomy month for US retailers. Iconic brands such as Linens-n-Things and Mervyns are in liquidation, while former electrical retail powerhouse Circuit City filed for bankruptcy protection last week. Store sales are down at every major US retailer - except one.On Thursday Wal-Mart...
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Published 2 weeks ago

Discovering Brand Personality
I have helped organizations position their brands through consensus building brand positioning workshops since the mid-1990s.  As a part of that process, I have the workshop participants (mostly organizational leaders) select the brand personality attributes for which they want their brands to...
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Published 2 weeks ago

PETA Must Adjust Brand Strategy to Make Fur Fly
What a difference a decade plus four makes. Back in 1994 Naomi, Claudia, Kate and Elle were at the height of their supermodel powers, naked as the day they were born and united in preferring to be that way than wear fur.Sales of fur had been flat for years and many furriers had closed their doors...
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Published 2 weeks ago