Building Borderless Brands:

Rethinking Innovation
"When all think alike, then no one is thinking."

— Walter Lippman

Being a brand is like owing an intangible asset and has its own distinct identity in
consumer’s mind. It is the soul, spirit or the way and the image of company itself,
recognizable and easily recalled. Branding is becoming the most considerable part of action
for companies to expand globally. Being a strong brand is the way to differentiate yourself
in market. A brand is a relationship, not a name. Forget the old definitions. Brands have
always been relationships. We build brands by relating to markets, not just by repeating
names. Brands develop around trust. It's that simple... and that complex. Earlier it use to
take companies a number of years to get well established, to be known as trusted brand
implying a mark of trust and quality.

Brands generate belief as the result of an innovation process that can broadly be broken
down into:

1. Identify a market opportunity that justifies belief and invest in a specific

competency.
2. Develop that competency to a point beyond the initial market opportunity so that as
the belief is realized, the business can grow.
3. Develop a reputation for the brand by consistently delivering the product/service.

In my opinion, sustained market-making innovation beats advertising hands-down as a

powerful way of forming a strong and distinct mental impression and gaining continual
brand recognition—as Jean Noel Kapferer puts it in his book Strategic Brand Management:
"Brands are rejuvenated by new products matching new needs, not by advertising."

By: Anamika Tarafdar

Branding through innovation was not much into the picture until the world witnessed the
shift from the early production concept to marketing concept. The world witnessed a flood
of innovation from companies like Apple, Microsoft, Dell and Sony and many more. In the
60s, Jaguar's designers identified an opportunity for a groundbreaking sports car and
rightly believed that the E-type would give them sustainable ownership of the category. In
the 70s, Sony uncovered the latent desire to have your own music in your own space,
making the Walkman the teenage product du jour; and in the 80s Apple created a stylish,
user friendly personal computer giving the Apple brand the right to innovate in a wide
range of categories where personal computing and style overlap.

Innovation is not just the new technology; it is the way an idea is put forward to bring the
masses in to create a difference to the company and subsequently the society. How much time
did Google, Facebook or Twitter took to be a brand, hardly ten and five respectively. What
was their key to being a strong brand; Innovation.

"Capital isn't so important in business. Experience isn't so important. You can get both
these things. What is important is ideas. If you have ideas, you have the main asset you
need, and there isn't any limit to what you can do with your business and your life."

— Harvey Firestone

Ideas that bring a wave of freshness in the environment, that rips off the silence of market,
that raves through the consumer market is so called innovation and most importantly it’s
not just a wave it’s a tide that keeps coming back to the shores, hitting with new force,
energy and angle.

But what it takes to be innovative? I say when you are exposed to different markets you tend
to innovate, when you Cross the Borders, you are compelled to innovate in order to sustain, as
said in business jargon. When you are forced to “think globally but act locally”, the innovation
is the next step in the ladder to be a Global Brand or Borderless Brand.

For companies like Coca-Cola or Microsoft or Apple or 3M, Google or Virgin, it was not just
one idea of their, that has made them world’s most innovative organization with a highly
distinct image. It was “Rethinking Innovation” which has brought them building a Global,
Borderless Brands.

Branding also means knowing your competitor, a hundred battles many won and many lost.
Dramatize to differentiate and make excitement to project an image larger than life.
Branding is so important today than never before.

What is the 21st century mantra to sustain Brand?

By: Anamika Tarafdar
  The part of consumer behavior that will study the subconscious part human
psychology would be the next breakthrough. When you cross the borders to serve a
new segment with different characteristics you need to kneel down to that level to
identify those potential segments and their demands. And when you combine your
opportunities with an idea or innovation it creates a bang.
Being a borderless or global brand means a responsibility of sustaining customer’s
trust and expectations. Customers profoundly identify themselves with the brands
they use, brands are replications of their own identity.

 Defending your brand while expanding into new markets, is one major activity to be
done while crossing the borders. Before you attack, you ought to be strong enough
to defend, but how? Answer is simple being precautious of what steps you take, be
innovative and internally strong. Until and unless you are strong from inside no
competition has the capacity to wipe you out of the market. Google is one good
example where only 10,000 employees are running the world on their tips of
fingers.

 Using media to create borderless brands. Media is so powerful these days that it can
make a brand in a short span of time but can also take you down to hell in a shorter
span. A correct mix of media and creativity can make feel the customers that the
product belongs to them, and that builds a brand.

 Stepping across the dotted line. Following what always has been done never makes
you innovate, when you step out of the line, thinking out of the box, running out of
the league makes you rethink innovation to sustain as a global brand.

 Brand consistency through service delivery in a culturally diverse world. As stated

earlier sustaining the trust of customer’s is one big challenge for brands. When you
stand by customer’s expectation then only you are successful in creating a Global
brand, some distinct thing that every single person on this earth identifies you with
them.

Innovations has never been on stop and neither would they be, its facet changes with time,
this era is about building borderless brands with the weapon of innovations. And when you
are stuck up but the aim of sustainability remains you rethink innovations.

By: Anamika Tarafdar