In modern business literature and journalism, dedicated to brands, brand and branding, you can see two directions.
- The first one is the high-calibre discourse on the importance of branding and the abstract inferences about the various dimensions, components and levels of the brand.
- The second direction is a set of specific tactical recommendations in a narrow area, which in principle would work, if not for one "but". This direction considers only the issue of tactics and cannot be used as a basis for planning strategic actions.
Thus, we have a rather vague description of the general situation and specific moves that are not related to this general description.
In other words, a strategy (or rather what is called a strategy) is separate from a tactic. And there is no transition from one to another.
Let's say more: the theory in this area is developed by itself and is not actually related to practice. Practice constantly refutes theory, and theory is very difficult to apply in practice because of its excessive abstraction. It cannot even be tested - there is nothing to test.
And what are the methods - these are the results. In any case, we have never met a single (not a joke) case when a brand was created in accordance with any concept. Post-factum - yes, many brands in their descriptions were adjusted to other people's schemes. But so that the brand was originally built according to a clear scheme? This did not happen and it did not.
This situation is caused by the lack of intelligible and realistic brand building technologies in the world (!) practic.
There were no concepts in the world covering all stages of the brand building process - from market research, setting business goals and developing strategies to determining the vector of movement in the implementation of this strategy in practice.
Moreover, it is often possible to hear the opinion that branding technologies are impossible at all. But we decided to argue with this, and as a result this channel appeared.
We took retail as a subject of study as the most actively developing sphere. While the most difficult for branding. In principle, the ideas outlined here are applicable in other areas, in other markets, while the markets are no less complex from the point of view of modern brand-builders - in the markets of all kinds of services, oriented to the end user.
That is, in those markets where the consumer chooses not a specific product with a specific logo, but something virtual, not always clearly formalizable. But retail is probably the most difficult area, and that's why we undertook this difficult task - to outline the basic principles of brand creation where all other "gurus" demonstrate their helplessness.
This channel is not a lengthy discussion of how important branding is, nor a set of recipes for quick happiness in the spirit of "make a red logo - and you will be happy.
We have tried to describe in detail all the stages of building a brand in the field of retail - from the algorithm of searching for the business idea itself to the principles of brand promotion and features of private label creation. We do not promise simplicity - you can not write about the complex primitively, it will only be profanation. But still we hope that the channel will be clear, useful, and the ideas set out in it, you can apply in practice independently.