Brand identity is the total proposal/promise that an organization makes to consumers. The brand can be perceived as a product, a personality, a set of values, and a position it occupies in consumer’s minds. Brand identity is all that an organization wants the brand to be considered as. It is a feature linked with a specific company, product, service or individual. It is a way of externally expressing a brand to the world. You can use brand identity elements that identify and differentiates the brand from other brands. There are six different used elements for this.
Brand name: To create brand awareness and brand association every brand should have his own name to identify itself and differentiate itself from others. As an allusive brand name, Apple is associated with products of high quality, using innovative technologies based on creativity and imagination. The high quality, excellence and performance give value to the customers.
Logo’s and symbols: Logo’s and symbols are a valuable way for consumers to connect with a brand. There are different logo’s and symbols: corporate names and trademarks, non-word logo’s. When you see the little Apple logo, people immediately know that it’s the logo of the Apple company. It’s a non-word logo, but it refers to the company name Apple. One of the most famous corporate logo in the world, is the apple logo. It is used on all apple products around the world. It has proven so effective, and so innovative, that the company does not even put the company’s name on it. Through its innovative logo and marketing system, it has created brand awareness through the apple logo, without using their name.
Characters and celebrity/athlete endorsements: Some brands use characters and famous people. Characters have been used for decades to connect consumers with brand awareness, whether it is a fictional character or an celebrity/athlete endorsement. Both of them can help to communicate key product benefits through advertising channels (Keller.) Apple uses famous people in their ads. For example the use of U2 and Coldplay in commercials to push people to buy iPods.
Slogans: A slogan is a memorable motto or phrase used in a political, commercial, religious, and other context as a repetitive expression of an idea or purpose Like Apple using the slogan: “think different”
Jingles: A jingle is normally musical and is used so that people can recall the jingle and associate it with the brand that uses the jingle.
Packaging of brands: Packaging of a brand can be very useful to identify the brand and create a strong brand association. Apple always uses a white box with the Apple logo on it to package its products.
Experience Apple in this video
So, when the company has chosen the brand elements (name,logo,slogan,characters, jingles, packaging)they still have to meet some criteria.
They have to be
Memorable; elements must be easily recognized en easy recalled. Apple elements are memorable because Apple always uses the Apple logo on every product. People easily recognize this logo after seeing it more often. The designs are always silver and black and have a design that is easily recognized. “that’s definitely an Apple product”. Apple is one of the biggest brands in the world that nearly everybody knows.
Meaningful; elements must be descriptive and persuasive. The brand name Apple is not based on the product, but they have promoted the brand so well that the logo became meaningful. When people see the Apple logo they think of ‘innovation’ and’high quality’.
Likable; elements must be fun and interesting, rich visual and verbal imagery and aesthetically pleasing. All Apple’s products have interesting features, they update their products very often and this makes the consumers curious for new updates and products.
Transferable; elements must be within and across product categories. transferability measures the extent to which the brand element adds to the brand equity for new products or in new markets for the brands. Apple extends their productlines with a lot of new products in different categories. They have mp3 players, computers, phones, televisions etc.
Adaptable; elements must be flexible and updatable. You can buy Apple products in every country in nearly every big city. So, products are always updatable because every now and then Apple comes with new product updates that can be bought on the internet and in nearly every city. Apple is also a product that stays with the same sort of designs.
Protectable; elements must be legally and competitively.
All Apple’s products are based on these criteria: (1) Choose brand elements that can be legally protected internationally, (2) formally register them with the appropriate legal bodies, and (3) vigorously defend trademarks from unauthorized competitive infringement. (Keller)
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