Your Brand Is What You Do, and How You Do It

Whenever people try to say what a brand is, it makes me think of the elephant parable in which different blind men describe an elephant based on what its different body parts feel like. Plenty of disagreements arise, and the discussion often ends in confusion.

I used to bristle over the ambiguity and long for a definitive description, but I now realize that a brand is, indeed, comprised of many elements, and while the different parts may seem as disparate as an elephant’s big, thick trunk and short, curly tail, they combine to create a substantive, powerful force.

I came to this realization while doing research for my book, What Great Brands Do: The Seven Brand-Building Principles That Separate the Best from the Rest. I looked at some of the world’s greatest brands, including Starbucks, Apple and Google as well as smaller but powerful and profitable brands such as Basecamp, Shake Shack and Wegmans. I discovered that great brands are made out of four building blocks:

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