Net companies have their priorities backward. For three arduous days and two endless nights, students of branding will toil like Talmudic scholars to dissect the meaning of the brand. Conventional wisdom says that Internet users are a confused lot who gravitate to brands like cattle to feed.
Brands suit the masses.
Business leaders have been trying to cast the Net as a business tool, using the trade press to champion business concepts torn from the pages of scholarly publications that bless new management ideas, the approved flavors of the day. Branding today enjoys the status of double-fudge chocolate. But Per Mollerup, the world-class Danish graphic designer, notes in Marks of Excellence that the most effective trademarks have been associated with products that have reputations that precede the trademarks themselves. He notes that a high-quality product acquires a reputation and the trademark then benefits by association. The visible trademark is respected for the invisible reputation.