From the turn of the 20^th century consumerism has followed a relentless march of progression, with its ideologies becoming further ingrained with each passing generation. Throughout this period marketing in its various forms has become more important in the creation of need; although we are bred to buy the saturation of the marketplace has meant the techniques used have had to grow more ‘sophisticated’.

Brands have throughout the years have been offered to us as a guarantee of quality, a product that did what it said on the tin laid the foundation of trust between the consumer and brand. Companies such as Rolls Royce, Aquascutum or Cadbury built their reputation by consistently producing quality products. The ‘sophisticated’ marketing and advertising followed some time later.

As long as there are companies with philosophies set on marketing budgets expanding and manufacturing budgets contracting, the shift in the focus to ’selling quantity’ over ‘production quality’ will continue and in turn have an adverse effect on the brand. Spending more time and money on promotion than bettering your products/services will often lead the marketing over-promising and the product under-delivering.

Perhaps it’s time to re-evaluate the typical, formulaic, seduction driven approach to building brands. It’s important to not get carried away with the glamour: the funky logo, the typeface, the clever sales concepts, and the talk of ‘tone of voice’ and ‘visual guidelines’. It’s important remember that customer relationships are built on producing better products/services than your competitors. This could mean faster innovation, better service or superior craftsmanship; for example spending another million on developing a 120 mpg engine will do more for the Toyota brand than spending that million on a new advert.

Managing the expectations of the customer is hugely important in developing the brand, working hard to truthfully market your products and working hard to make that truth worth telling is the starting point. Your customers will not expect your company to be all things to all men, you cannot single handedly be the most innovative, provide the highest quality and deliver the best service. Dyson products are notoriously expensive, but Dyson doesn’t sell affordability. Dyson concentrates on Innovation.

It’s important for your brand to do the same; choose one thing to get right and put everything behind living up to that promise. Consumers whom that promise appeals to will buy into the brand and begin talking/blogging/recommending. After a while trust is built in your products/services and growth will be organic, that’s good, ‘old fashioned’ brand building.