Some more wise words from my unlikely inspiration, this time, on what “brand” means:
“The saying goes, "a brand is a promise." On a personal level, I've always felt that statement was incomplete. A promise is the lowest common denominator of a brand - it's what people expect. Think of your favorite brand, whether search engine or sneaker or coffee shop or free software, and you'll know what I mean - a brand is an expectation. If you experience anything less, you're disappointed.”
I distinctly remember the time one of the candidates in my group was asked to define a brand in an interview. According to him, a brand was a set of positive (or negative) associations that were made with an entity – a product, a service, or even a person. It consists if certain qualities, some things that come to mind when that entity's name is taken. He continued to define himself as a brand, in terms of qualities and abilities, and that of an institute as well, expressing some of the ideals that it stood for. I thought it was a brilliant answer. It was only when I read the above blog that I realised that there is much more to this now-ambiguous-sounding word. And this knowledge/realisation comes with experience. I wonder, in the new world that I going to in a couple of months, how much knowledge will be realised into experience?