In Drew McLellan’s blog, Drew’s Marketing Minute, in which he writes about “The most important job any business owner has” – he claims this is taking care of the business’ brand. He says that “building it [the brand], managing it, protecting it… is the single most challenging job you’ve got”.
While I do not completely disagree with his statement, I would argue that the importance of protecting or building a brand depends on the competitive premise or the products of a company.
For a company where product features, quality and service is of high importance, branding is similarly incredibly important to the company’s ability to thrive. For example, in the cellphone industry, brand is the number one deciding factor in a consumer’s decision – people will even line up hours in advance at an Apple store to buy a new iPhone 5. While there are not that differences in quality or functionality between an iPhone and another smartphone, such as the Samsung Galaxy, people still opt for the more expensive iPhone because of the popularity of the Apple brand.
On the other hand, for companies like Dollarama and Dollar Giant, while they certainly use the power of branding in their marketing strategies, the impact of their brand is not as strong as that of Apple. For example, as a consumer, I would not choose to shop at Dollarama over Dollar Giant because I feel a deeper connection with one brand over another. For large chain dollar stores, protecting their brand is not as important as protecting a brand in the technology industry. They would focus mainly on other parts of marketing, such as which products to offer and at which locations.