
Brand management: Why your business should up its branding game
In a period where the internet is providing businesses across a range of industries a platform to have their voices heard, branding’s importance cannot be understated. Branding enables companies to create strong, positive perceptions about the company, it’s services and/or products in a sea of noise.
It goes without saying that brand management has become essential in business strategy, especially to stand out from the competition and build your value and credibility.
Many companies thrive from successful branding. Household names like Tesla, Apple, and Nike are just a handful of examples of brands with successful branding strategies.
Nike, for instance, is renowned for its empowering tagline, “Just Do It”. Their campaigns feature both men and women that can resonate with athletes to the average Joe or Jane, while their social media captions are strong and punchy.
There’s so much to be gained with strong branding, making it unsurprising why just about anyone – from individuals in marketing roles to entrepreneurs and business owners – stand to benefit from upskilling in the field.
And anyone can get skilled in the area with branding courses.
Upskilling in branding
There are many ways for professionals who want to broaden their knowledge in the area– to upskill in branding, be it via micro badges to online certification courses and executive education at universities.
For instance, Kellogg offers an executive education programme for branding. The course teaches you how to use marketing and branding to build a profitable and enduring business, and how to gain new insights into the importance and value of a strongly differentiated brand. Students will be equipped with new knowledge and skills that can be immediately applicable to increase customer loyalty, competitive advantage, and profitability, notes its website.
Managers who are responsible for brands, marketers looking to develop their capabilities in brand building, and leaders who want to elevate the role of branding in their organisation are among those who stand to benefit from the course.
eCornell offers a certificate programme in brand management. Through the programme’s coursework, students will define the foundational building blocks for their brand purpose by understanding the target audience and crafting integrated marketing communications.
“You’ll identify opportunities and threats that affect your brand’s market position and determine potential strategies to capitalise on opportunities to strengthen your brand’s position. You’ll then create a brand positioning strategy for your market, and identify various vehicles for marketing communications that would effectively reach the brand’s target market,” notes its website.
edX’s branding courses include Strategic Brand Management, which will teach you how to apply the concepts of advertising and marketing to branding. Students will examine topics and various strategies related to building, measuring, and managing a brand, including direct and indirect measures of brand equity, structures of desired brand knowledge, choice of brand elements, development of supporting marketing programs, and management of brands over time.
There are plenty of branding courses on Udemy for beginners to experienced professionals, for topics related to personal to business branding, among other niches. Some of their courses include introduction to branding, branding for small businesses, to name a few.
There are numerous courses for individuals of all skill levels, but a branding qualification can help you stand out and be an asset to your organisation.