What is the marketing power of brands? The definition of a brand is rather simple. It’s a trademark or name that identifies products or services of a firm or of other manufacturers. Sounds pretty simple, right? For most consumers it is. And that’s precisely the problem! We don’t pay that much attention to brands, and we often just ignore them altogether. So what does this mean for marketers? It means that consumer behavior toward brands can be influenced in ways similar to real-world situations such as love, friendship, and political persuasions. 

Your brand is the face of your business to the consumer. Whether you are an established brand or up-and-coming, there are distinct ways that can influence your current and potential customer base. Understanding how consumers make their purchase decisions will help you make strategic decisions, capitalize on consumer values, change consumer perceptions of your brand and more in order to enhance your core value proposition. 

Brand influence is not a new concept 

Like any other marketing tactic, brands have the ability to influence consumer behavior and shape their experiences. Often, we cannot help but crave for a particular brand of a product – a product that is made and distributed by a specific company. This is because of brand influences.

In understanding how to utilize brand influence in your own organization, it is important to first understand what brand influence is. Defining brand influence is considered a difficult task. This is because brand influence actually varies, depending on one’s viewpoint or orientation. 

Any consumer product or service inevitably has a brand behind it

The brand represents the value of the product and helps to determine consumer perception, with numerous brands for each product type present in any developed country. Branding influences consumer behavior in three ways:

1. It creates a relationship with the customers, changes the perception of the product.
2. There are always people who say that branding is useless for them.
3. They even consider it harmful, because it makes fake image of the product and leads to unnecessary and harmful expenses.

Brand is the most important element in building a successful business. The term ‘brand’ is not only used to signify in the present but also is perceived as the identity of a company for future generations. Branding is an important tool that helps companies building trust among their customers.

Brands are key to influencing consumers behavior

Consumers perceive brands through five sensory organs, namely the eyes, ears, mouth, nose and skin. Hearing and seeing is how the brand communicates to the consumer – what offerings does it give and what services does it perform? Its texture is outlined in this exercise as well by how the product looks and feels.

To plant a brand message in consumers’ mind, you must create an image that people are accustomed to seeing and turns into a symbol of the brand. This is where branding comes in. From my knowledge of marketing, I know that when a company decides to market their created product or service, they have to decide on how they want that product or service to be perceived by consumers.

This means more than just creating a catchy commercial with enough fame to make it stick in your mind. It also means taking advantage of your brand’s name recognition and creating it to match with recognizable characteristics that consumers will relate to. If you can get them dialed-in enough on what they believe your brand is about, you can craft a relationship with them that becomes deep-seated enough to influence their behavior.

I can see your Brand from Here

Brands mean different things and have different levels of influence on us all. It’s no secret that brands cultivate a certain identity to fit specific needs. This is often a selling point for consumers. Certain brands appeal to you because of the unique identity they portray, revealing a part of your personality you didn’t know existed (or alternatively, reaffirming one you already knew about).

When consumers are exposed to a brand on a daily basis, they are influenced by that identity. Over time, the consumer’s perception of the brand becomes part of the consumer’s sense of self and how they understand their position in society. Let’s be real here, not all consumers live in a vacuum and many people use brands to express who they are and fit in with their families or peer groups.

A brand’s identity influences consumer behavior through the impact of branding, (advertising), media attention on a brand and peer perception of a brand.

Stay in Sync with People Around Us

Let’s explore word-of-mouth influence and how it works. What is word-of-mouth influence? Word of mouth affects consumer behavior through peer influence. Peer influence is people watching people. It’s us subconsciously syncing our behaviors, opinions, strategies, and thoughts to those around us.

We’ve all been there; we see something and wonder why the heck anyone would buy it. I am sure you have experienced a time when you were younger when you wanted to fit in with your peers at school or with your friends. I’m pretty sure there was a time when you wanted to wear something that was in style or listen to a certain kind of music. Peer Influence – Examples Children are influenced by their peers, and this can lead to bad behavior.

We constantly try to adjust our attitudes and actions to be consistent with people around us. Given that brands are everywhere, we are exposed to them more than any other element of society. They have a lot of the same characteristics as people but have many built-in advantages that help them become an authority that we trust. Ultimately, these cultural symbols shaped so strongly by celebrities are becoming the virtual influencers in our lives.

A Whole New Avenue of Communicating with Consumers

Direct marketing and content marketing have made this possible — but now, smartphone apps are taking it to the next level. The smartphone apps revolution is changing the way companies influence consumer behavior. Today’s transaction-based economy has taken a step back, and it’s all about relationship building. Mobile makes usability frictionless, resulting in people using their money to buy what they want when they want it.

Apps allow brands to connect to users in a personalized way. Instead of general marketing and advertising, apps can use triggers such as location and customer history to send highly personalized content. This creates a more personal connection between customer and brand.

Celebrities to Persuade Consumers 

You might be surprised to learn that celebrities aren’t always the most effective choice for advertising. Or — and this is what I want to focus on today — the effect of a celebrity endorsement depends heavily on how people view the product in question. 

In the abstract sense, celebrity endorsements make sense as advertisements because they attract attention. It’s amazing to see a face that you recognize from TV or the movies in a new light. The most obvious example is a celebrity spokesperson for a product. A well-known actor can help influence consumer behavior in many ways, one of the most obvious being increased brand recognition from the ads they do with the company.

In a very real sense, however, what causes people to notice celebrities in ads is something a little more complex — their association with specific products. This trend has been studied since the 1980s and has shown that not all celebrities are created equal. While you may assume that brands and celebrities are a match made in advertising heaven—so many endorsement deals are made after all—this is more often a recipe for failure than success.