Larry light, a prominent advertising research professional was asked by the editor of the journal of advertising research for his perspective on marketing many decades into the future.Light’s analysis was instructive! he said: “The marketing battle will be a battle of brands,a competition for brand dominance.Busineesses and investors will recognize brands as the company’s most valauable assets.This is a critical concept.It is a vision of how to develop,strengthen,defend and manage a business.It will be more important to own markets that to own factories. The only way to own markets is to own market-dominant brands.”
According to David A Aaker the father of brands, A brand is a distinguishing name and/or symbol(such as a logo,trademark or package design) intended to identify the goods or services of either one seller or group of sellers and to differentiate those goods or services from those of competitors.
A product is something that is made in a factory, a brand is something that is bought by a customer.A product can be copied by a competitor; a brand is unique.A. product can be quickly outdated but a successful brand is timeless.
It was not a until the 20th century that branding become so central to competitors. A distinguishing characteristic of modern marketing has been its focus upon the creation of differentiated brands.Market research is used to help identify and develop bases of brand differentiation using product attributes,names,packages,distribution strategies and advertising.
The main objective to move product and services beyond commodities to branded products is to reduce the primacy of price upon the purchase decision.’
To illustrate the power of brand, look at the the amount of money sunkist got to licence its name to use on products. It was used by cadbury schweppes to launch sunkist orange soda, Ben Myerson candy to launch sunkist fruit gems, lipton to launch sunkist fruit snacks which overcome an established fruit corner snacks from general mills.
Ashton Stratton Advertising 