In an era of mixed media messages, in which brands are extended to the breaking point and marketing theories compete for attention, it is difficult to create effective brands. Drawing on the authors' experience of working with the world's top brands, this book shows how to communicate with customers and make your brand resonate.

Since the publication of his previous best-selling title, BrandSimple, Allen P. Adamson has studied and worked with companies as they've experimented with and integrated digital initiatives into their branding mix. In his new book, BrandDigtial, he clearly demonstrates that in an environment where everything is transparent, brand professionals have unprecedented opportunities to learn more about their customers, and to deliver brand experiences that meet customer expectations better than ever before. Based on over 100 interviews with leaders in both the branding and digital technology industries, Adamson drives home his point by using case studies and first-hand, in-market examples from companies including Hewlett-Packard, Johnson & Johnson, Procter & Gamble, Nike, Ameriprise, Burger King, PepsiCo, and General Mills. Along with putting into proper context the role Google, YouTube, Second Life, social media, and blogs play in the branding process, Adamson shows how the best companies are taking advantage of evolving digital technology and its associated behavior to build stronger bonds with their customers and stronger, more responsive brands.

In the digital age, the old rules of marketing and branding are in desperate need of overhaul. Word of mouth has evolved to word of type as customers promote or deride products and services to a massive Internet audience at a moments notice. Any misstep away from the brand message becomes a catastrophe as companies are no longer afforded the luxury of tweaking their message as a commercial, ad, or story develops, resulting in damage control that not only costs the brand money, but also costs customer support, hurting a brand's image and integrity. In The Edge, Allen Adamson examines how the leading brands of today maintain their dominance in the market utilizing the strategies put forth in his previous books BrandSimple and BrandDigital. Adamson succinctly accounts specific challenges facing the biggest brands of today, from major companies like Apple and General Mills to celebrity brands like Lady Gaga and Jay Z. He reveals the guiding principles employed to ensure the message stays focused, remains clear, and continues to drive a brand to the top of the market.

Profit Brand presents a results-driven view of branding that any CEO or CFO would applaud. While branding strategies often concern themselves with "awareness," "visibility," "impact," and "image," author Nick Wreden shifts the focus to the bottom line. He offers a comprehensive metrics-based approach to branding that allows companies to link branding activities directly with profits. Wreden looks at the inefficiencies of traditional branding strategies that stress customer acquisition over customer retention. Customer loyalty, he argues, is the key to delivering profitability. With this in mind, he explores loyalty schemes, the need to own the customer experience, and the means of leveraging allies as brand ambassadors. He covers topics such as segmentation, optimization, pricing, and communication strategies and explores accountability systems such as six sigma, CRM, and scorecards. Citing examples from global brands such as IBM, Disney, Amex and KLM, the book highlights marketing practices both good and bad.

A young woman tells a focus group that Diet Coke is like her boyfriend. A twenty-something tattoos the logo of Turner Classic Movies onto his skin. These consumers aren’t just using these brands. They are engaging in a rich, complex, ever-changing relationship, and they’ll stay loyal, resisting marketing gimmicks from competitors and influencing others to try the brand they love. How can marketers cultivate and grow the deep relationships that earn this kind of love and drive lasting success for their brands? In Romancing the Brand, branding expert Tim Halloran reveals what it takes to make consumers fall in love with your brand. Step by step,he reveals how to start, grow, maintain, and troubleshoot a flourishing relationship between brand and consumer. Along the way, Halloran shares the secrets behind establishing a mutually beneficial “romance.” Drawing on exclusive, in-depth interviews with managers of some of the world’s most iconic brands, Romancing the Brand arms you with an arsenal of classic and emerging marketing tools—such as benefit laddering and word-of-mouth marketing—that make best-in-class brands so successful. The book is filled with examples, strategies, and tools from powerful brands that consumers love, including Coke, Dos Equis, smartwater, the Atlanta Falcons, Domino’s Pizza, Bounty, Turner Classic Movies, and many more. Ultimately, Romancing the Brand provides marketers with a set of principles for making brands strong, resilient, and beloved—and the insight and confidence to use them.

As the recent Tiger Woods scandal illustrates, brand reputation is more precarious than ever before. True and false information spreads like wildfire in the vast and interconnected social media landscape and even the most venerable brands can be leveled in a flash—by disgruntled customers, competing companies, even internal sources. Here, veteran marketing executive Jonathan Copulsky shows companies and individuals how to play brand defense in the twenty-first century. Five Signs that You Need to Pay More Attention to the Possibility of Brand Sabotage: A group of uniformed employees posts embarrassing YouTube videos, in which they display unprofessional attitudes towards their work. One of your senior executives publicly blames a supplier for product defects, even though they predate your relationship with the supplier. Your competitor's ads trumpet their solution to the performance problems associated with your most recent product. A customer unhappy with changes made to your product design launches a Facebook group, which attracts 5,000 fans. Your outsource partner is prominently featured in numerous blogs and websites describing allegations of worker mistreatment and workplace safety hazards.

Why do consumers pay a premium for a Dell or Hewlett-Packard laptop, when they could get a generic machine with similar features for a lower price? The answer lies in the power of branding. A brand is not just a logo. It is the image your company creates of itself, from your advertising look to your customer interaction style. It makes a promise for your business, and that promise becomes the sticking point for customer loyalty. And that loyalty and trust is why, so to speak, your laptops sell and your competitors’ don’t. Whatever your business is, whether it’s large or small, global or local, Branding For Dummies gives you the nuts and bolts know-how to create, improve, or maintain a brand. This plain-English guide will help you brand everything from products to services to individuals. It gives you step-by-step advice on assembling a top-notch branding team, positioning your brand, handling advertising and promotion, avoiding blunders, and keeping your brand viable, visible, and healthy. You’ll get familiar with branding essentials like: Defining your company’s identity Developing logos and taglines Launching your brand marketing plan Managing and protecting your brand Fixing a broken brand Making customers loyal brand champions Filled with easy-to-navigate icons, charts, figures, top ten lists, and humor, Branding For Dummies is the straight-up, jargon-free resource for making your brand stand out from the pack—and for positioning your business to reap the ensuing rewards.