Innovation Will Fail Without Effective Intrabranding


Intrabranding: The Keystone of Corporate Agility

Invention is often interchanged with innovation. This is wrong: 95 percent of patents, which are inventions, sit on the shelf — unlicensed and uncommercialized.

Companies strive to be innovative, to be known as innovative. Why? Because it sounds impressive, doesn’t it? CEOs think an “innovative” reputation makes customers believe they can get better products and services from such companies.

Is that true? What does it mean to be innovative? What is an innovation?

Every year, Boston Consulting Group and business publication “Fast Company” rank companies worldwide by nebulous interpretations of innovativeness. Problem is, neither organization properly defines innovation, so the rankings have limited value.

Invention is often interchanged with innovation. This is wrong: 95 percent of patents, which are inventions, sit on the shelf — unlicensed and uncommercialized.

Marc Rudov’s third book on branding — “Intrabranding: The Keystone of Corporate Agility” — clearly explains innovation, what it is and isn’t. Quite simply, innovation is the continuous process of enhancing customers’ lives, ACCORDING TO THEM, with products and services. A product or service that doesn’t achieve this, therefore, is NOT an innovation.

The CEO’s job, ultimately, is to establish and enforce the corporate brand, which dictates what to innovate, and why. Without the customer-based brand, there’s no purpose and direction, and, therefore, no innovation.

And, intrabranding — the internal communication and leadership mechanism that aligns the employees and management with the brand — provides the requisite conveyance and feedback loop that enables companies to be agile and innovate successfully.

“Put simply,” says Rudov, “Innovation will fail without effective intrabranding.”

Ordering information for “Intrabranding: The Keystone of Corporate Agility” is available at Intrabranding.com.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Marc Rudov is a branding advisor to CEOs, media commentator, and author of two prior books, “Brand Is Destiny: The Ultimate Bottom Line” and “Be Unique or Be Ignored: The CEO’s Guide to Branding.”

Ordering information for “Intrabranding: The Keystone of Corporate Agility” is available at Intrabranding.com.

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