I recently attended the first pre-conference workshop of the year entitled “So You Think You Can Brand?” on October 29, 2012 from 6:00 pm-7:30 pm at the Birmingham Lounge, Henry Angus in the Sauder School of Business. One speaker for the event is Chris Dallin, Director of Branding and Design, Karacters Design Group, at DDB, Canada’s most awarded agency for 10 years running, and a truly seasoned professional when it comes to handling million dollar campaigns and delivering impeccable brand strategy to clients.

Chris Dallin talks about the importance of branding in marketing. He mentions that branding has various definitions and depends on how one defines it. He defines branding as doing one’s best in delivering the best products and services to consumers. On the other hand, other people define branding as creating a unique image for the product in order to attract various consumers. The brand a company will develop for its product depend on its definition.

Branding has three aspects, which are relevance, coherence, and participation. He mentions that the product must have some relevance or use to the consumer for them to purchase it. It must be coherent, meaning that the quality of product they sell to consumers must be consistent. An example is how the taste of a Starbucks coffee must be the same for all consumers. Any difference in the taste of the coffee allows the consumers to question the credibility of the company’s brand. The product must encourage participation among consumers to purchase the product. A company will not succeed even if the product is relevant and coherent if no one is willing to purchase it.

Lastly, he mentions the various stakeholders involved in branding, which are the art director, the strategist, graphic designer, marketing director, and others. Each of these roles must not only have knowledge in marketing in order to succeed, but he must also have knowledge of some graphic and art design in order to work well with the other stakeholders in branding.