Brand management

Normally, the Olympic Games are a positive force in marketing. Worldwide marketing expenditures increase as official sponsors and unofficial free-riders attach themselves to the Olympic logo, to particular sports, national teams or individual athletes. Global brands, in particular, see the Olympics and World Cup soccer as the two most important international sporting events; brand linkage […]

There's no going back to the old normal.

Companies may want to shift a brand's position--to exploit less crowded territory, for example, or grow sales. Companies have long used perceptual mapping...

With the first African World Cup now going full blast, South Africans are more excited than I’ve ever seen them. And the corporate gamesmanship here is almost as interesting as the matches being played out in magnificent stadiums around the country. The brand competition began the moment I arrived in Johannesburg from the UK. As […]

As technology becomes more powerful and affordable, your company is only limited by its imagination.

Your strategy should be driven by relationship-building - not shiny new tech.

The nine types of brands — and their corresponding values.

A distinctive brand is good for business, of course. But you’d be surprised how important it is to a firm’s overall performance. We studied how customer perceptions of brand differentiation related to stock price over the course of 11 years in 275 “monobrand” companies such as AT&T, Krispy Kreme Doughnuts, and Reebok. (Customer brand-perceptions data […]

Even as companies devote increasing shares of their marketing budgets to paying social media influencers to tout their products, researchers know little...

"There is no excuse. Creativity has to be at the forefront."

When the author was tapped to join Levi Strauss, in 2011, the company's financial performance had been erratic for a decade. He went on a listening tour,...

This post is part of the HBR Insight Center Marketing That Works. Not long ago, market research shop Millward Brown released a ranking of the world's...

Companies that focus on their "superconsumers"--a subset of heavy consumers who are highly engaged with a category and a brand--can realize even greater...

CEO Peter Walsh faces a classic innovator's dilemma. His company, Crescordia, produces high-quality metal plates, pins, and screws that orthopedic surgeons...

How the President can beat a flagging economy, and Mitt Romney.

The owner of the prestigious Château de Vallois must decide whether to launch an affordable wine.

There’s a reason why creative people in advertising get out of bed in the morning. It’s about making someone feel something — an emotion — in order to get them to act later. As we ponder a future of advertising bathed in delivering customized messages to each person, in their precise place on their every […]

Sandy Michaels, chief marketing officer of financial services giant Pace Sterling, faces a tough dilemma now that the high-profile golf tournament her...

Which one should you invest in?

Brand builders everywhere think they want global brands. But global brand leadership, not global brands, should be the priority. Successful companies follow four principles to meet that goal.