Building business by building a masterbrand
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LYNN UPSHAW is a leading US independent brand/marketing strategist who advises Fortune 100 and Internet companies. He is the author of ‘Building Brand Identity’ and co-author of ‘The Masterbrand Mandate’. He also co-authors (with Robert Liljenwall) The e.Brand Letter, a monthly online analysis of Internet branding.
EARL TAYLOR is a senior vice president with the Cambridge, MA, office of Research International. He has conducted primary research and consulted on a broad spectrum of issues relating to branding, customer loyalty and new product development for a wide range of clients, specialising in intangible service industries such as IT, telecommunications and energy. He holds a doctorate in sociology from Harvard University.
Abstract It is becoming apparent that the information or knowledge economy is operating within a much broader (and older) affinity economy, rooted in the very human nature of community building based on trust. That is, companies must compete for the right or permission to get to know, and thus better serve, their current and prospective customers. The brand, pervasive and enacted throughout the company, is the ideal vehicle for obtaining that permission and trust.
Lynn Upshaw Upshaw and Associates, Suite 245, 68 Mitchell Boulevard, San Raphael, 94903, CA, USA Tel: ⫹1 415 507 9193; Fax: ⫹1 415 507 9194; E-mail: [email protected]
In ‘The Masterbrand Mandate’1 the authors argue that the rise of companies that are managed as coherent, powerful ‘masterbrands’ is an effective response to the challenges of competing within such an affinity economy. Specifically, masterbrands create and are in turn ‘owned’ by brand communities of employees, customers, strategic allies and investors who share and help enact a common vision of what the masterbrand means and promises. As with other human communities, masterbrand communities exist only in and through their individual members, while transcending them as well. In the ultimate example of outsourcing to the experts, masterbrand-managed companies ‘outbrand’ the competition by deploying branding resources throughout the brand community. The discipline of masterbrand management
thus requires a thorough understanding of, and engagement in, the collaborative process of community building. In addition, the rise of online communities and the rocky but inevitable growth of B2B and B2C e-commerce create a virtual laboratory for distilling the principles of masterbrand management, and illustrate the dos and don’ts of building masterbrand communities.
THE MASTERBRAND MODEL During much of the 20th century, many product brands operated more as icons of awareness and accumulators of name and slogan recall than as sophisticated marketing instruments. Even after the creation of the brand management system at Procter & Gamble in the early 1930s, brands were often not draped in a particularly rich strategic
䉷 HENRY STEWART PUBLICATIONS 1350-231X BRAND MANAGEMENT VOL. 8, NO. 6, 417–426 JULY 2001
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tapestry, although some (such as CocaCola,
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