What is a brand?
A strong brand helps distinguish products from your
competitors'. It adds value to the business by enhancing
consumer awareness and improving customer loyalty. A brand can be
made up of many elements, including:
- A logo (Nike swish).
- A word (Kodak).
- A colour (Virgin red).
- A shape (Coca-Cola bottle).
- A strap line or jingle (The future's bright, the
future's Orange).
- A domain name (Amazon.com).
- A person's name (David Beckham).
A strong brand can be an extremely valuable commercial asset,
but brands are also fragile and can be lost or devalued if they are
not adequately protected. When brands are damaged, companies can
have huge value wiped from them overnight. For example, it was
reported that BP had billions of dollars wiped from the value of
its brand in the wake of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill.
