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Showing posts with the label Branding

Decoding the Concept of Brand

Why would you even want to read this? Because the question ‘What is Brand?’ may make you uncomfortable and send you looking out for answer. You may be aware of the importance of Brand in the ‘Corporate Jungle’, role it plays in the ‘Marketing Strategy’ and its seeming impact on the ‘Consumer’s Life’. However, this most basic question usually evokes a very text bookish response. When I graduated of my MBA College (a very respectable one, I must say) with the ‘Best Marketing Student’ tag, I was very comfortable in what Philp Kotler had to say about brand: brand is defined as a "name, term, sign symbol (or a combination of these) that identifies the maker or seller of the product." And though it is perfectly okay to look at ‘Brand’ through the prism of the above definition, I have come to conclude that this is not the only truth or the version out there. This belief has come from interacting consumers of all hues and colours in my career of last one decade. Why see...
Rebranding Kolkata (Calcutta)!!! “Who will funds all these projects?” the Danish girl raised the question. We were having a guest lecture on city planning and development and an eminent city planner was putting forth his vision for the city of Kolkata (I would rather use the colonial version of the name -- “Calcutta” as it sounds more appealing to me). The planner asked the reason behind the apprehension. ‘I know that most of these projects which you talked about will not take place because of the political compulsions.’ The girl replied. ‘Even after being one of the largest cities of this part of world this city lacks basic amenities and people here seem to lack courage to implement good plans on map.’ The planner smiled at this. ‘I think this is perhaps not the best time for you people to visit this part of India. The whole Singur episode might have left you with a very negative impression regarding the administration and politics of this state. And I am not advocating that the city ...