Corporate branding refers to a company applying its name to a product. The product and the company name become the brand name. The company can advertise several of its products under a single brand name in a practice referred to as family branding or umbrella branding.
By using corporate branding with a successfully marketed product, a company can familiarize consumers with its products and may create brand loyalty. If the public likes one product from this company, then they may seek out the brand name when buying other products. Corporate branding is usually only successful if the company is well known and sells reputable products with a positive image. One of the disadvantages of corporate branding is that the company can become identified with only one type of product.
To consumers, corporate branding represents a level of quality that they have come to expect from the company. They will expect every product with the same brand name to have the same level of quality that they are familiar with. The company can increase sales by comparing one of their more popular products with a similar product by another company, showing sales figures to back up their promise. The value of the brand is determined by the profits the products have made. If profits are high, then the manufacturer is able to charge more for their product.
When applying corporate branding to a product or products, companies need to follow a few guidelines. A corporate brand should be easy to recognize and attract attention. It should also be legally protectable and suggest the company or product image.
Ideally, the brand should be easy to pronounce and easy to remember. A premier brand product typically costs more to purchase than an economy brand. Consumers are paying for the name and the quality of product that name guarantees.
There are a few extensions to corporate branding. One brand name may be used for a number of products in family branding, or all the products may be given different brand names in a practice called individual branding. When large retailers buy goods in bulk and then put their own brand name on them, this is called store branding, label branding, or private branding. Co-branding is when two or more manufactures combine to sell their products. When a company sells the right to use their brand name to another company for use in another location or for non-competitive purposes, this is called brand licensing.
Corporate branding has the ability to make a product very successful. If the brand name has a track record of a guarantee of quality, then there are huge amounts of money to be made by using the name. However, just one shoddy product under the brand name may cause bad word of mouth, affecting sales of all the other products under the same name and causing irreversible damage to the company.