Literature Review
Corporate branding helps in making a positive image of the business and brands associated leading to the development of brand equity. Measures of brand equity can be done through loyalty measures, leadership measures, differentiation measures, awareness measures and market behaviour measures. In combination, these four measures contain the brand equity ten which determine the overall brand equity resulting from branding activities. The brand equity ten measures such as loyalty and price premium (loyalty measures); leadership and perceived quality (leadership measures); organizational associations, brand personality and perceived value (differentiation measures); brand awareness (awareness measure); and price and distribution indices and market share (market behaviour measures) (Aaker, 1996 p. 102-120). Whenever brand equity is needed to be performed, these 10 measures provide a point of departure. Measurement needs to be adapted to comprise of brand specific information. The objectives of communication if are made operational and clear; needs to suggest what is important for the brand and identifies areas where improvement is needed. The brand elements that are part of the communication program should be included in the system of measuring brand equity.
Corporate branding requires placing increased emphasis on factors important to the organisation, providing increased attention to an employee’s role in the process of brand building. Even though management is important to the process, the staff members need to be encouraged for contributing with educated inputs. Externally, managers have to examine the reputation of the brand among stakeholders that ensures brand’s identity is successfully communicated and the outcomes are consistently conveyed. Corporate branding requires several stakeholders to interact with the staff members across the different departments in the organisation. To ensure corporate branding is effective, consistent messages concerning the identity of the brand and uniform delivery of message to all stakeholders ensured that a positive and favourable brand reputation is developed. For successfully communicating the corporate identity to external audiences, internal congruency and consistency are important. Thus, organization and the brand’s values need to be consistent in the process of corporate branding. Having shared values play a crucial role in facilitation of coherent action and congruent brand perceptions within the team handling brand and across the business. Shared values also ensure that organization communication is effectively sent to the outside world (Harris & De Chernatony, 2001 p. 441-456).
Corporate branding aims at developing brands that can be coveted, venerated, and adored by the masses. These corporate brands work as tools of navigation for stakeholders involved in different processes such as investment, employment, and above all consumer buying behaviour. Corporate branding is seen as image building devices, symbols related with important values, means to construct identities, marks that denote ownership, etc. Corporate brands and identities are used interchangeably many times but in reality there are major differences between them. One of the main differences is that identity is applicable to every entity. Still, not every entity plans wants to have, or even needs a corporate brand. The core of the corporate branding is having an explicit covenant between stakeholders in the organization, including the customers. The relevance of corporate branding is so important that it can be seen as a different identity type such as actual, communicated, ideal, conceived and desired. Other concepts such as brand architecture are the relationships between and among corporate, product and company brands. These relationships hold products and services; or a combination of them across the brand hierarchy. As a resource, firm imparts long-term value through their corporate branding action (Balmer & Gray, 2003 p. 972-997).
Hoeffler & Keller (2002) described CSM (Corporate societal marketing) is defined to: “encompass marketing initiatives that have at least one non-economic objective related to social welfare and use the resources of the company and/or one of its partners” (p. 78).
The six means through which Corporate Social Marketing programs help in building brand equity are enhancing brand image; building brand awareness; evoking brand feelings; establishing brand credibility; eliciting brand engagement; and developing a sense of community through the brand. There are factors that are important for predicting the level of leverage, which can result by linking brands to causes through the CSM program such as knowledge and awareness of the cause; meaningfulness and relevance of the reason for the cause; and transferability of the reason of the cause. From the branding point of view, two different paths of choosing a cause exist such as complementarity and commonality. In simpler words, choosing the cause revolves around whether to add and augment to the image and equity and reinforcing the existing brand image (p. 78-88).
Corporate branding has become an essential part of many businesses and new brands are always introduced with heavy investment in brands. De Chernatony has proposed brand triangle model that is the foundation of strategic processes for delivering and designing a corporate brand. To achieve the most effective brand delivery, the behaviour and attitude of employees are essential for the cause. The authors summarize that corporate brands are holistic in nature, which means it involves everyone and everything in the organization. Corporate branding is also strategic in nature, which shapes the future of the company. Corporate branding is also relational as it is founded on the basis of external-internal stakeholder’s activities. There are some challenges that are faced by corporate brands such as management of the corporate brand coherence, protection of the reputation of the corporate brand, measurement of the corporate brand’s success, overcoming internal rivalry and turf in brand management, etc. These challenges are needed to be controlled as they can derail the corporate branding efforts (Schultz & De Chernatony, 2002 p. 105-112).
The crux of corporate branding is based on the values that are related with the brand. It represents an informal contract between the brand and its several stakeholders. Corporate branding is considered as one of the many, albeit organisational and significant imperatives. The nation of brand orientation notion, which applies to the corporate brands, is focused more on the implicit, rather than the explicit. According to the Balmer (2013), corporate brand orientation refers to: “a category of institution where the corporate brand specifically acts as an entity’s cornerstone” (p. 723-741). Both the espoused and inherent corporate brand values underpin the culture and core philosophy of the organization. The brand values are also reflected in the ethos, purpose and activities of the entity. More importantly, there is an important logic in categorization of perspectives related to brand orientation such as corporate brand orientation; corporate identity orientation; corporate marketing orientation and total corporate communication orientation. Corporate brand orientation needs amenability for corporate marketing precepts, which focuses on important stakeholders such as customers. It means taking a perspective that is omni-temporal, and it is chary that corporate marketing is reinforced by corporate social responsibility and societal tenets.
References
Aaker, D. A. (1996). Measuring Brand Equity Across Products and Markets. California Management Review, 38(3), 102-120. doi:10.2307/41165845
Balmer, J.M.T., (2013). Corporate brand orientation: What is it? What of it? Journal of Brand Management, 20, 723–741.
Balmer, J.M.T., & Gray, E. R. (2003). Corporate brands: what are they? What of them? European Journal of Marketing, 37(7/8), 972 - 997.
Harris, F., & De Chernatony, L. (2001). Corporate Branding and Corporate Brand Performance.European Journal of Marketing, 35(3/4), 441-456.
Hoeffler, S., & Keller, K. L. (2002). Building Brand Equity Through Corporate Societal Marketing. Journal of Public Policy & Marketing, 21(1), 78-89.
Schultz, M., & De Chernatony, L. (2002). The Challenges of Corporate Branding. Corporate Reputation Review, 5(2/3), 105-112.
