Branding? Defined as a “Name, Term, Sign, Symbol or Design”, or a combination of them intended to find the goods and services of one seller or group of sellers and to differentiate them from other sellers” by the American Marketing Association (AMA). I agree to calling it a combination of all the above. So why Branding? Lets assume, you’re setup for a blind date! How would your prep be like? Obviously your first thoughts will be looking good to impress your date on that first night out. Right? Oh, let me not go off track! The same applies to a startup or any organization in particular, we all do superb branding with a main intention of making that first impression count and stick. Ok!! so why even bother? Let me outline a few personal thoughts about the aims of a good brand;

Creates a bond between the startup and the target audience. Confirms that you are Genuine and Credible. Delivers a clear message to your target audience without even saying a word. And if your Startup relies on funding from Venture Capitalists and other forms, well Branded startups stand more chances of winning VC recognition and consideration. Bridges that gap of customer doubt.

Lets share more insights in the World of Branding if you’re not convinced! In October 2013, The Walt Disney company acquired LucasFilm Ltd including legendary STAR WARS franchise. “Acquisition continues Disney’s strategic focus on creating and monetizing the world’s best branded content, innovative technology and global growth to drive long-term shareholder value.” In 2012, Facebook acquired Instagram for a Billion US Dollars, but do you think the team was worth that much? No it wasn’t.. but the Brand was. “I’m excited to share the news that we’ve agreed to acquire Instagram and that their talented team will be joining Facebook. For years, we’ve focused on building the best experience for sharing photos with your friends and family. Now, we’ll be able to work even more closely with the Instagram team to also offer the best experiences for sharing beautiful mobile photos with people based on your interests. We believe these are different experiences that complement each other. But in order to do this well, we need to be mindful about keeping and building on Instagram’s strengths and features rather than just trying to integrate everything into Facebook. That’s why we’re committed to building and growing Instagram independently. Millions of people around the world love the Instagram app and the brand associated with it, and our goal is to help spread this app and brand to even more people. We think the fact that Instagram is connected to other services beyond Facebook is an important part of the experience. We plan on keeping features like the ability to post to other social networks, the ability to not share your Instagrams on Facebook if you want, and the ability to have followers and follow people separately from your friends on Facebook. These and many other features are important parts of the Instagram experience and we understand that. We will try to learn from Instagram’s experience to build similar features into our other products. At the same time, we will try to help Instagram continue to grow by using Facebook’s strong engineering team and infrastructure. This is an important milestone for Facebook because it’s the first time we’ve ever acquired a product and company with so many users. We don’t plan on doing many more of these, if any at all. But providing the best photo sharing experience is one reason so many people love Facebook and we knew it would be worth bringing these two companies together. We’re looking forward to working with the Instagram team and to all of the great new experiences we’re going to be able to build together.” As shared by Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Facebook. “Cadbury Milk Chocolates” Photo credit: cadbury.co.uk Kraft acquired Cadbury for $19.5 Billion, but at the end of the day, all they bought was the Brand, not the Chocolates, the factories, the Recipes, not even the Candy Makers. Conclusion I’ve shared a few of some of the Brands that have been acquired for over whelming Millions of Dollars, all with one thing in common! They were all well Branded. So do the best with your Startup branding , always make that first impression count. You never know! It could be the gateway to that Billion Dollar deal.