Branding is strategic. Marketing is tactical.
Marketing may contribute to a brand, but the brand is bigger than any
particular marketing effort. The brand is what remains after the
marketing has swept through the room. It’s what sticks in your mind
associated with a product, service, or organization—whether or not, at
that particular moment, you bought or did not buy.
The brand is ultimately what determines if you will become a loyal
customer or not. The marketing may convince you to buy a particular
Toyota, and maybe it’s the first foreign car you ever owned, but it is
the brand that will determine if you will only buy Toyotas for the rest
of your life.
The brand is built from many things. Very important among these things
is the lived experience of the brand. Did that car deliver on its brand
promise of reliability? Did the maker continue to uphold the quality
standards that made them what they are? Did the sales guy or the service
center mechanic know what they were talking about?
