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A brand is not a logo, a product or a character. Your brand is not even what you say (or think) it is. It is something that exists in the minds of your consumers – a perception created by their emotional experiences. A brand is to a business what a reputation is to a person. It cannot be bought or fabricated; it can only be earned over time.

To cope with the flood of information and variety that swamps them daily, consumers need to filter the information somehow. The marketplace has never been more crowded or noisy than it is today. What makes a consumer choose one brand over another? The answer is as simple as it is challenging:

Trust
n. Reliance on and confidence in the truth, worth, reliability, etc. of a person or thing.

Who’s Your Granny?

The legend of Ouma Rusks begins way back in 1939, during the Great Depression. The little town of Molteno in the Eastern Cape was brought to its knees along with the rest of the country. But Ouma Greyvenstein wouldn’t be beaten. Inspired to fund mission work, she invested her scant means in her great talent: baking rusks. Her old family recipe was a commercial hit and the rest is history. She lives on in South African homes to this day. And many expats miss her as dearly as they miss their own grandmothers back home. Even though the brand is now owned by Nola, which is owned by Foodcorp. Even though the recipe is probably nothing like the one Ouma Greyvenstein’s ouma passed down to her. She even had a make-over recently: her new shweshwe apron proves that she is every South African’s gogo – a true icon of our collective culture.

So what’s your story?

Brands have always been about stories. The success of a brand has always hinged on winning the buyer’s trust. Traditional advertising’s messages kept evolving in response to the changing market, while the game plan stayed the same: Put your message out there and get people to buy your stuff. But it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that a major paradigm shift is rocking the marketing world. Traditional advertising isn’t working like it used to.

The market has evolved once again – nothing new. But this time, simply changing the message will not be enough. The very mind-set behind media communication needs a radical transformation.

The Good News

This is not the end of the world. It is the beginning of a revolution. And, like all good revolutions, it’s levelling the playing field and giving power to the people. Social media (real people having real conversations on the web) got Obama into the White House. It liberated Tunisia. And Egypt. It gave homesick expats an Ouma Rusks Facebook page. If branding is about storytelling and building relationships (earning trust), social media is redefining it. It also packs a whole lot more bang into your buck: its been said that marketing online and via social networks costs 64% less, per lead generated, than traditional advertising. It’s a brand new future.

Curious about the How To? Watch this space for the next instalment:
“The Short & Sweet of Social Media”.

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