BRANDING vs. MARKETING - WHAT's THE DIFFERENCE?

BRANDING & MARKETING

Welcome to the Envision Brand Marketing Blog Spot and the very first blog post! 

When creating a name for my agency I deliberately chose to put the words "brand marketing" in the title because they are the ingredients to the capabilities and services Envision provides. They are also essential to the marketing and advertising industry because they encompass the who, why, what, when, how, and where. Unfortunately, these two words either get confused as one in the same or they get ignored/forgotten under the pressure and impatience of creating a profitable business.  So what's the difference between branding and marketing and why are they important?

Branding and your brand are the WHO, WHAT, and WHY, and it must consistently identify, define, and verbalize what you dreamt about creating for your business before you made it a reality. To take it a step further, the brand is the identity that is perceived by an audience; it's a noun, a person, place or thing. Branding is the specific actions and characteristics the brand embodies on a daily basis (internally and externally). Once brands have taken their dream to reality I've noticed in my 17 plus years in the marketing industry that the brand and branding tend to take a back seat to shiny new social trends and marketing tactics. This clearly ignores the WHY and focuses on HOW, WHEN, and WHERE, which leaves out the foundation and unique value as to why a consumer or business would be attracted to purchasing your service or product in the first place. Your brand should organically live and breathe within every aspect of your company; without branding, you're just pushing or selling services/products in hopes that people understand your WHO, WHAT, and WHY. 

Once your brand and branding are established you can then, and only then, begin developing internal and external marketing. Marketing by definition is the relationship builder between the brand and the intended target audience. But similar to dating and finding  "the one", you flounder unless you know who you are, what you have to offer, and why it's valuable to someone else. Not to mention you need trustworthy support and advocates to help you grow while holding you accountable.

That being said, marketing encompasses many different aspects in order to develop and implement it with success. The Business Dictionary provides four (4) key elements called the Four P's, Product, Price, Place, Promotional Strategy, which summarizes how marketing is organized and executed.  Each of the Four P's requires special attention and research to construct leading to the intersection where marketing meets strategy to formulate an execution plan.  What's crucial and sometimes overlooked in the development of the marketing strategy is the "brand". A marketing strategy must be led by the branding and be integrated throughout or the return on investment (ROI) will be unsuccessful.  ​

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The topic of brand/branding versus marketing has many layers and can spawn off into many different conversations, but this blog is to clearly identify their differences. The relationship of brand vs. marketing must coexist if a brand business wants to thrive. The BRAND is the story and the BRANDING and MARKETING are the storytellers. ​\

Thank you for taking the time to read the Envision Brand Marketing Blog. Feel free to leave thoughts, comments or question regarding Brand vs. Marketing.