Building strong and lasting relationships with customers and the communities in which the businesses reside as well as with their own employees seems to be (or should be) the focus of many companies.

Just as there are many branding techniques, there are also many different uses for branding. Here are the seven common types of branding.

Corporate Branding – Making the promise of quality products, service, and delivery to customers. The intent is to attract new customers and create loyalty in past customers. Corporate branding is nothing new; it’s been around as long as competition between businesses has existed.

Employer Branding – Focusing on employees to understand the vision, mission, goals, products, and services of the company. It is designed to educate employees in order for them to uphold the corporate brand to their customers. (While employer branding may be required and essential to a competitive business, it neither aligns an employee’s goals and values with a company’s, nor does it apparently help in retaining employees as indicated by the continuing efforts to reduce turnover.)

Cause Branding – Attempting to attract customers by associating the company with a cause or purpose that potential customers would find beneficial to their personal goals or in line with their values. This might be a percentage contribution of company sales to charitable organizations or donations to nature and wildlife preservation councils.

Co-Branding – Becoming more familiar to the consumer all the time. These include, for example, mini-marts attached to gas stations, banking facilities within grocery stores, and Laundromats attached to anything from bowling alleys to
family entertainment centers. This branding falls in the “one-stop shopping” category.

Spirit Branding – Hit the consumer market big time by selling soft drinks with the slogan of I’d like to teach the world to sing . . . . It’s that “get a good feeling” from using our product approach. The world looks brighter and things just go better when you start your morning off with our product.

Community Branding – Showing the collective good a company can do for the community in which it and its employees reside. This branding can include company and employee outreach programs to help the needy, support the
elderly, contribute to public education, or provide emergency relief and jobs for the unemployed. It’s a promise to the people in the community that this company will be a beneficial partner to them.

Culture branding – Another method of branding, branding to employees may be something new to consider in waging war against sagging morale and high employee turnover. Culture branding is making promises to employees concerning their working environment and relationship to their leaders and managers. In this case, “promises” are different from guarantees and opportunities in that they are offered free of encumbrances other than taking advantage of them through either purchase and use or employment agreement.