Kotler and Keller (Marketing Management, 2015) said that, in general, a product is anything that can be offered to a market to satisfy a desire or need, including physical goods, services, experiences, events, people, places, properties, organizations, information and ideas.

This means that a product can be anything from a stay at a hotel, a flight, a language course, to clothes, food, toothpaste, etc.

To illustrate the definition of the product and its place in defining branding, we will use the example of water: water is a free resource that people must use to live and survive. However, water has become a product that people and companies have begun to market by selling water in bottles and plastic bottles.

Water always looks the same, doesn’t it? It is liquid and transparent. So how can different companies sell the same product, but persuade people to buy their bottled water instead of water from competing companies?

THE ANSWER IS: BY CREATING A BRAND.

The American Marketing Association has defined branding as a name, design, symbol, or any other characteristic that identifies a seller’s goods or services as different from those of other sellers.

We think of a brand as the idea or image that people have in mind when they think of a company’s products, services and activities, both in practice (“shoes are light”) and emotionally (” the shoes make me feel stronger ”). Therefore, not only the physical characteristics create a brand, but also the feelings that consumers develop towards the company or towards its products. This combination of physical and emotional cues is triggered when exposed to the name, logo, visual identity, or even communicated messages.

A product can be easily copied by other competitors in the market, but a brand will always be unique. For example, the taste of Pepsi and Coca-Cola is very similar, but for some reason, some people are more attracted to Pepsi and others to Coca-Cola.

Let us illustrate this by taking the example of water again. The product sold is water. But to persuade people to buy a certain type of water, companies have developed different water brands, such as Evian, Perrier or Fiji. Each of these brands offers a different meaning to water: Evian makes you feel younger, Perrier is invigorating, Fiji water is pure, natural and healthy and so on.

Brand is the feeling that a person has for a certain product or for a company. Each person creates their own vision of a product or a company. Brand popularity increases or decreases depending on how people feel when they use their products.

Branding is the process of giving meaning to a specific company, product or service by creating and shaping a brand in the minds of consumers.

The goal is to attract and retain loyal customers by delivering a product that is always in line with what the brand promises.

WHO IS THE BRAND INFLUENCING?

Consumers: As discussed above, a brand offers consumers a quick decision when they feel undecided about the same product from different companies.

Employees / shareholders / third parties: in addition to helping consumers distinguish similar products, successful branding strategies add to a company’s reputation. This good can affect a number of people, from consumers to employees, investors, shareholders, suppliers and distributors. For example, if you don’t like or feel connected to a brand, you probably don’t want to work for it. However, if you feel that the brand understands you and offers you products that inspire you, you will probably want to work for it and be part of its world.

HOW IS A BRAND CREATED?

Companies tend to use different tools to create and form a brand. For example, branding can be achieved by:

Visual identity of the brand (logo, website, colors, etc.)
Advertising and communications
Product and packaging design
In-store experience
Pricing
Sponsorships and partnerships
In a nutshell, the product is what you sell, the brand is the image created by the product you sell, and branding is the strategy for creating that image.

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