IntRusting BraAnding
I just read Kyoorius and it sparked off thoughts. Jump into my head.
“The brand is the visual identity of the activities and everything that a company stands for in the geographies it operates in. Brand activities may relate to how you want to be locally present or globally present. Apart from standard print applications like brochures, the brand colours get translated to everything – from their logo, products, livery, t-shirts for events, office interiors, their fleet of trucks…everything!”
~Latika Khosla (Freedom Tree Design)
Kyoorius Design Magazine
Branding is overrated crap.
Branding – Great but unnecessary?
‘I don’t know your company. I don’t know your company’s product.
McGraw-Hill Publications
Design Agency vs Advertising Agency
Design Agency:
- Strength – Client and Market Awareness
- Employees - media planners + client servicing + creative dept
- Output - Print ads and TV Commercials, Hoardings , Radio
- Media fee
- Clients are often established brands
Ad Agency:
- Strength – Design
- Employees - Creative dept. Lots of designers who do specialized art and illustrations
- Output - Print ads & Collateral, Websites, Audio-Visuals, Hoardings, Products, Interiors, Packaging, Any new solution
- Design fee
- Clients are often new products, companies that need branding
It’s the fire in the belly that matters.
Design is not always about problem-solving. It’s about adding quality to life.
Why do you need branding? Do you?
Big Design Firms vs Small Design Agencies
Big design firms:
Have resources, time and manpower to issue publications, organise seminars and work for big projects like the Olympic Games.
Large-scale abundant work.
Pssstt… Who is responsible for the communication design behind Commonwealth Games in
Small design firms:
More autocracy and room for risk as they tackle new products and do initial branding for them. Owned by designers and they have personal stake in it. The company is not an MNC under a president. Hardcore brainstorming, interaction and design solutions. Interesting Work.
Does size of the firm have bearing on the output?
Factors that matter – Talent and Resources.
Indian Design:
Indian design is inspired at home, in
The treatment such as the minimalism in the art direction in the same Airtel Ad is definitely influenced from the West. Channel V’s Simpu Singh and Lola Kutty are concepts rooted in Indian attitudes and culture and thus, comes across as human and empathetic .
When Indian products and brands want to compete internationally, it is important that
What’s the status on Brain-Drain?
Large vs Niche Audience:
As audience widens and one tries to please everyone, design loses its position, stance and identity. Is that true? What about the design behind international giants such as Google and the iPod? But then what about R.K Laxman’s sketches of the Common Man centred on middle-class
ViSuAl DiAleCt
Message vs Tone of Voice
Message+Tone of Voice
On the Quality of Design:
“Quality in design works at two levels Macro and Micro. The micro is the most tangible and viable aspect of the design which amounts to how the design is crafted to elicit a superior consumer experience. The macro to me is how the design plugs into the business model and its ecosystem. Micro is the touch point of a brand, more visible, driven by consumers’ feedback and experience whereas macro is the invisible aspect and the quality of it is decided by the business managers, often goes unrecognised. A design which straddles both these domains successfully and scores high on these accounts defines the quality of the design for me. Brand equity thrives on these aspects of design.”
~Balakrishna Mahajan (Ticket Design)
Kyoorius Design Magazine
Branding provides visibility through marketing and design.
No Branding = Great Product. No buyers. No business.
Branding >> Differentiation >> Effect on Retail.
Sceptics – Realists or Cowards?
“Branding is not under-represented in progressive marketing-led companies. Most clients are smarter than we give them credit for. They have a more holistic picture of their business and don’t obsessively view branding in isolation like the design agencies.
Top Management in most businesses are in fact looking out for professionals who have the ability and confidence to analyse a business situation and prescribe a design solution with defined measurable results.”
Harsh Purohit (Cognito Advertising)
Kyoorius design Magazine
I think Google is avoiding brand overload while creating a strong presence in a masterly fashion!
Science vs Whim
Rational Choices by the Consumer vs Irrational choices.
What design choice would AI (Artificial Intelligence) make?
I hAte being PreaCheD at and TolD how my Mind works.
Brand MACHINE
Make a database of emotional responses to colour
A list of reaction to stimuli
Reactions in different Cultures
List down influences and symbols and associations
List down motives and interests
List down demographics, psychographics
List down rebellion
List down alternative thoughts
Where they come from
Why do they generate
What’s the pattern and trend behind innovation?
After all, Youth is never all that new
Jig up the machine
Run the database
Do we have a Branding Tool?
Empirical and Systematic.
We aren’t all that individual as we thought
Free-will is limited by freedom
A pool of societal, borrowed ideas
In a body, as a consumer
As a person, as a lover.
“The most common misperception is the word ‘design’. People think of primarily pretty pictures or forms. They don’t understand the depth to which design goes – not only in products, but in every aspect of our life and also of our future. Whether it is the design of a program, a product or some form of communication, we are living in a world that’s totally designed. Somebody made a decision about everything. And it was a design decision.”
Sam Farber, Founder, Copco cookware, OXO kitchen tools, WOVO serveware
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