Invisible Branding

Steal this Idea by Marty Neumeier

These days when CEOs and corporate marketers talk about investing in brand, they’re probably referring to traditionally visible touchpoints such as product design, advertising, or web experience. That’s great, but what they, and most people, don’t realize is that branding is much more than just the stuff you can see.

Invisible branding refers to those stakeholder touchpoints that have little or no visual presence in the market, but can have a huge impact on your company’s reputation. The list includes items such as CEO vision, employee training, pricing strategy, customer relationships, and sales force communications. Each of these items are an essential part of a company’s brand, but because they’re not visible, business leaders often overlook them.

How important is invisible branding to your company? The short answer: it depends. If you’re a company like Apple you probably have bigger fish to fry (hello, tech support?). But, if you’re a B2B company, invisible branding is everything. Why? Most B2Bs operate without the advantage of consumer-style marketing—their reputation is staked one hundred percent on invisible branding.

Does your company invest in this under-appreciated opportunity? If not, use the image above to help you start the conversation.