Branding Governance

Branding Governance challenges traditional thinking on brands. Bestselling author Nicholas Ind and cross-cultural communications expert Rune Bjerke expose the flaws in the marketing communications-led approach to brand-building, and argue instead for a highly participative, organisationwide process that delivers both fulfilment to employees and value to customers. Their emphasis is on the importance of interaction and experience in determining brand equity. To achieve this, organisations must break down the boundaries between those inside and outside it, and fuse the different parts together. Building a brand, for Ind and Bjerke, is the responsibility not of a select few but of everyone in the organisation. Drawing on a wide range of sources from philosophy and sociology to marketing and organisational development, they show why brand building is a fluid process that requires the ability to sense and make sense of customer behaviour while enhancing the capabilities of the organisation. The key to a participatory approach is that customers and other external audiences must join managers and employees as active participants in defining and developing the brand. For this to work, the relationship between the organisation and its customers must be one of respect and authenticity. Branding Governance looks beyond organisational silos to offer a new and integrated approach to the process of planning, structuring, executing and measuring brand policy.