Modern Day Branding

There are often misconceptions of how important branding is to a company's success.  But every company of quality knows how well a brand can make a product or service.  Companies hire designer agencies to create the brand, but even the most important work is done before the agency gets started.  The company has to clarify its target consumer group, and figure out the message it wants to convey with its brand.

When a company brands itself, it is mostly in the form of a logo or a simple phrase.  For example, McDonald's brand is the golden arches consumers can spot from a mile a way when they are driving through a developed part of town.  Nike's brand is the swoosh, that conveys higher quality athletic equipment accompanied by prestigious gear worn by all our premier athletes.  Brands are a means for consumers to identify with a particular organization, and it is because of this that a company's brand is paramount.

One company I am most familiar with is Adidas.  This particular organization sponsored my club soccer team.  As a result, I frequently purchased their gear, and over many years of athletics, I gathered quite a vast collection of Adidas merchandise.

Adidas brands itself by its logo.  Three increasingly smaller lines, stacked one on top of the other.  That's not the only method for how it is branded.  Athletes around the world know the simple, yet powerful catch phrase, "nothing is impossible".  These three words when uttered separately mean next to nothing, one can even deter individual motivation for success, but when combined, these three words mark a phrase that carries extraordinary power in today's fitness world.  Adidas created a strong brand for itself.  It created a simple, yet effective logo that is easily identifiable and readily familiar.  It created a simple slogan, enticing hope and desire for any athlete that wished to pursue unimaginable feats.  Adidas did its research and understood its target consumers quite well.  Through such powerful branding, this company was able to construct a reputation that shall persist for generations.

The brand itself is just an identity marker.  Its the reputation that is built around it that captures consumer attention, and lets them know this product is better than the rest.  The easiest way Adidas is capable of building such a persona, similar to how many top-end organizations do, is have professional athletes model their merchandise.  It targets professional athletes for the obvious reason that its commodity's use is favorable for the active person.  It has a strong reputation in the athletic market, and if it wants to build its prestige more, then it is a great idea to associate its product with chief role models.  This leaves the impression that the product it offers is higher in quality and intended for premier performance standards  Everyday athletes look up to professionals.  Those are the people we inspire to be someday and wish for every minute that we could attain the glory that comes with walking the path they stride.  Adidas understood that.  They figured that people would attribute high quality with professionals, and thus assimilate this higher quality to the merchandise itself.  Through professional athletes, Adidas provided a solid framework for establishing its reputation.

If Adidas wished for their high-end reputation to persist, they had to continue to adapt.  They would have to constantly manufacture new merchandise befitting the latest styles and trends in the athletic world.  If they failed to re-invent themselves, without compromising their original brand of course, then their reputation might squander and the quality the brand once conveyed will increasingly suffer.

A brand acts as a footmark for an organization.  It provides an original identity of what the company's product is and who it is intended for.  Through advertisements and media outlets, a company is able to build its reputation.  It is able to further sustain it through proper marketing and creating new ideas for its products.  A brand builds a company, but a reputation sustains it.

Numbers Never Lie

I have mentioned in previous posts about my passion for weightlifting.  Outside of work and my family, the gym is where I have developed my strongest reputation at this stage of my life.  A majority of my thoughts and actions are constantly comprised of behaviors regarding anything workout related.  Because of this, I have developed a concrete reputation with those who share a common interest in the sport, as well as with those people outside the weight room.

One thing is for certain, I by no means consider myself an elite lifter.  I still have many concepts to learn and understand about lifting as well as recognize the physiological responses of the body to different forms of exercise.  At this point in time, I have merely begun to scratch the surface in regards to fathoming every aspect of the human body and its response to various stress loads.  I feel it is this that fuels my hunger for further knowledge.  Because of this, I have an ever increasing burning desire to push my body to optimal performance levels.  These are the reasons I have developed a strong reputation thus far, in the culture of weightlifting.

As aforementioned, I am far from the top rung of the metaphorical powerlifting ladder.  Nonetheless, I have still made a substantial amount of progress from when I first started in my freshmen year of college.  In this sport, reputation grows by numbers and dedication.  I understand this may be a bit superficial, but numbers don't lie, and in the weight room, numbers tend to hold a substantial weight in what truly matters.  In relation to my fellow students, I can lift a substantial amount of weight.  It even shocks them further when they find out that I am a former soccer player.  Us soccer players are supposed to be frail.  I love to push this stereotype.  The amount I lift is one way that I have gained my reputation.  However, this is not the only facet that brings a lifter respect.  A great lifter has to be humble, he or she has to be courteous and understand proper weight room etiquette so as not to be rude.  Everyone should have an opportunity to better themselves physically, and a great lifter has to acknowledge this.  A great lifter has to also make sacrifices, and has to be willing to help those who lack appropriate understanding.

From following these guidelines is where my reputation stems, and from regulating my behaviors on behalf these beliefs is how my reputation was born and continues to grow.  I have to eat constantly, and also have to continuously learn more about the sport.  My friends and family always see how strict I am with my diet, and through this my reputation enhances.  I make sacrifices, choosing to go to the gym instead of sleeping or going out, and through constantly pushing myself to my own limits I earn respect from others and increase my reputation as an avid powerlifter.

I do not always stray from behaviors that benefit me in the gym, but at times I do feel it is extremely necessary to indulge in other enjoyments of life.  Especially, since exercise is only a stimulus for growth.  The actual muscle-building comes through recovery.  In my opinion variety is the spice of life, and putting 100 percent of your time into one activity can burn you out, no matter how much you enjoy it.  When i stray from my usual behaviors, I for one become more lenient on my diet.  I eat out with friends, and enjoy lots of fatty and sugary foods that I do not eat very often.  Once in a while it feels amazing to taste these delicious treats.  This also keeps me sane, since eating a lot of the same foods everyday can be mentally exhausting.  Other days I sleep in and take extra days off the gym.  Instead of going through daily stretches and exercises, I partake in activities I have enjoyed since I was a child.  I play video games, and watch movies that make me laugh and smile.  This mental vacation from always thinking about the gym restores any lost motivation.  Once I choose to direct my attention again towards the weights, new motivation arises and I am increasingly excited to return to lifting.

An individual's reputation is important in life.  It provides a fundamental basis for how others perceive your behavior.  Only the individual can build his or her reputation, and it is up the that person whether they choose to sustain it or increase it further.

Parking, Parking, and More Parking.

One such experience I can recall that reflects the standard principal agent model, is a time that I ran parking for one of the home Illini Football games.  I understand that I have related this setting to class concepts in the past, and the scene may be getting a little stale, but nonetheless, many of my experiences at the IHotel relate very well to topics of the course.  Thus, I shall reflect upon another aspect of my occupation that addresses the prompt for this week.

I have discussed previously about operations regarding parking for home football games that we conduct.  Because of this, I will not bore you with another detailed description behind our process.  Whilst I am on the clock, I answer to two principals, the conference center management and the customers.  This also applies to any parking scenario.  Our main objective is to park as many cars as possible, because the more cars we accommodate the more money the hotel receives.  The amount of money the managers turn in also reflects on how efficient they made the process.  Because of this, my superiors have a tendency to micromanage us in order to make sure we are doing our job to the best of our abilities.  We certainly don't want to fail in their eyes.

Besides making as much money as possible, it is our duty to maintain a friendly and fun atmosphere for those parking in the lot.  On game day, we want to assure everyone that their car will be safe, and provide them with whatever they need to make their tail gaiting a fun experience at the IHotel.  Often times, guests wish to take up more space than the managers appreciate, in order to set up their pre-game festivities.  This is where conflicts arise between myself, the agent, and the two principals.  Guests want more room, yet managers want more money.

The difficulty in this situation is when guests are asked to condense their tail-gait they often get angry.  They are there to appreciate the moments before kick off, surrounded by friends and family whose company they appreciate.  Whenever they take up more than one spot, my manager angrily commands us to enforce the one-spot per payment rule.  We have two options in this situation.  We can painstakingly ask them to move their stuff to a smaller area in front of their car, or explain to them that if they wish to take up an extra spot then they must pay an extra twenty dollars.  You can imagine their reaction when we ask them to pay more money on top of the steep twenty dollar fee required to park in the lot.

When I run into this dilemma, I almost always give in to the customer.  The only time I do not, is if the guest parks in such an absurd manner that it disrupts the entire flow of the parking operation.  I feel it is just easier this way.  Most of the people get extremely moody when asked to move their belongings or pay extra.  Some even get hostile, as which I witnessed one morning when I asked a patron to move his tent.  I do not wish to spoil anyone's good time.  Furthermore, I do not wish to constantly run into conflict with the guests, which happens about fifty percent of the time that I request tail-gaiting condensing.  In the end the hotel loses out on potential profit, but I feel since parking provides "free" money, then we can afford to lose some profit in order to satisfy the customers' needs.  That being adequate space for tail-gating.

Now by satisfying the customer, I do fail from my manager's perspective.  The guests are better off, yet we lost out on an increase in profit.  My boss also gets angry since it reflects somewhat poorly on him.  It is extremely hard to solve this issue.  Both parties will never be fully satisfied, and in order to make one better off, we have to make the other worse.  An increase in parking efficiency may assist in higher profits.  Yet, the guests will be unhappy with the small space they are provided to enjoy themselves.  The only way I see to solve this tension is to allow guests to park where they desire when the lot is empty, as long as they park in an orderly manner.  From here we can try to manage the space they inhabit during tail-gating.  Further instructions on the amount of room that guests receive for their entertainment should be provided upon entrance into the lot.  This way when visitors are confronted, they will be more understanding and reasonable.  Lastly, implementing more organization once the lot fills provides increases in customer satisfaction and parking efficiency.  In the end the situation is tricky.  My manager wants to squeeze as much cash out of this as he can.  However, by aiding the guests, I will  inevitably fail in the eyes of my superiors.