Creating a brand before there is a product…
Grant McCracken – who I had the pleasure to talk with recently – has a really interesting post on his blog about a startup idea for a consultancy that specializes in the creation of brands…brands that are product free that is. The idea is that once the brand is created, you sell it to companies.
He believes that companies that would buy pre-launched brands like that could shave months off their go-to-market time.
Now, I was one of those guys that believed that there must be an organic connection between the product and its brand – actually between product “usage” and its brand. But then again, throughout my career as a marketer I have also always preferred marketing/selling the vision/idea about the product without showing/demoing the product itself – believing that I could create a stronger impression in people’s mind without the constraints of the actual product. Am I mixing things up? How do you get through to early adopters and innovators if you have no products? Don’t they love to tinker with the innovation, not just the concept?
Considering that Grant is an expert on branding and I am not – I am really intrigued about this and will noodle on this one for some time to come.
If you haven’t read it before, his blog is *very good* – talking about branding and marketing at the intersection of anthropology and economics (and complexity theory).
[Technorati Tags: branding marketing culture]
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