MODULE TWO

CORPORATE IMAGE, IDENTITY

AND BRAND PORTFOLIO

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 Contents
• Corporate image and identity
• Corporate communication
• Brand portfolio
• Component of brand portfolio

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 A: CORPORATE IMAGE AND IDENTITY
• These terms mean different things, but they
are sometimes used interchangeably.
• The organization identity is a multilateral
combination of the central character of
an organization. It lays in its manifestation i.e its
logo, company colours, house style of dress,
decor and so on. WHEREAS
• The corporate image is the impression that
people have about the organization as a
whole. The two are linked just to imply and to
infer but they describe two different concepts.
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 1: CORPORATE IMAGE

• Image is a description that appears in

public’s mind about the corporate eg. its
service, products quality, culture,
individuals, etc.
• In most of the literature on image, the
terms reputation and image are used
interchangeably. Dowling (2001), however,
distinguishes between corporate image
and corporate reputation.
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 CORPORATE IMAGE Cont…….

• According to him, corporate image is the

global evaluation (comprised of a set of
beliefs and feelings) a person has about
an organization.
• It is the set of beliefs, ideas and
impression a customer, shareholder or an
employee holds regarding the company.
It can be negative or positive.
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 CORPORATE IMAGE Cont…….
• Corporate reputation is the attributed values
(such as authenticity, honesty, responsibility
and integrity) evoked of the company.
• Dowling then contends that if a person's
beliefs and feelings about a company (its
image) fit their personal values regarding
proper corporate behavior, then the person
will attribute a good reputation to that
organization. Therefore organizations must not
only know what others think about them, they
need first and foremost to know themselves.
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 CORPORATE IMAGE Cont…….

• Corporate image is the whole image built

from the corporate’s components (product
quality, export success, financial health,
employees attitude, social responsibility of
the environment, etc.).
• Corporate image is begun from its identity:
name/ company logo, employee uniform,
company profile, and non-physical identity
such as the corporate’s philosophy as well
as work and communication style.
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 CORPORATE IMAGE Cont…….

OTHER WAYS OF DEVELOPING GOOD

CORPORATE IMAGE
• Better quality and pricing techniques
• Attractiveness of products & services
• Discounts, credits, after sales services
• Relations with press (media)
• Social responsibility

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 CORPORATE IMAGE Cont…….

• Employee welfare
• Consumer service & welfare
• Extent of R&D in product modification
• Extent of innovations

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 2: CORPORATE IDENTITY

• We have a tendency to personify things:

it's a way to build a relationship with our
surroundings and belongings. By
unconsciously establishing a personal
relationship to the corporations we
choose to do business with and the
products that we buy, we build a
foundation for loyalty.

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 CORPORATE IDENTITY……………

• Whether our feelings about a product or

corporation are positive or negative
depend on the how we perceive the
company and the experience that we
have with them and their products.

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 OVERVIEW OF CORPORATE IDENTITY

• A pleased customer is a loyal customer, and a

loyal customer is someone who feels a sort
of familiarity with the company's core values,
or identity. This is why it is so important for
corporations to determine the best possible
relationship between their identity and the
identities of their products, which act as
representatives of the company.
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 OVERVIEW Cont…..

• Corporate identity merges strategy,

culture, and communications to present a
memorable personality to prospects and
customers.
• The term is closely linked to corporate
philosophy, the company's business
mission and values, as well as corporate
personality, the distinct corporate culture
reflecting this philosophy, and corporate
image.
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 OVERVIEW Cont…..

• The main objective of corporate identity

is to achieve a favorable image among
the company's prospects and customers.
When a corporation is favorably regarded
this is likely to result in loyalty. If the
corporate identity is the self-portrayal of
a company, then the corporate image is
the perception of an organization by the
audience.
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 OVERVIEW Cont…..

• The closer the corporate image is to the

corporate identity; the closer the public's
perception of a company is to how the
company defines itself, making for
superior corporate communication.

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 OVERVIEW Cont…..

• For example, most companies have

access to the same technology. If they
want to further distinguish themselves,
the strategy must rely on another factor
than technology e.g the user experience.
As the audience's focus changes
constantly, corporate strategies must
move in the same direction as the
customer.
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 OVERVIEW Cont…..

• The consumer's impression of a company, or

the corporate image, is highly influenced by
how he or she experiences the company's
products.
• The product identity, the sum of the products
formal and functional properties, will help the
user shape a mental image of the product
manufacturer.
• Therefore the corporation needs to carefully
plan what it wants to communicate through its
product, and how.
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 OVERVIEW Cont…..

• Establishing a solid corporate identity is

vital for companies in today's
overcrowded market. Because
consumers are increasingly overwhelmed
by the number of choices presented to
them, it is crucial to differentiate your
product or service from the competition.
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 OVERVIEW Cont…..

• Dowling (2001) defines corporate identity as

the symbols and names used by an
organization to identify itself to people (i.e
letterhead, business cards, news releases,
annual reports, sales bulletins, cartons,
labels, stamps, logos, trucks, ships &
business cars).
• For instance Nike doesn't even need to use
its name anymore; the "Swoosh" logo is
sufficient.
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 Elements of corporate identity

• Corporate color. Corporate colors makes the

elements of corporate identity more
attractive, better remembered, able to make a
strong emotional influence.
• The main objective in developing corporate
colors is to pick them up in a way, so that they
will cause a persistent association with
company’s field or direction. When choosing
colors, marketers need to consider the
psychological and emotional impact, like
sympathy and trust to organization.
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 Elements……..

• Corporate font. This reflects and

emphasizes brand features and
peculiarities. Corporate font can be one
of the best elements in corporate
identity. Recognition of a nicely-designed
corporate font is quite big (i.e., recall the
font of Coca logos).

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 Elements……..
• Business card (card). The traditional
piece of contact information of a
company representative. Usually it is
made of heavy paper or cardboard,
rarely of plastic, wood (plywood) or
metal. Conventionally all cards can be
divided into personal, business and
corporate information.
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 Elements……..
• Letterhead. This is the face of the
company. Every document that comes
out of the company should be printed on
company letterhead. That’s why it should
have high-quality, real and memorable
design.

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 Elements……..
• Designed envelopes. These are special
envelopes for corresponding, mailing
flyers, transferring official information,
wrapped up in envelope with corporate
branding mark. Envelopes usually don’t
contain many elements and their design
has to be concise and rigorous. When
selecting the size of the envelope one
often focuses on its function.
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 Elements……..

• Company Logo. Logo represents the

company image, depicted a graphical
miniature, and aimed to remind
consumers that your company exists and
that it is just what they need.
• Style. Style is a set of certain signs that
distinguish an individual from others. It is
what we remember first, what attracts us,
or, on the contrary, permanently deprives
the desire to repeat any interaction with
this person.
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 ROLES OF CORPORATE IDENTITY
Corporate Identity is important for a number of
reasons as depicted below:-
• The primary roles of identity are to create
awareness, trigger recognition of the
organization, and activate an already stored
image of the organization.
• A purposeful identity communicated with
consistent symbols can also inspire confidence
among stakeholder groups because they will
have a clearer picture of the organization.
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 ROLES Cont………………

• It helps in raising motivation among

employees by creating a "we"
feeling, allowing people to identify
with their organizations.
• It can inspire customer confidence,
which can be the basis of long-term
relationships.
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 ROLES Cont…

• Finally, it can inspire confidence in the

financial community, among the
suppliers of capital.
• If the organization’s corporate identity is
confused or non-existent, the public
relations programme may start with an
overhaul and implementation of a new
identity.
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 TYPES OF IDENTITY

• The type of corporate identity will

determine the characteristics that link
the product to its company or brand.
According to Wally Olins, one of the
world's leading branding consultants,
there are three kinds of corporate
identity.
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 TYPES OF IDENTITY Cont…..

a) The identity can be monolithic, meaning

that the whole company uses one visual
style and that the consistency between
the corporate identity and the product
identity is very strong, the product
reflecting the corporation directly.

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 TYPES OF IDENTITY Cont…..

b)The identity can also be endorsed where

the subsidiary companies (brands) have
their own style, but the parent company
remains recognizable in the background.
In this case, the link between the
corporation and its different brands may
take the shape of a common factor, tying
the different brands together.
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 TYPES OF IDENTITY Cont…..

• Finally, there is the branded corporate

identity in which the subsidiaries have
their own style, and the parent company
is not recognizable.
• The products represent the brand
identities rather than the corporate
identity.

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 TYPES OF IDENTITY Cont…..

• All the same, a strong general corporate

identity remains of great importance, as
it defines the guidelines and strategies of
the subordinate brands.
• Therefore the identities of the products
of each brand are consistent with the
main corporate identity and values.

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Communicating Corporate Identity through Products

• Products are the most important

spokespersons for any brand or company.
Therefore, the key to defining your corporate
identity resides in how well a company
communicates its visions and values by means
of the identity and image of its products,
always keeping the target audience
involvement in mind.

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 Communicating Corporate Identity through Products Cont….

• The public’s image of a company is

largely a result of the user’s product
experience, which should be supported
by an effective communication system.
The company’s products are the items
with the most impact on how the market
perceives and interpret a brand or
corporate image and identity.
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 Communicating Corporate Identity through Products Cont….

• The first step is to get a thorough

understanding of how the corporate voice is
refining the brands and/or company’s
identity (history, philosophy, vision, mission,
and personality), its image and its strategies.
• Next step, the ideas and attributes
mentioned above need to be translated into
a design, or brand language.
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 Communicating Corporate Identity through Products Cont….

• The last step is to transfer this language

to products. Some companies rely
entirely on their products when it comes
to expressing their core values.
Properties like seriousness, creativity,
user friendliness, or even market leader
must be conveyed carefully through the
web pages overall design and structure.
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The relation between corporate identity and corporate
image

• According to Dowling (2001): A good

corporate identity can affect corporate
image in two ways. People make the
association between the company and its
identity, i.e., they recognize the
organization.

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The relation btn corporate identity and corporate image Cont…

• The identity elements can help them

recall their image of the organization,
which may include a mental picture (an
actual picture of a building, perhaps)
and/or sensory feelings (for example
whether or not the interaction with the
organization was pleasurable).

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The relation btn corporate identity and corporate image Cont…

• According to Smith: Smith states that the

corporate image normally developed
from the corporate identity as indicated
below:

• CORPORATE IDENTITY:
- Products & Services (customer care, product quality)
- Social responsibility, ethical behavior, and community affairs
- Environments (office, showrooms, factories)
- Communications (advertisements, brochures, etc)

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 B: CORPORATE COMMUNICATION

• This term encompasses all the

communications activities which an
organization undertakes as a corporate
entity: everything in effect, which comes
from head office, is aimed at all staff or
which reflects the organization as a
whole.

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 Continue…..

• The concept of corporate communication

could be seen as an integrative
communication structure linking
stakeholders to the organization.
• It includes the organization’s website,
annual reports, corporate identity
programmes, corporate advertising and
most investor relations activity.
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 Continue…..

• Corporate communication is a set of

activities involved in managing and
coordinating all internal and external
communications aimed at creating
favourable point of view among
stakeholders on which the company
depends.
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OR 43
 Continue…..

• According to Haynes (2003), corporate

communication is the total
communication activity generated by a
company, body or institute to its public(s)
to achieve its planned objectives. The
publics encompasses internal (i.e
employees and shareholders) and
external publics (i.e agencies, channel
partners, government, media etc)
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 Continue…..

• It is the messages issued by a corporate

organization, body, or institute to its
audiences, such as employees, media,
channel partners and the general public.
Organizations aim to communicate the
same message to all its stakeholders, to
transmit coherence, credibility and
ethics.

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 Continue…..

• Corporate Communications help

organizations explain their mission,
combine its many visions and values into
a cohesive message to stakeholders.

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 C: BRAND PORTFOLIO

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 1: Overview of Brand Portfolio

• A brand is a name, term, sign,

symbol or design, or a combination
of them, intended to identify the
goods or services of one seller or
group of sellers and to differentiate
them from those of competitors.
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 Continue…..

• Product branding is a well-known

phenomenon in marketing. A brand
is a promise to the customer that
goes beyond the generic product,
the technical and physical attributes.

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 Continue…..
• When selling a branded product the
company promises that the consumer
will achieve special qualities by using the
product, different qualities than when
using a similar non branded or different
branded product.
• A typical message from the company is
“when using this product you will be
more attracted, become better looking
and signal a higher social class“.
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 Continue…..
• By using the branded product the
consumer can communicate his/her
lifestyle or wanted lifestyle.
• On the other side corporate branding
refers to the practice of using a company’s
name as a product brand name.
• It is an attempt to leverage corporate
brand equity to create product brand
recognition.
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 Continue…..

•Corporate branding: Attempt to attach higher

credibility to a new product by associating it with a
well established company name.
• Unlike a family-branding (which can be applied
only to a specific family of product), corporate
branding can be used for every product marketed
by a firm.

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 Continue…..

• The size of an organization’s brand

portfolio can vary significantly from
industry to industry and even from
business to business.
• The different brands under which the
company presents its products and
services allow the organization to
differentiate its products from its
other lines.
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 Continue…..

• A brand portfolio is simply the collection

of brands under a company’s control.
Small businesses with just one shop may
have only a single brand, but large and
multinational corporations may have
dozens of distinct brands in their
portfolios.

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 Continue…..

• In some cases, a business may present

the same product or line under
different brands in different markets;
each of these brands is a component
of the company’s brand portfolio.

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 Reasons for Brand Portfolios
• Increasing shelf presence and retailer
dependence in the store
• Attracting consumers seeking variety
• Increasing internal competition within
the firm
• Yielding economies of scale in
advertising, sales, merchandising, and
distribution
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 2: Elements of managing Brand Portfolio

• A business needs to stay relevant in a

dynamic market in which new categories
and sub-categories are emerging,
mergers or brand extensions are taking
place. Too often a brand finds its market
share declining despite retaining strong
awareness, image, and even loyalty.
Customers are simply no longer buying.
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 Continue…..

• Managing brands in a coordinated

way helps a company to avoid
confusing its customers, investing in
overlapping product-development
and marketing efforts and
multiplying its brands at its own
rather that its competitor’s expense.

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 Continue…..

Here are five key elements to consider

in managing a brand portfolio:
a) Differentiate
• Differentiation is the only alternative
to price-dominated competition.
However, achieving a sustainable
point of differentiation is difficult.
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 Continue…..

• Offering base points of differentiation

that are effective is generally short-
lived as competitors copy them quickly.
• A portfolio solution is to create
branded differentiators, branded
features, services or programmes that
provide a sustainable point of
differentiation.
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 Continue…..

b) Energize
• Most brands can use more energy. The
energy gap problem is particularly
troublesome, ironically, for market-leader
firms in mature categories that often have an
desirable reputation of high quality,
trustworthiness and innovation. Such brands
nearly always tend to be viewed as boring.
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 Continue…..

• The portfolio solution is to create a

branded energizer, a branded product,
promotion, sponsorship programme or
other entity that will enhance and
energize a target brand. The target
brand which may be boring, can be
linked to a brand that has substantial
energy.
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 Continue…..

c) Extend
• Most companies desire growth in order to
create organizational vitality and to realize
the objectives of investors. Even if a
growth sub-market is discovered for which
competition is modest and an attractive
offering is available, a brand asset will be
needed to enable the growth option.
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 Continue…..

• A portfolio solution is to create and

influence brand assets. A brand
extension strategy is useful to build
brand platforms that will eventually
span many products by using sub-
brands rather than looking to
incremental extensions.

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 Continue…..

d) Clarify
• Consumers and employees become
frustrated in trying to determine what
the firm stands for in the various
product-market settings. There is also a
lack of brand-building focus, resulting
in ineffective use of brand-building
budgets.
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 Continue…..

• A portfolio strategy can enhance focus

and clarity through reducing the
number of brands or to clarify the roles
that the various brands would play,
develop them for success in those roles
and make sure they are used
consistently.

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 Continue…..

e) Start and end with the consumer

• The starting point for marketers is to
define categories as consumer do.
• The marketers need a disciplined way
of evaluating their brands’
opportunities, like analyzing the need
states – the intersection between what
customers want and how they want it.
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 3: Corporate branding strategies
• Three different strategies can be
approached for corporate branding:
• Monolithic brand identity is when a
company uses only one name and one
visual style for all it products. The strength
is the simplicity and the potential for
growth. The weakness is that one
happening; one scandal can cause severe
damage even to big strong brands.
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 Continue…..

• Endorsed brand identity is when an

organization has a group of products or
companies that it endorses with a group
name and a common identity. The
strength of this approach lies in the
relationship of the products/companies,
they can benefit from the goodwill
given to others with the same common
identity.
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 Continue…..

• Branded identity is when a company uses

different brands for their products that
function independent from each other and
the company’s brand. The strength of this
strategy is the flexibility.
• The company can build different brands in
different marked segments and for different
products. If a brand is involved in a scandal
it will only damage that brand, and will not
hurt the other brands of the company.
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 4: Advantages of a corporate branding strategy
Among the advantages of a corporate
branding strategy we can count:
• The corporate brand is the face of the
business strategy, portraying what the
corporation aims at doing and what it
wants to be known for in the market place,
is the overall umbrella for the corporations’
activities and put in a nutshell its vision,
values, personality, positioning and image
among many other dimensions.
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 Advantages………

• Corporate branding strategy creates

simplicity; it stands on top of the
brand portfolio as the ultimate
identifier of the corporation.
• A corporate branding strategy can
drive some cost efficiencies that can
often be achieved as opposed to a
large multi-brand planning.
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 5: Disadvantages of a corporate branding
strategy

• On the other side among main

disadvantages of this strategy is that
products may not be treated
individually, which reduces the focus
on the products’ unique characteristics
or that the corporate name can
become synonymous with a product
category.
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