Branding is Changing – Fast

Important sentence in the New York Times this morning: “But the branding game has changed radically, largely because of the myriad choices the Internet provides consumers and because of the economic influence of widespread Web pontificating, known as the blogosphere, which barely existed as a popular force until about four years ago.”

It’s an important sentence from an important article that is crucial reading for anyone involved in branding – teaching branding, tracking branding or thinking about branding. So, it’s crucial reading for, well, almost anyone inhabiting the planet.

The article is called “Brands for the Chattering Masses” and it’s by Keith Schneider. It tells the story of the newly minted brand monitoring company, Nielsen BuzzMetrics. (And, yes, you have to register for the online edition of the New York Times to make our title link in this paragraph work. But the New York Times online edition is free, so if you haven’t done it yet, you need to do it now).

Online brand monitoring is experiencing gigantic growth these days and BuzzMetrics asserts that the interactive web of blogs, wikis and social networking sites provides a gold mine of customer feedback and brand evaluation that “threatens to upend traditional branding efforts.”

It’s one of those articles that may well make you shiver – with fear, with potential, with ideas, with anticipation. Read it.

A phrase from the article (and sentence quoted in our first paragraph) keeps ringing in our ears – “…the myriad choices the Internet provides…” After all, our business is all about how to harness “the myriad of choices the Internet provides” – and the vast human potential those choices can unleash.

The choices the Internet provides are not only changing your branding, but your selling approaches, your service providers, your advertising, your marketing, your network, your partnerships – your world.

Those choices can be daunting, exciting, frightening or exhilarating – depending on your outlook. The Internet is changing that for you, too – and this article will hasten the progress.

In fact, it might even open the “Floodgates.” Read the article.