Where in the world am I today?: Woke Up in Aruba and am heading home…
Went to my computer’s dictionary to get a semi-official definition of the term branding and it gave me this –
[as n. ] ( branding) the promotion of a particular product or company by means of advertising and distinctive design.
The concept of branding has been used by large corporations and business for years to create a strong, memorable, positive impression with their target demographic.
Some companies create company awareness through a logo that, in and of itself, says very little about the products or services that they sell. Examples include the Apple Computers Logo with a bite out of it, the Nike Swoosh or the Golden Arches of McDonalds. Each of these are instantly recognizable to most consumers who know exactly what company each logo represents.
Another technique takes the company name and gives it a color and stylized font treatment that also becomes very identifiable to the point where the name itself has turned into a logo. A great example of this is the flowing type used on every can of Coka-Cola. As soon as you see a red can with that flowing text you know instantly that it’s a can of Coke.
Hybrids that take color, text and logos and combine them together have also been incredibly effective with the Starbucks logo being an excellent example of a logo that incorporates a specific shade of green with the companies two tailed mermaid logo and a specific font treatment of the text.
I’ve been very fortunate to have had a couple of things happen to me that have made branding my product or rather branding ‘me’ incredibly easy. The decision to base my costuming around a checkerboard motif is where it all started. When checkerboard items started appear in costuming I wasn’t thinking too much about it, I just liked black and white checks and bit by bit more and more checkered items became a part of my regular costume. Because I wore the same costume at every show, the checkerboard pattern began to be associated with my show and my character and became an incredible hook. People saw the show, remembered the costume and started to call me ‘The Checkerboard Guy’ which became as powerful a hook as the pattern itself had been because the name conjured up the look which conjured up memories of the show which lead to people calling me for gigs…
The name ‘The Checkerboard Guy’ doesn’t actually say much about what I do which, has at times, creates some confusion, but wording introductions or press materials to say things like, ‘Award-Winning Comedy-Juggler David Aiken – The Checkerboard Guy’ is an easy way to combine all of the elements of who I am and what I do into an easy to understand title that still taking advantage of the hooks and branding that I’ve been using for years.
The bottom line with what ever sort of branding you choose to implement is to create a positive impression for your target market and to be remembered when what ever it is that you do is needed by who ever it is that needs it. Anything that you can do to help yourself, your product or your service stick out amongst the competitors, the better.
[…] are a fantastic way to get your name/logo/brand out into the world no doubt about it, but although there are some great pluses, there are some […]