What Makes a Brand (Stand Out)?

The six elements of a successful brand

What makes a brand a brand, and what makes a successful brand? In this article we’re going to go beyond logos, color codes, and fonts — and talk about the elements at the core of brand identity, brand success, and effective brand management.

In branding, style is frequently confused with substance.
— Wally Olins

There’s something magical about branding. Something elusive and magical. Working in marketing for a number of years now, I’ve always found it an amazing psychological fact that by doing branding and marketing right, you can add intangible value to a product or service.

Research has pointed out that when drinking a glass of coca-cola, we will subjectively rate our experience of the drink as significantly better when we know or believe it’s coca-cola, as opposed to a cheaper/nameless brand.

Even when, if logo’s are switched or removed from sight, we rate various colas as roughly equal in taste.

This can be interpreted as follows: by consistently ‘loading’ a brand by using specific imagery, words, stories, pictures and logo’s and connecting them to a brand, you can make the subjective experience that someone has with a product or service