Download Brands

Brands: Markets, Media
and Movement
What is "brand"? A frequently
cited epithet goes: a product is
made in a factory; a brand is
bought by consumer.
(Wang, 2008; 23)
Media economy or mediation
of the economy is understood
in terms of the increasing role
of markets and marketing.
So it is called
marketization.
Marketization describes the expansion of arrangements for bringing
buyers and sellers together for self-advantaging exchange.
Marketization has intensified in recent years as a part of
what is sometimes called neo-liberalism (Harvey 2005):
• individual liberty and freedom can best be achieved by institutional structure
that supports strong private property rights, free markets and free trade.
The state should not be involved in the regulation of the economy too much,
but should use its power to preserve private property rights,
institutions of market and promote those on the global stage.
Mediatization refers to the
increasing importance of
information, image and media
in the organization and
expression of the economy,
consumer culture and everyday
life.
Arguments about the growth in importance of
mediation relate to broader theories of what has
variously been called cognitive or knowing capitalism
(Thrift, 2005) or an immaterial economy (Lazzarato,
2004)
in which activity or productivity is no longer limited to
the workplace but distributed between the producer and
the consumer, and reaches outside the economy unto
everyday life.
Branding becomes a visible force in the organization of
production and consumption in industrialized countries.
Aggressive competition between producers became even more
intense due to the stretching of markets over national and
international space.
From 1880s
corporate logos were increasingly
used to promote products (Coca-Cola,
Campbell`s soup etc.)
In this early stages brands were intended to
allow the producer to speak "directly" to the
consumer through presentation, packaging and
other media.
Here we can see conflicts between
manufactures and retailers: some supermarkets
develop their own brands.
By the 1950s and 1960s the discipline of
marketing was able to have more active role in the
coordination of production through its use of
knowledge about customer.
In 1960 we can see the publication of Theodor
Levitt`s manifesto for global marketing revolution.
Selling, he said:
focuses on the needs of the seller, marketing on the
needs of the buyer. Selling is preoccupied with
seller`s need to convert his product into cash,
marketing with the idea of satysfying the needs of
customer by means of the product
and the whole cluster of things associated with
creating, delivering and finally consuming it. (Quoted
in Mitchell, 2001: 76 - 7)
The information about consumer was a
pivotal resource. This led to the birth of
marketing science, a research stream that
could model and optimize market
activities.
The importance of statistics, psychology
and behavioral analysis gave birth to
consumer research, which helps to map
the target and describe the market in
terms of lifestyle.
Changes in the view of the producer-consumer relationship: no longer
in terms of stimulus-response, the relation was already relationship
through "creative advertising" (first in London).
"Creative ad": to construct for consumers an imaginary lifestyle within
which the emotional and aesthetic values of the product were
elaborated.
Branding becomes increasingly central to the internal organization of
firms. Brands have now a dual role: exchange between producers and
consumers and relationships within the company itself, between
employers and employees.
This called "brand engagement" and "internal marketing".
Branding by the last quarter of 20th century: set
of marketing, distribution practices, media
communication, product design, retail design.
(Moor, 2007).
Brand consultancies were launched.
Branding has become a matter of increasing
public concern (political activity of Naomi Klein in
2000 - "No Logo").
In 2000 a survey of 200 senior UK
managers revealed that 73 per cent
anticipated restructuring their
companies, building the working
structure of the firm around the brand.
This makes brand management a
concern of management in general:
the only unique elements in the
company are its people and there
should be certain values of this
company that people share as part of
their own values.
"Brand new people" (people who
present themselves as brands
appear), so called "personal
branding".
"Non-business" organizations
(universities, political parties, football clubs)
started to be presented as brands.
Now for the social marketing
the figure of the customer is central
for both the public and private sectors.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NewrLTw_Wk (A short story of marketing)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JKIAOZZritk
(what is branding)