# The 22 Immutable Laws of Branding ## Metadata * Author: [Al Ries and Laura Ries](https://www.amazon.comundefined) * ASIN: B000FC10H0 * Reference: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B000FC10H0 * [Kindle link](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0) ## Highlights Successful branding programs are based on the concept of singularity. — location: [69](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=69) ^ref-45097 --- the mind of the prospect the perception that there is no other product on the market quite like your product. — location: [70](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=70) ^ref-30851 --- Marketing is not selling. Marketing is building a brand in the mind of the prospect. — location: [78](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=78) ^ref-31921 --- A brand name is nothing but a word in the mind, albeit a special kind of word. — location: [106](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=106) ^ref-10339 --- Customers want brands that are narrow in scope and are distinguishable by a single word, the shorter the better. — location: [201](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=201) ^ref-27778 --- Today brands are born, not made. A new brand must be capable of generating favorable publicity in the media or it won’t have a chance in the marketplace. — location: [287](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=287) ^ref-57271 --- And just how do you generate publicity? The best — location: [288](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=288) ^ref-470 --- way to generate publicity is by being first. In other words, by being the first brand in a new category. — location: [288](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=288) ^ref-4253 --- brands are built with publicity and maintained with advertising. — location: [308](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=308) ^ref-13394 --- If you want to build a brand, you must focus your branding efforts on owning a word in the prospect’s mind. A word that nobody else owns. — location: [379](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=379) ^ref-46210 --- Why don’t the many varieties of tissue dilute the Kleenex brand? Because when a person looks across a room, sees a box of Scott tissue, and says: “Please hand me a Kleenex,” — location: [395](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=395) ^ref-19591 --- Here’s the catch: You can’t become generic by overtaking the leader. Pepsi won’t become generic for cola even if the brand outsells Coke (as it once did in the supermarket distribution channel). You can only become generic by being the first brand and establishing the category. — location: [401](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=401) ^ref-4981 --- So what do you do if you weren’t the first in a category? Quite often you can create a new category by simply narrowing your focus. — location: [403](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=403) ^ref-53409 Airbnb /craiglist --- Emery Air Freight, started in 1946, was the first air cargo carrier. But Emery fell into the Chevrolet trap. Instead of focusing on one type of service, it offered everything. Overnight, inexpensive two- or three-day service, small packages, large packages. “Whatever you want to ship, Emery can handle it.” What did Federal Express do? In the early seventies, it was a struggling player in the delivery business. But in a streak of brilliance, CEO Fred Smith decided to narrow its focus to overnight delivery only. “When it absolutely, positively has to be there overnight.” — location: [404](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=404) ^ref-11274 --- Look at what Prego did to Ragú. For years Ragú was the leading brand of spaghetti sauce with a market share in excess of 50 percent. Like Emery Air Freight, Ragú had many different varieties. So what did Prego do? The brand narrowed its focus to one variety, “thick” spaghetti sauce. With this one type of sauce Prego won 27 percent of the market. Prego owns the word “thick” in the mind of the spaghetti sauce — location: [415](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=415) ^ref-22633 --- To get into the consumer’s mind you have to sacrifice. You have to reduce the essence of your brand to a single thought or attribute. An attribute that nobody else already owns in your category. — location: [426](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=426) ^ref-45089 --- But you need subtlety in dealing with a word like “prestige.” Its connotations may work in brand building, but the word itself does not. It’s not that people aren’t dying to own prestige brands. They just hate to admit it. To be successful in branding a “prestige” product or service, you need to do two things: You need to make your product or service more expensive than the competition. You need to find a code word for prestige. — location: [438](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=438) ^ref-47353 --- Mercedes also found a powerful code word for — location: [444](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=444) ^ref-57974 --- prestige. “Engineered like no other car in the world.” — location: [444](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=444) ^ref-58627 --- Ask not what percentage of an existing market your brand can achieve, ask how large a market your brand can create by narrowing its focus and owning a word in the mind. — location: [452](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=452) ^ref-12038 --- The crucial ingredient in the success of any brand is its claim to authenticity. — location: [455](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=455) ^ref-27549 --- When you don’t have the leading brand, your best strategy is to create a new — location: [466](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=466) ^ref-12374 --- category in which you can claim leadership. — location: [467](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=467) ^ref-5371 --- When the benefits, however, are structured around some aspect of a brand’s credentials, they carry much more weight. — location: [487](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=487) ^ref-52103 --- Never forget leadership. No matter how small the market, don’t get duped into simply selling the benefits of the category early in the branding process. — location: [494](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=494) ^ref-26341 --- once you get on top, it’s hard to lose your spot. — location: [496](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=496) ^ref-30772 --- Quality, or rather the perception of quality, resides in the mind of the buyer. If you want to build a powerful brand, you have to build a powerful perception of quality in the mind. — location: [531](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=531) ^ref-4427 --- Another factor in building a high-quality perception is having a high price. — location: [550](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=550) ^ref-50972 --- High price is a benefit to customers. It allows the affluent customer to obtain psychic satisfaction from the public purchase and consumption of a high-end brand. — location: [552](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=552) ^ref-3873 --- A better strategy in a sea of similar products with similar prices is to deliberately start with a higher price. Then ask yourself, What can we put into our brand to justify the higher price? Rolex made its watches bigger and heavier with a unique-looking wristband. Callaway made its drivers oversized. Montblanc made its pens fatter. Häagen-Dazs added more butterfat. Chivas Regal let its Scotch whisky age longer. — location: [561](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=561) ^ref-19805 --- To build a quality brand you need to narrow the focus and combine that narrow focus with a better name and a higher price. — location: [567](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=567) ^ref-23632 --- you narrow the focus to such a degree that there is no longer any market for the brand? This is potentially the best situation of all. What you have created is the opportunity to introduce a brand-new category. What was the market for an expensive vodka before Stolichnaya? Almost nothing. What was the market for expensive cars before Mercedes-Benz? Almost nothing. What was the market for cheap cars before Volkswagen? Almost nothing. What was the market for home pizza delivery before Domino’s Pizza? Almost nothing. What was the market for in-line skates before Rollerblade? Almost nothing. — location: [570](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=570) ^ref-54095 --- the most efficient, most productive, most useful aspect of branding has nothing to do with increasing a company’s market share. The most efficient, most productive, most useful aspect of branding is creating a new category. In other words, narrowing the focus to nothing and starting something totally new. — location: [578](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=578) ^ref-10590 --- You have to launch the brand in such a way as to create the perception that that brand was the first, the leader, the pioneer, or the original. Invariably, you should use one of these words to describe your brand. You have to promote the new category. — location: [582](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=582) ^ref-60647 --- volume is going nowhere, the manufacturer concludes it needs more brands to maintain or increase sales. When a category is increasing in sales, there are opportunities for new brands, but manufacturer logic suggests they’re not needed. “We are doing great, we don’t need any more brands.” — location: [695](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=695) ^ref-51126 --- As a result, the marketplace is filled with line extensions in areas where they are not needed and is starved for new brands in areas where they are needed. — location: [697](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=697) ^ref-1470 --- In order to build the category, a brand should welcome other brands. — location: [753](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=753) ^ref-30166 --- One of the fastest routes to failure is giving a brand a generic — location: [807](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=807) ^ref-3420 --- rents the best movies. Budget — location: [854](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=854) ^ref-2273 --- Brand names should almost always take precedence over company names. — location: [881](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=881) ^ref-20908 --- Consumers buy brands, they don’t buy companies. — location: [881](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=881) ^ref-12111 --- Gresham’s law of marketing, — location: [959](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=959) ^ref-22471 --- There is a time and a place to launch a second brand. — location: [985](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=985) ^ref-4223 --- brand’s logotype should be designed to fit the eyes. Both eyes. — location: [1058](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=1058) ^ref-25781 --- the ideal shape for a logotype is horizontal. Roughly two and one-fourth units wide and one unit high. — location: [1061](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=1061) ^ref-17026 --- A brand should use a color that is the opposite of its major competitor’s. — location: [1096](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=1096) ^ref-45793 --- There are no barriers to global branding. A brand should know no borders. — location: [1151](kindle://book?action=open&asin=B000FC10H0&location=1151) ^ref-64410 ---