This is one of the most commonly asked and confused questions in business.

What’s the difference between branding and marketing?

The answer to this question is dependent on who you ask. Marketing strategists, experts, CMOs, social media managers, SEOs, PR executives, and brand managers will all have different answers.

The terms “business development” and “sales” have been used so interchangeably over the years that their true meaning has become somewhat lost. A shame, because while they often overlap, they are both powerful business concepts in their own right.

So now that we’ve established that, let’s try to clear up the confusion around these two terms once and for all.

What is Branding?

Many people are not clear about this.

After digging a little deeper into research conducted on branding and marketing, I came across a study where a group of industry experts was tasked with answering this very question:

What is branding?

Between the notable branding and marketing experts, they managed to come up with 12 completely different explanations.

Branding is the use of a name, term, design, symbol, or other feature to identify a product or service and distinguish it from those of other producers.

A brand is a name, term, design, symbol, or combination of these elements that is intended to identify the goods or services of a particular seller or group of sellers and to differentiate them from the competition.

In other words, branding is what makes customers choose one competitor over another. However, as Kevin Keller, a marketing professor at the Tuck School of Business in Dartmouth points out, this ignores the role of developing an emotional connection between the brand and the consumer.

According to Keller, brands that are able to form emotional connections with their customers through consistent provision of desired goods or services have a competitive advantage, as this behavior reinforces positive purchase decisions.

Take a look at Starbucks as an example.

Let’s be honest, the coffee at this chain is not good. There are many locally owned coffee shops that make a better cup. So why do customers keep coming back to this chain?

The answer is the distinct experience Starbucks offers.

At their franchises, customers can enjoy more than just coffee. They offer a “third place” community experience where people can come to work or socialize with family and friends.

This attribute is something that Starbucks is aware of and focuses on in its brand strategy. Everything from the furniture to the music to the artwork hanging on the walls creates the experience that the store is going for.

What is Marketing?

If branding is the identity of a company and marketing is the tool that finds relevant audiences and gets them to buy into the company’s mission, then what is the mission/story behind the company?

It is the marketers job to educate the audience on the brand, why it matters, and how the company’s products/services will satisfy their needs. The last point, sales, is key for the large majority of companies.

In order to survive, every company, from small nonprofits to large conglomerates, needs to sell.

And as the AMA points out in their definition of marketing:

. Marketing is activity done in order to exchange things of value in order to create relationships between buyers and sellers. This activity includes creating and communication value, along with delivering and exchanging offerings. These offerings must be of value to customers, clients, partners, and society as a whole in order for marketing to be successful.

There are many different “institutions” and “processes” for delivering that end goal. Typically, these different entities or subcategories can be split into two groups:

• INBOUND marketing
• OUTBOUND marketing

Inbound Marketing

Inbound marketing is a form of marketing that focuses on attracting customers through the use of organic content. This content can come in the form of blogs, videos, podcasts, eBooks, or other materials that provide value to the reader or viewer. Inbound marketing also relies on techniques such as search engine optimization (SEO), social media marketing, and events to reach a highly targeted audience of potential customers.

Typically, inbound marketing activities guide prospective clients along a 4-stage buyer’s journey – from brand awareness to brand loyalty:

Attract

Stage 1 is all about getting your brand out there and making sure your target audience knows what needs you satisfy and what products and services you offer. The best way to reach your target audience in a way that they will organically see is through SEO-optimized content. This is because people who are searching for topics related to your brand are more likely to be interested in your product than someone who is just randomly flipping through channels and sees your commercial.

The goal during this stage is to address common pain points that consumers have and position your product or service as the best solution.

Convert

Now that you’ve built up a small following and garnered some initial interest, it’s time to convert some of these prospects into actual leads.

In order to get more valuable content, you can exchange something of value for a customer’s contact information. This could be in the form of an exclusive eBook, a whitepaper, a webinar series, or even a free consultation, depending on your business.

You’re ready to move on to Stage #3 once you’ve gotten an email address or telephone number.

Close

As your email list continues to grow, you can start focusing on converting these leads into sales.

The biggest mistake that companies make is when they try to sell their product to their leads right away. If you stop and think about it, would you want to be bothered when you first start researching a problem?

Although someone downloading an eBook guide on product bundling techniques may be interested in an eCommerce platform, it is not a guarantee.

Instead of sending generic emails, you could use customer relationship management software to send targeted content that is relevant to the recipient’s concerns. This would not only be more effective, but you could also use the software to analyze which content is most effective in reaching your audience.

Delight

The last and most underrated step of the inbound marketing process is customer happiness. Satisfied customers are the most reliable and influential source of new business prospects.

For example, you are 30% more likely to convert a referral lead than a standard marketing-generated lead. Also, 16% of referral leads have a higher lifetime customer value.

The primary goal of your customer success team should be to keep existing customers happy. However, marketing can also help out by engaging with customers on social media, continuing to send them relevant content, and continually asking for feedback regarding the performance of your product/service.

Outbound Marketing

In contrast, outbound marketing uses more conventional methods, such as advertising on television, billboards, in print media, at commercial trade shows, and through cold calls.

In inbound marketing, the consumer finds you, while in outbound marketing it’s the brand that initiates the conversation.

Though it may seem like outbound is no longer effective, that is not the case.

While consumers are technically interrupted by your ad while they are browsing, that doesn’t mean the ad was irrelevant.

Modern digital marketing allows marketers to be very specific about who they want to target with their campaigns. For example, they can target people based on factors such as age, gender, interests, etc. Additionally, Adwords lets advertisers pay to have their website or product appear at the top of the search results whenever a particular keyword is searched.

When someone is browsing their social media feed or conducting a Google search, they may see ads that are relevant to them.

Inbound marketing efforts can be effective when combined with other methods.

Branding VS Marketing

What’s the difference between branding and marketing?

Branding and marketing have similar objectives, but are fundamentally different. Branding is the process of creating customer loyalty and emotional attachment to a product, while marketing is the process of creating customer demand for a product

The brand is the face of the company that is put out to the public. A crucial part of branding is deciding what you want to be known for, and then living up to that ideal. For example, if you want to be seen as honest, you need to make sure that you always act with integrity.

The answer is that you need to make that a key trait of your business operations. For a company, creating the impression that you are honest and reliable might involve:

• Always admitting when you made a mistake
• Providing transparent pricing
• Not charging a consumer when you don’t provide the service
• Highlighting how honest the company is in all your marketing material
• Having competent customer service staff who can handle upset customers

You can turn your company into a reliable brand by completing all of these tasks. That’s what brand management is all about.

Visual branding is the second element of branding, which most people are familiar with. Visual branding involves the visual elements of your company such as the logo, color scheme, and fonts used in sales and marketing materials.

Marketing encompasses all of the activities you conduct to promote your company, which include content you release on social media, blog posts, and videos.

The purpose of marketing is to expand and interact with your target audience. Your marketing strategy will be a significant factor in how people see your brand. A good illustration of how your marketing can shape people’s perceptions of your brand is the social media team at Wendy’s fast-food chain.

The social media team’s joking around often reflects in the company as a whole- giving Wendy’s the reputation of being a funny company.

1. Branding builds loyalty, marketing drives sales

A well-executed marketing campaign will bring customers in and encourage them to buy a company’s products or services. Your branding affects everything that happens after they reach your online or offline store. Creating a coherent brand strategy is important in order to keep customers coming back.

If your company’s service is poor, even the best marketing campaigns will not result in sales. Therefore, it is important to continue marketing efforts in order to maintain your company’s presence in the minds of your target audience.

CrowdSpring says that 77% of consumers make their purchasing decisions based on the brand name.

2. Branding is long-term. Marketing strategies change

Your company’s branding is part of a long-term business strategy. You establish what you want your company to be known for and work hard to create that association with your audience.

The process of creating and maintaining a favorable reputation for a company or product is called brand management.

Managing a brand involves making sure that the business is known for positive traits that the owner wants to promote. This often requires taking care of any negative associations that customers have with the company, for example, poor customer service or products that break often.

As your business grows, you may find that your original branding no longer accurately reflects your company. A brand refresh can help to update your branding and better reflect your company’s current mission and values.

Although the core product offering for companies like Coca-Cola remains unchanged, they will still update their visual identity periodically.

If things go poorly, you may have to rebrand.

Rebranding is where you change how your consumers see your company. Amazon has done this a few times, for example when it changed from being an online bookstore to selling everything.

When Tik Tok became popular, marketers began using it to share content.

The content you share through your marketing channels will change over time, but companies usually don’t change their brand messaging.

Branding VS Marketing VS Sales

What’s the difference between branding, marketing and sales?

Those who work in sales and marketing may see them as separate departments, but it is important to understand how they work together to form the bigger picture.

You need to put thought into your company’s brand because it is the basis of all your company’s operations. The process of creating a brand involves figuring out your company’s core values and making them relatable and significant. In other words, your brand is how you represent your company’s values to the public.

After you have developed a strong branding strategy, it is important for your marketing team to spread that message to potential customers. The marketing process focuses on making people aware of your brand and showing them how your products or services can help them with their needs.

This final step involves your sales team converting leads that were generated by marketing into customers. They will engage with these customers to help them determine what their specific requirements are, and then suggest a product that meets those needs.

The purpose of branding is to create a brand that customers will remember and come back to. A company’s brand, distributed through marketing, will help keep customers satisfied and potentially turn them into loyal, paying customers.