Branding: A Make Or Break Story

Abstract

The process of globalization is demolishing the physical boundaries of the markets and fuelling competition. Now creation of brands plays an important role in achieving an edge over competitors. Economic interest in brands is a recent phenomenon all over the world especially in under developed countries like Pakistan. Brands are a focal point for all positive and negative impressions created by the buyers over time. It performs an economic function in the mind of the consumer and thus has a lasting and memorable effect on a company’s activities. Successful global companies recognize that the source of their prowess in world markets is branding, and that investment in plant, technology and people is no longer enough to guarantee long-term sustainable profits. Branding has become a vital strategic issue for companies. In increasingly turbulent markets such as Pakistan’s, brands are a key to customer loyalty, long-term survival and growth. Brand management is a relatively new phenomenon and as such no elaborate guidelines exist for managing a particular brand. The monetary value of brands has been recognized only recently. Whether to include brands as assets on the overall Balance Sheet of a company is still a debatable point as the benefits arising out of building brands are largely intangible. Companies are now becoming increasingly aware of the actual potential of brands. The present research study deals with identifying the true potential of creating brands and the manifold benefits that companies can gain out of it. A real time example of P&G’s Hair Care segment for Pakistan has been taken to fully understand this issue.