Branding is Timeless, Marketing is Today
The world is moving at an unimaginable speed today. Technology has brought us to the point where the barriers of entry for creating a new brand, can be destroyed with the right set of phone apps. That ultimately brings us to increasing competition for whatever goal you are trying to achieve. Fun fact, sometimes panic can cause companies to scramble in trying new marketing tactics without making sure they align with the underlying brand strategy.
If we don’t have the right foundation in place with our branding, before we take on marketing, we will never achieve the big disruptive goals that make headlines, make our bosses or investors happy and ultimately increase our bottom line.
In today’s world you if are reading marketing publications, you are likely to be hearing the words “branding” and “marketing” together.
While we love to talk about these words keeping in mind the big picture as marketers, combining these two words together can be a big problem because it may get you into thinking “What is the difference between marketing and branding actually?” And the answer is they are almost two different poles apart.
While marketing and branding go hand-in-hand when it comes to selling your business, they’re still two separate concepts and should be treated as such. That’s why we’ve developed a quick little crash course, or a refresher, to clearly define the difference between branding and marketing, and how your videos can be doing both.
Branding is about defining your company
First things first, branding is all about defining who you are as a company. That’s why the word “brand” is often used interchangeably with the word “company”. Crazy, right?
It’s also why, when we talk about branding, we’re really talking about who you are as a company:
What are your core values?
What is your company culture like?
What is your mission statement?
How do you choose to communicate with your audience?
What makes you different from all of the other companies selling the same thing?
Branding is what decides how your audience feels about your company. It’s the core tenet to brand, or company, loyalty. A great promotion or marketing campaign may be enough to get a new customer through the door, but it’s how that customer feels about the brand that determines whether or not they’ll return. In fact, 59 percent of buyers prefer to buy a new product from a brand that they trust as opposed to an unfamiliar one. So, creating a rock-solid brand and understanding your brand identity is the first step in the ongoing communication you plan to build your audience.
Marketing is about driving that message
By its simplest definition, marketing is the array of tools you use to communicate your brand’s message and grow your audience. It’s your marketing tactics that attract new customers and convert leads into sales. And there’s plenty of marketing methods out there from traditional mediums to digital marketing done online.
Like any digital marketing agency, we often combine different methodologies to develop a marketing plan that will best work for our clients. Typically, you’ll hear us talk a lot about:
SEO
Inbound marketing
Video Production
Social Media and Social Ads
Content Marketing
Of course, the marketing campaigns that you design will be heavily impacted by the brand that you’ve created. Everything from written copy to visuals used in a campaign has to remain on brand or on message in order to be successful for your company.
Another hallmark difference between marketing and branding is that your branding should stay consistent while your marketing can, and should, change.
Videos work on both the branding and marketing spectrum
Another area where branding and marketing overlap is with video. As the versatile medium that it is, video presents the perfect opportunity to establish and communicate your brand as well as kickstart your digital marketing efforts.
We recommend that every company should have a brand story video that lives on its website to showcase what you are all about and also to hold your visitor’s attention. We also recommend creating People and Culture videos to highlight what your company is like behind the scenes.
Videos are also a great option for your marketing efforts. Using video in your social media advertisements, for example, is proven to get more views and more engagement than any other type of social ad. Using video on your landing pages or in your email marketing campaigns are also great options to boost conversions and start making sales.
