The importance of branding cannot get overemphasised.
Most people can build a small company, but if you want to grow one into something bigger, an essential ingredient is required.
One must be able to create a brand everyone loves and talks about.
Your company needs to have the ability to grow through word-of-mouth if it’s ever going to turn over millions of dollars per year.
The most popular brands in the world today didn’t start with higher revenue than the annual GDP of some countries by luck.
Learning from the most influential brands in the world:
These companies struggled to gain traction and build their successful brands; however, you can go through fewer trials and errors by gaining insights from their branding strategies.
You have the power to take what they did and use it to your advantage.
By following their branding case-studies, you might not create the next billion-dollar company, but you may execute useful branding techniques, and your profits might skyrocket.
We’ve looked into twenty world-famous brands to analyse the tactics they used to grow.
Here is our research:
1. Apple:
People think of Steve Jobs when you mention Apple, but they didn’t find real success until they focused on simplicity and gorgeous design.
Now, millions of raving fans wouldn’t touch other products and even the ones who would are locked into the Apple ecosystem, making it hard for them to leave.
2. Microsoft:
Bill Gates had the premium operating system of its time, yet he didn’t start selling Microsoft computers.
Instead, he licensed Windows to all the other computer manufacturers on the market because it was much more lucrative. They leveraged the power of other companies to make billions of dollars.
3. Google:
Google knew the offerings on the market weren’t good enough, so they focused all of their energy into building a product search engine users would find more useful than anything else.
Now you automatically think of the Google homepage when anyone talks about searching for something on the internet.
4. Disney:
Adults aren’t Disney’s target market, so how did they get so big when kids don’t own credit cards?
They knew if they focused their branding efforts purely on youngsters, it would cause them to beg their parents to spend money, and who wouldn’t want to buy their children something to make them happy?
5. McDonald‘s:
Everyone knows McDonald’s don’t serve the best food, but people still decide to eat there instead of any other kind of restaurant.
Their branding is so effective because everyone will feel safe in the knowledge they’ll know exactly what they’re getting no matter where they buy their burger and fries.
6. IBM:
Does anyone even know what IBM does? If you ask random members of the public, they will try to guess, yet they’ve still heard of the company because it’s so big.
IBM has done a great job of focusing specifically on their target market, and they’ve worked hard to become almost an all-in-one solution for them.
7. Facebook:
If Facebook opened up its doors to the world straight away, we’d probably still be using MySpace.
Mark Zuckerberg purposefully grew the brand slowly by restricting access to nearly everyone, and by the time people were talking about it, they were all desperate to sign up.
8. Toyota:
When people think of Toyota, they expect an inexpensive and reliable car with cheap spare parts, but the company knew it wasn’t going to keep them ahead of the game forever.
They looked into the future and started selling hybrid cars, so today they’ve sold more of them than anyone else by branding themselves as an environmentally friendly company.
9. Samsung:
Although Samsung has a rich history, they snowballed by branding themselves as the anti-Apple.
Most people who hate Apple want an Android phone, and Samsung leads the way when it comes to smartphones and tablets offering the operating system. They are now considered Apple’s chief rival.
10. Nike:
Nike was already a huge company when they teamed up with Michael Jordan, but when they released his signature basketball shoes, they became the leading player in the industry.
Now they pay a tremendous amount of money to athletes all over the world, but they’re profitable – so it’s useful to partner with influencers.
11. BMW:
If there is one thing, Germany is well-known for it’s their fantastic engineering, and BMW branded themselves on the skills of an entire country.
When someone buys a BMW today the one thing they can be sure of is that it will g built to perfection, and BMW found a shortcut to make them think this way.
12. Mercedes-Benz:
Mercedes-Benz offers high-performance luxury cars, but they’re not cheap so how could they compete with the Ferraris, Aston Martins, and Jaguars of the world?
They knew those sports cars weren’t the most comfortable to drive, so they focused on comfort as a critical differentiator to set them apart.
13. Louis Vuitton:
There are so many fashion brands in the world; it’s impossible to know about them all, but most people have heard of Louis Vuitton.
Not only did they set themselves apart by charging high prices, but they also have a signature design seen on handbags and many other products. Their branding means they’re now top-of-mind when anyone thinks of high fashion.
14. Amazon:
If you order something from Amazon you know it’s going to arrive at your door within days, and they’ve used their streamlined warehouses to start Fulfilment by Amazon.
Companies all over the world use Amazon to sell their products, so customers have access to nearly any product available on a website they trust while Jeff Bezos sits back and counts his money.
15. Visa:
PayPal created a billion-dollar business by building something on top of an existing marketplace, and as you know, the financial industry is very lucrative.
Visa did the same thing when they were building their brand, although they managed to do it almost 60 years earlier, and they are now one of the most trusted brands in the industry.
16. Nescafe:
Instant coffee was being sold before Nescafe came along, but it was still swift to the party. It didn’t catch a lucky break by building a new industry from scratch, but it jumped on a trend while creating a better product at the same time.
Their advanced coffee refining process introduced in 1938 was so popular because it tasted better than what was available.
17. IKEA:
New homeowners can walk into IKEA and buy all the furniture they need to decorate their home because the company found a way to offer their products for the lowest price possible.
Instead of buying prebuilt furniture like you usually would, IKEA popularised buying flat-pack furniture you would need to build yourself when you got home by figuring out how to make existing products cheaper.
18. Nestle:
Nestle is the biggest food company in the world, and the reason they’re so successful could be seen in the products they offer. To put it simply, they paid close attention to their customers and gave them exactly what they wanted.
They appeal to the masses by providing them with all the food-related products they need, and they make sure the quality is always excellent.
19. Starbucks:
If you’re a coffee-lover, you’ve probably drunk at Starbucks, yet even if you haven’t; you can’t deny it’s one of the most influential brands in the world.
Their success came because they saw an opportunity in the industry and saturated the market. It’s hard to ignore Starbucks now due to its coffee shops almost everywhere in the world.
20. Zara:
Some of the fashion retailers offering cheap clothes compared to brands like Louis Vuitton sell almost identical products because they know there will always be a market for people with less money who want to keep up with current trends.
Zara has built its brand around being able to bring these clothes to market quicker than anyone else.
