What is a brand?

Currently, there are many products and services in the market. Over the years and the development and creation of new companies, the market has more and more competition, having many similar products. Therefore, companies have a clear objective: differentiate themselves and be unique in the market. One of the first steps for this is to choose a brand through which your customers identify and differentiate them.

We tell you what a brand consists of and why its choice is so important.

Brand definition
The brand is a distinctive sign, whose main function is to differentiate and make unique the products and / or services of a company compared to other competitors. The brand is, so to speak, what gives identity and meaning to a specific product or service. For example, one of the most famous examples of brands is, possibly, Coca-Cola, a strong, powerful brand with an indisputable identity. Just to name it, the whole world knows that we are referring to a specific refreshment.

Although the main function of the brand is precisely to identify companies, create their own stamp through which to differentiate themselves from other companies, brands perform other functions, such as:
They indicate the origin of the product, that is, what company offers it.
It serves as an advertising element. The brand concept is not only identified with the name itself, but with everything that transmits at the level of value, corporate identity and brand philosophy, which is the basis for good publicity of a brand.
Inform about the product.
Synthesize prestige and good work of the company.
The brand, therefore, not only serves to identify a company. The brand has a value by itself, represents an image or an ideal in the mind of the consumer. For example, buying a car from the Ferrari brand is equivalent to a specific status, a type of life and social class. The Ferrari brand is equivalent to luxury, high class and great social status.

However, not any name can be registered as a trademark, being regulated in the law, specifically in articles 5 and 6 of Law 17/2001, some prohibitions. For example, those signs that do not have a distinctive character, those that are contrary to the law, public order or good customs or those that may induce the public to error, for example, may not be trademarks.

For all this, before creating a company we must take into account the brand with which we will market our products and services, as it will be essential for the future of the company.

Types of brands

The brand does not only mean the name with which the customers identify the company. Here we detail the different types of brands or examples of brands:

Word marks An example of a brand consisting of the combination of letters and numbers.
Graphic marks This type of marks are those that have graphic symbols, logos, drawings, etc.
Mixed or figurative marks. They are those marks that combine the two previous marks, that is, they consist of the combination of letters and / or numbers, as well as graphic symbols.
Three-dimensional marks. Brands that have the graphic elements arranged in three dimensions. Here, an example of this could be the containers and wrappings, the shape of the product, etc. An example of a brand of this type would be, for example, Babybel cheese, with a very peculiar and distinctive packaging
Sound marks This type of marks refers to those consisting of a succession of sounds that may be different
Now that you know what a brand is and the types that exist, you can now learn how to create a powerful brand that identifies your target audience and that will bring benefits to your company.