Brand Personality
Building a brand can take many years to actualize into a single, unique, discernible and distinct entity. Within the construct of a brand’s core promise, its essence and persona, is a canvas that lends itself to the ability to create and be created, over again. An introduction between brand and consumer happens at an intersection where many brand owners hope for something magical, but only few achieve something close to a lasting impact. A brand embodies its personality and so does the consumer – two distinct personalities – whose tastes and preferences change with trends, advancements in technology and societal evolution.

Brand Connection
A brand must speak to the consumer – consistently too, without being obtrusive – to maintain a relationship that deepens with time. If a brand does not know its consumer, it fails to establish a connection when it communicates. As with many brands, marketing communications is the channel that allows for conversations between brand and consumer, but an integral consumer insight to consider when planning marketing communications, is consumer behavior as is shaped by technology. The consumer of today enjoys content across multiple social media platforms, engages with cross-cultural challenges that span various passion points and desires relevance as it relates to his/her individual preferences. So what does your brand know about its consumer? How does it seek to engage this consumer? Where does it hope to connect with this consumer?

Brand Technology
Brands like Coca Cola have a central promise, “to refresh the world in mind, body and spirit, and inspire moments of optimism; to create value and make a difference.” They express this promise in innovative ways that employ the use of technology, be it with gesture based marketing like the Hug Me campaign in Singapore. The central premise here revolved around perception. Coca Cola wanted its target consumers to see it the way it has built itself over the years – as a brand that has kept pace with its promise and the times.

In a world where Facebook likes and Instagram comments are considered “social gestures,” getting consumers to make specific gestures become a synergy that creates the magic you seek between brand and consumer.

Innovation is ever evolving and good branding should keep pace. Technological advancements can affect how consumers engage with your brand. The future for great brands lie at the intersection between branding and technology.