I took the rant on marketing semantics to my Business Week column today. I never imagined such a seemingly simple issue would have such legs, but the resistance I’ve gotten from some quarters–dismissiveness, anger, derision–is unusual. There are a lot of marketers out there who don’t want the boat rocked.

But the struggle over the meaning of Brand is only scratching the surface. There are many concepts in marketing that are equally vague or confused, or conveniently reinterpreted to fit each marketer’s understanding or expertise. Depending on who you’re talking to, Segmentation can mean either market segmentation or segmented pricing. Positioning can refer to a competitive market strategy, a marcom messaging strategy, or even brand image.

In a conversation, the multiple meanings of a word are usually stabiliized by context. If I say "grab the wheel", and we’re sitting in a car, you’ll know I mean the steering wheel. If we’re outside the car changing a flat, you’ll know I mean the tire. Using context, experience and inflection to determine what meaning of the word was intended doesn’t change the meaning of a concrete thing. A tire is still a tire, and a steering wheel is still a steering wheel. But what happens when the word is referring to something that is no more solid than an *idea*? What happens to the idea of segmentation, or positioning, or brand, when, through my own channels of experience–through context, inflection, etc–I interpret the meaning in a way that is different? What happens when I downright confuse one meaning with another, and then transmit that confused meaning to someone else?

In an age of Information, when we make our living as Knowledge Workers, what happens is that we fill our universe with static. Knowledge is shared through the use of language, and if the language isn’t sufficiently clear, it’s like we’re talking to each other over a bad connection. In the short run, it’s merely annoying–your clients or colleagues don’t fully understand what you’re saying. But in the long run it’s destructive. People who are not marketers, but who depend on interacting effectively with marketers, begin to lose confidence in the value of marketing because every conversation is slightly vague, slightly confusing–and more troubling still, the meanings of important concepts seem to change from person to person. That lack of clarity and credibility has become the brand image of marketing, and until we get clear in our communication, we stand little chance of improving it.

If you’re coming in from BusinessWeek, welcome. I’d really like to get more of a dialog going than a rant, so please drop a comment, if you would. Thanks for reading.

My business partner pointed out "Exhibit B" in the ongoing fight over defining the meaning of "Brand". Over at Corante’s blog on branding there’s a discussion going on about the difference between "we companies" vs. "they companies". I’m not going to pick up that thread right now, because there’s something far more important to draw out of this discussion.

One of the blog authors, Jennifer Rice, who apparently has a deep resume in brand consulting for some big companies, and who makes some interesting observations about brand strategy, nevertheless says in an offhanded way what I’ve been arguing is a stake in the heart of the marketing profession. Here it is:

My definition of a brand is an idea in the minds of your customers… and that idea is formed by what you say and what you do.

Before we get to the dreaded ~semantic~ argument that so many marketers want to avoid like the plague, let’s just parse the framing of this definition. It is "My definition". Not "the definition". "My definition". What, exactly is the purpose of a "definition" if its meaning can be determined individually? How do you transfer knowledge about a thing, if the meaning of the thing can be arbitrarily open to interpretation?

To be fair and honest, I can’t throw any rocks at Jennifer Rice’s glass house, because I’m in one myself. I’m fairly certain if you go digging through my writing, you’ll find someplace where I’ve said "my definition of x is…" This isn’t about Jennifer Rice, it’s about marketers as a profession. We MUST stop treating such bedrock professional concepts as a blank page for waxing philosophical about meaning. I’m arguing that this is one of the major reasons why marketing is continuing to lose credibility–because it cannot consistently communicate an idea that is solid and immutable. And this is a profound irony. What is one of the most commonly cited attributes of a strong brand? Consistency across time and medium. Apparently we marketers don’t know how build equity for our brand.

Without rehashing all of the arguments about why Rice’s definition is derivitive (you can find one of the posts on this topic here) I’ll summarize the argument, stolen from Heidi Schultz, this way: There is a legal definition, and legal status for the concept of a brand. You own it. You can buy it and sell it. There are laws to protect it. Not one of these commercial facts applies to the concept of "an idea in the mind of your customer". Your brand is your logo, your name, your trade dress. Everything going on in the mind of your customer is derivitive and distinct. Call it brand image. Call it brand reputation. It is not your brand.

As an oversimplified analogy, someone might say "that Ferrari is my pride and joy". Is the Ferarri *really* an emotion? Of course not. You understand that without having to parse it. A Ferrari is a tangible object. It may influence your emotions. It may make you happy and proud to drive it. But your emotions are distinct entities that are influenced by other things too.

Same with a brand. You create a brand. You cultivate brand image and reputation. There are many things that effect brand image and reputation but that do not flow directly from your brand. There are social currents, historical events, cultural attitudes, economic trends–I’m sure someone, somewhere has drawn up an exhaustive list–that also have an impact on your brand image and reputation independent of any action you take. That’s why it’s useful and meaningful to consider them distinctly. If you require one single word, "brand", to carry the weight of a thousand ideas, it quickly loses its ability to convey anything of value. And if marketers today are in need of anything, it’s an ability to convey clear ideas with real value.

You can have a big marketing budget, a big name spokesperson, a big event with huge publicity and emotional appeal, but if you’ve got a junky product, it won’t improve your sales. Witness today’s report of the Pontiac G6 debacle. Oprah Winfrey gave away 276 of these cars on a tear-jerking show that set the marketing world on fire. But, sales have dropped through the floor.

Art Spinella, an industry observer and marketer, summed it pretty succinctly:

Spinella said neither GM’s marketing department nor Winfrey can be blamed for the market performance of the G6.

"It’s one thing to have that kind of a major marketing coup, but you
need to back it up," said Spinella, who said he believes that the
vehicle is an underwhelming package in a competitive marketplace.

Here is Exhibit A of the problem I’m addressing with the confused meaning of "Brand". A "marketing innovator" who posts a blog but doesn’t identify himself, takes issue with my support of a tangible definition for the meaning of brand.

Christopher
Kenton of Marketonomy wants
to reclaim the term "brand" for the advertising realm.

I’d be curious to know on what basis that judgement is made, since nothing could be further from the truth. I want to reclaim the term "brand" for the rational realm, and distinguish it from the other derivative brand concepts that are important but *different*.

He’s argument is
well-thought-out but wrong. It is meaningful to distinguish between
‘brand image’ and ‘brand experience’ but in the end, a company has to
live more in the derivative world of brand consequences than in the
artistic world of brand impressions. Speaking as someone who’s worked
for many companies where the advertising was at devastating odds with
the real experience of customers in the company, I think we stand to
gain more as marketers by insisting that ‘brand’ = the total customer
experience based on encounters with the company.

It’s funny, because I used to argue the same thing. In fact, if you look at my theory on Touchpoint Mapping, the whole premise was that the only way to try and bring the entire breadth of the brand experience into the realm of the tangible was to understand the practical meaning of brand to be the entire array of Touchpoints a company uses to create a relationship between the company and the customer. Brand Experience is *critically* imortant to the success of any company. BUT IT IS NOT BRAND. You own your brand. You do not own your customer’s experience. One is something you create. The other is something you cultivate.

It blows my mind that so many marketers refuse to accept such a basic semantic necessity as clarifying words and meanings so that we don’t confuse each other by talking in circles about what a Brand is. It’s a relationship. No. It’s a bond. No. It’s an experience. No It’s an image. No. It’s a promise.

What marketers stand to gain from most is Clarity.

I’ve had my feet held to the fire today over my column on the meaning of brand–which
is as it should be. Don’t ever take the word of a marketer at face
value. Some of my critics took issue with the fact that I was flogging
a ~semantic~ argument. Semantic apparently meaning "unworthy of
consideration", rather than "a useful exploration of meanings".

But some of the criticisms were useful. One of the more interesting discussions took place via email with
Justin Mink, a brand marketer from USATODAY.com. With his permission, I’m
posting the dialog here. 

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