Branding Glossary

Paid communications aimed at persuading an audience to buy a product, use a service, change a behavior, or adopt a viewpoint.

A type of marketing in which a business rewards an affiliate for bringing customers to it.

A tool developed by Google to help marketing teams work faster and more collaboratively.

A standardized model of a personality or behavior, often used in marketing, storytelling, psychology, and philosophy. Often used for Brand Archetypes.

A survey of opinions about a brand, often used as a benchmark before and after making changes to the brand.

The group of people for which a product, service, message, or experience is designed.

The quality of being genuine, considered a powerful brand attribute

A digital alter ego; in branding, an icon designed to operate freely in a variety of
media. Often social media.

A survey that measures an audience’s familiarity with a brand, often divided into
“aided” and “unaided” awareness.

A phrase made familiar by repeated use.

Chief Brand Officer, responsible for integrating the work of the brand community.

A product, service, or company that competes with one or more stronger competitors in its category.

A brand that inspires a high degree of customer loyalty; also known as a lifestyle
brand or passion brand.

The process by which customers come to see products, services, or companies as
interchangeable, resulting in the erosion of profit margins; a failure of branding.

A discipline that combines visual design and verbal design to produce identity elements, websites, advertisements, publications, and other vehicles for messaging and content.

The reason a company exists beyond making a profit; a key component of a core ideology.

An enduring set of principles that defines the ethics of a company; a key component of a core ideology.

A document that outlines the parameters of a design project, such as its context, goals, processes, and budgetary constraints.

In behavioral psychology, the observation that the more people do or believe something, the more others will be inclined to do or believe the same thing.

On the web, a small, rectangular ad designed to attract users to a website.

Customer-driven marketing, as opposed to top-down or management-driven marketing.

In web analytics, the percentage of users who quickly leave a particular page.

A technique for generating, exploring, and evaluating ideas as a group

A person experienced in building brands as strategic systems.

A hierarchy of related brands or brand names, often beginning with a master brand and describing its relationship to sub-brands and co-brands.

Any aspect of a brand that has strategic value, including brand associations, brand attributes, brand awareness or brand loyalty.

A distinctive feature of a product, service or company brand.

A formal assessment of a brand’s strengths and weaknesses across its touchpoints.

A measurement of how well a product, service, or company is recognized by its
audience.

A publication or online resource that outlines the strategy, key messages, and style guidelines for a brand.

A coordinated effort to increase brand awareness, brand equity or brand loyalty.

A shared understanding of a company’s purpose, value proposition, personality, and messaging that allows brand builders to collaborate with autonomy.

The network of people who contribute to building a brand, including internal
departments, external firms, industry partners, customers, users, and the media.

The accumulated value of a company’s brand assets, both financially and strategically; the overall strength of a brand.

All the interactions people have with a product, service, or organization.

A series of related brands owned by the same company

A disconnect between business strategy and brand experience

The outward expression of a brand, including its trademark, name, communications, and visual appearance.

Any effort or program designed to increase value or avoid commoditization by building a differentiated brand.

The strength of preference for a brand compared to competing brands, sometimes measured in repeat purchases

A document that articulates the parameters of a brand for members of the brand
community; a standardized set of brand-building tools.

The verbal or written component of a brand icon; the name of a product, service, or organization.

The character of a brand as defined in anthropomorphic terms

A manager or team responsible for strict compliance with the guidelines in a brand manual

A stated or implied guarantee that creates customer expectations and employee
responsibilities.

A measurement of how strongly a brand name is connected with a category in the
minds of an audience.

A measurement of how familiar a brand name is to an audience.

A person responsible for protecting and developing a brand

A plan for the systematic development of a brand in alignment with a business
strategy.