It was with great interest that I read the current issue of BusinessWeek, and in particular their article on Amazon entitled “Marketing is for Dummies”.
In it, they claim that Amazon refused to contribute to the article because executives there “don’t spend much time on branding.” An interesting statement, yes, but in reality I’d say that Amazon actually spend a tremendous amount of time on branding, just not in the traditional way.
To quote the article: “By investing back in the user experience, you get high loyalty and repeat usage.” To me, this is branding.
As our world changes, the idea of branding is also changing. In an open-source environment where Google, YouTube and indeed Amazon are the first places where people go to check out what brands really offer, then the traditional idea of ‘branding’ through image making (logo’s, identities, advertising campaigns etc) will continue to deliver lower value relative to investments in innovation, platforms and increasing the overall utility offered to the consumer.
In case we needed any more evidence, Amazon demonstrates that this truly is a world where what you do matters much more than what you say.
(Paul Worthington)
