Brand Not Dead! and traditional brand tools are dying.

When the Internet is not yet popular, many people think that the brand will become history as the internet grows. Some frontier observers in the IT economic circles are also disseminating this view, including Carl Chapillo (Carl Shapiro) and Hal R. Varian (Hal R. Varian, current chief economist of Google). The two men jointly published a powerful book on the rules of information (information) in 1999. The book predicts that the power of the brand will shrink as people get access to free information. This view has proved to be wrong. In fact, the Internet is now the world of several big brands. In addition, the expansion of the Internet also reflects the strong adaptability of the weak brands. Recently, Itamar Simonsen, a professor at Stanford University, and Imanuel Rosen (Emanual Rosen) in his new book Itamar Simonson: What really affects customers in the information age? (differs Value:what really influences Customers in the age of (nearly) Perfect) that marketers need to reassess the impact of brands on consumer buying decisions 。 They claim that brands are less important when consumers can access product quality information through better channels such as user evaluation, expert opinion or social media. "The decline of big brands follows a clear logic: the primary role of brands is to make it easier for consumers to choose products." If consumers can easily access the information of users ' comments, expert opinions and so on, the value of the brand will be reduced. The development of mobile networks is a strong proof of this theory. There is no doubt that the era of Simonson and Rosen's description of consumers getting a lot of product information in a timely fashion is no longer far away from us. However, this does not mean that the brand must Die "theory, now more than 15 years ago when the proposed more correct. The opposite is true. With the digital penetration, the brand becomes more important and more valuable. Look at the current list of brands is clear, for example, in the digital brand, Apple, Google, Microsoft, IBM, Intel and Samsung and other brands, almost in most rankings occupy the top 10. This is not because people no longer like Coca-Cola, McDonald's, Mercedes-Benz these brands, but the rapid development of digital brands beyond them. If the brand is no longer important, then how can the Internet world be dominated by the digital brand? Why do people prefer Google search to Bing search? Why are Apple products expensive and poorly functioning, but can be the most valuable companies? Because the brand is still very important. The mistake of Simonson and Rosen is that they confuse the value, role, and meaning of a brand in a digital economy when they are used to build a brand. Google and AppleThe reason why they can surpass other old brands is that they have built their own brands. Google rarely spends money on traditional ads. But Google is smart enough to boast that, although all its revenue comes from advertising, it doesn't brag about it. Instead, Google has maintained the meaning of the brand and its relevance to the user's life by offering free services and innovative ideas. Apple reshaped the brand with a lower marketing budget and a "different" slogan. They have withdrawn the traditional brand image advertisement, and will build the brand the work to focus in the design fine, the comprehensive unified product experience. Apple has strictly limited its budget to dull product ads. The role of a brand is never just a matter of information. Brands should provide users with meaning and meet emotional needs, and these basic human needs have never changed. Conversely, as consumers experience information overload, people may be more inclined to information that they already know or comfort. Of course, disruptive digital services will continue to evolve and even dominate temporarily, but it is still a long way from the development of popular services like Pinterest and WhatsApp to price-controlled brands. Therefore, for marketers and managers, rather than discuss the brand ", rather than reflect: when advertising, public relations, corporate CIS and other traditional brand tools to decline, how should we strengthen brand building?" One answer is to make the brand more central, not the other way around. In this highly transparent digital world, consumers can easily know the consistency of business. Enterprises can no longer simply segment the boundaries between marketing and product development, communication and services, but must integrate themselves into the customer value chain. Products and services to learn to tell stories, learn to throw away the cloak of advertising, to convey value to users. As information contacts become increasingly easy and brand value becomes more important, learning to tell meaningful stories through actions and products will be the only way to win a brand.