BRANDING
Businesses all over the world require a name to identify their business. Beginning from a huge multi-national company to the smallest market business man, all cherish a need to make their business stand out. However, only a few of these companies have the qualities to be classed as a brand.

Branding is the process of creating and distributing the brand name of a company. Brand is a name or symbol that is usually known to identify a company or its products and distinguish them from the competition.

Organizations use branding as a means of communications to spread word about their product to the audience. It allows innovative thoughts and concepts to be shared with many. As the years have passed by, the sophistication of advertising methods and techniques has advanced, tempting and shaping consumer needs. Branding has such created such an impact on the consumers that luxuries have turned in to necessities.

Branding is applied to a single product or to the corporate identity. Branding helps to distinguish a product from others so that the brand can be easily communicated and advertised. The brand name is the name of the  product. Brands are often advertised with the use of logos and graphic representations of the brand. The customers than identify the company with help of this logo. For example, Mc Donald's can be easily recognized from its M symbol by any one. Branding is quite crucial for a company. In a highly competitive world, branding can raise the profile of a product and in turn of the company selling it, setting it apart from rivals in the market.

A strong brand is seen as an opening, to stretch the brand to new products successfully and can command a price premium. Advertisers consider branding can increase cash flow, increase the product's lifecycle and increase customer loyalty. The main advantage of branding is that customers are likely to remember that particular business more than the other ones. A strong brand name image helps to keep the company image in the mind of the potential client.

Branding is usually associated with larger businesses that have the money to spend on advertising and promotion. A sturdy brand will project an image of a large and recognized business to the customers. Effective branding can make any business appear to be much bigger than it really is.
Every business comes with a package of the good and the bad. The bad side of branding is that can involve a lot of design and marketing costs. A strong brand may be memorable to the customers but it requires a steady in-flow of good advertising and PR to maintain this image. This can sometimes prove to be quite costly. If the brand is focused only on one product then it can limit the company's ability to sell other products. For example, if Nike, which has a brand name in sports gear, decides to sell cameras. Then this product probably won't get that much attention as the sports gear from the customers. This happens because branding has type casted it as a company selling sports gear.

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