For any corporation it is very important to create a distinct image in the market. This is known as Corporate Image which distinguishes the corporation from its competitors and provides a picture of it to the general public. It depicts the principles, beliefs, productivity of the company. This image is responsible for increasing the sales of the product and to achieve brand equity.
Corporate image creation is a strenuous and time consuming process and is carried out by experts qualifying in perception management. Basically, the creation involves marketing experts who used various kinds of promotional methods and public relations. Since this image is targeted to attract the customers it should be highly appealing. Besides the marketing experts critics play an important role too.
The name of the corporation and its catch line should reflect its belief like Union Bank of Nigeria Plc that recently unveiled a new brand identity. The bank changed its brand mantra from “big, strong and reliable,” to “building simpler, smart bank to reflect what the current market needs are. They rolled out a new banking platform called Oracle FlexcubeUBS 12.0, and launched Smarter Banking Centres that targeted at technology savvy customers looking for convenient banking service. All these have to reflect on their new corporate image building and management.
Also Wal-Mart, which says that it sells for less. A logo should also be designed accordingly. Like the corporation FedEx has an arrow incorporated in its logo which depicts its fast and efficient service and Union bank with their new logo.
Once the image is created by the corporation the next step is advertising and product distribution in the market. Like if the corporation creates luxury products, they should rope in big names in the advertising experts and the models to be featured in these ads should be super stars. Likewise, they should not distribute their products to every other store; instead they should target more hi-fi malls. Time to time, advertising and branding budget should be reviewed to cut down on cost and to be in-sync with the technology. This also helps in revamping the corporate image according to the fast changing demands of the consumer.
Testimonies of newspapers, magazines, and social media can deteriorate a well-created corporate image. Simplest of controversies can be exaggerated by the media and spoil the name of the company. Controversies are born by the interference of organizations related to environment, religion, crime, politics, education and charity. Government, too, is another powerful and influential organization by itself.
Once the corporate image is created, it should be retained. It should not be like here today and gone tomorrow. This image should be reflected in all the brands and product line of the corporation. Even if one of the products isn’t up to the mark, it will lead to confusion among the consumers and will hit the sales of the company. For example, Let say there was controversy about a particular contact lens solution of a company. It was supposed to be infecting the users with a rare disease. This not only affected the sales revenue of that particular product but also made the customers think and raise question about the authenticity of other products of that particular company.
Another example is having a company that produces a vegetarian’s product having a hidden non-vegetarian ingredient in its product. This will lead to the decrease of trust among the customers. In such a case the company should either advertise itself as a company selling non-vegetarian food or it should invest in promoting the company as vegetarian by introducing more vegetarian products. So the image of each individual product of the company makes up for the complete image of the corporation. And last but not the least, the image should be very realistic, truly representing its values and should leave a personal touch with the consumers.
I hope this article will be helpful in your organization plans and decisions on corporate image management.
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