I discovered a lesson in brand management at the local supermarket. While cruising an aisle I spotted two boxes of the same style of soup and was instantly and viscerally struck by how appetizing one was and the other wasn’t. Also immediately noticeable was a brand conflict that detracted from the weaker packaging in a rather astounding way. Combined, some rapid education in brand management was presented to everyone buying groceries that day. First, allow me to repeat Silicon Strategies Marketing’s [heavily copyrighted] definition of branding. It is the process of “making the market think and feel what you want them to think and feel about your product or company”. A soup maker would primarily want to make customers think their soup is tasty, and perhaps secondarily that it is wholesome and healthy. There may be subsidiary brand elements, but these two are pretty essential. Here we have soups by … Continue reading →