Brand Identity vs Brand Image: Difference and Comparison

Branding is a parameter that ensures a product or a service is detached especially from other products in the market.

It is through branding that a product or a service becomes a standout and gains a competitive advantage above the substitute products. In the branding process, many users confuse brand identity from the brand image whereas both are unique.

Key Takeaways

1. Brand identity refers to the visual and verbal elements representing a brand, such as a logo, tagline, and color scheme. In contrast, a brand image is the brand’s perception in consumers’ minds.
2. Companies create and control their brand identity through strategic marketing and design choices, while consumer experiences, opinions, and external factors shape brand image.
3. A strong brand identity and a positive brand image are crucial for brand recognition, customer loyalty, and market differentiation.

Brand Identity vs Brand Image

Brand identity is made by the company itself. It’s how the company shows itself to the public encompassing general representation of the brand, logo, colors, and interaction. Brand image is the real perception and actual impression of the company that exists in the minds of the public and the customers of the brand about the quality, services, and interaction of the brand.

Furthermore, the brand identity revolves most around the owner of the brand, and how that particular owner presents the brand to the consumers. The brand image, however, revolves around the customer and how they perceive the brand especially after using it or experiencing it in one way or another.

The brand identity may comprise of the company logo, the tagline, or the slogan and the unique tone it applies. However, the brand image consists of the impression of the customers towards the brand, and what they believe in terms of its existence and influence.

Further discussion in this article reveals the explicit differences between brand identity and brand image.

Comparison Table

Parameter of Comparison	Brand Identity	Brand Image
Meaning	The way the company wants the customer to perceive the brand	The way the customers view the brand from their perspective
How they trend	In an active approach where the company must look for the consumer	The consumer is free to decide whether to consume or not
Comprises of	The physical elements that can be seen about the brand	Both physical and emotional connections towards the brand
Tells more about	The firm’s real entity	The customers’ perception of the firm
The determining factor	The presentation of the company to the customers	The experience of the customers with the brand in question
Mainly concentrates on	Looking back to what can please the customers	Looking ahead to the best competitors

What is Brand Identity?

Brand identity is the selective way through which a company represents its authenticity to the customers and the rapport it creates towards its fans in the ground. In essence, it is the reflection or the ace of the company that entails its personality, values, and ideas.

It is through the brand identity that the company showcases what it can offer in terms of, performance, quality, attributes, support, and services that it offers to the customers.

The brand identity reflects the consulted efforts of the organization and the management at large to create a unique product that will trend with distinct features above other products in the market.

The organization can create a depiction of the brand to its target audience, and this depiction is the real brand identity.

Intuitively, marketing techniques and strategies and branding contribute significantly to helping the organization communicate to the target audience about their products. The brand identity reveals the brand positioning, brand vision, relationships, and personality stands.

It is much to do with the operational and intellectual connections with the brand to enhance differentiation and familiarity with the brand.

Any company that wishes to trend and bridge the gap with the competitors must develop a strategy that will take the company to the next level in terms of what they offer and how convenient it is to access it.

What is Brand Image?

The brand image revolves around how the customers perceive the company in terms of the existence and prospection of its brand. It encompasses the beliefs, impressions, and ideas that the customers hold about the company.

In essence, the brand image communicates how the customers think about the company, and the feelings provoked by hearing the name of the company by the customers.

The development of the brand image takes time to grow gradually through such approaches as direct customer interaction with the target brand or promotional campaigns.

It is all about everything and anything that influences the customer positively towards the brand. The customers connect with the brand after their experiences and long term interaction with the products that a particular brand offers.

The brand image may, therefore, be positive or negative depending on the customers’ perception towards it and its position in the market. The customers’ perception towards the brand may vary from one person to another, but however, the variation, the image of the brand gets affected I one way or another.

The customer may like a brand but fail to defend it when another substitute comes to the market.

The perception of the customer towards the brand creates a rationale that dictates whether that product will attract more customers and probably influence the company turnover.

Main Differences Between Brand Identity and Brand Image

1. While the brand identity demands the active participation of the organization by reaching out to the customers, brand image is a passive experience that resonates around consuming and giving feedback after the experience.
2. The brand identity entails the total brand components that the company creates in the efforts of positively influencing the target customers. The brand image, on the other hand, entails the complete and genuine impression about the brand or product from the consumers’ point of view after all the sources are considered.
3. The brand identity is real as it depicts the mission, vision, objectives and core values of the organization, whereas the band image entails the general perception of the customers towards the product.
4. The brand identity reveals much about what can be seen by the customers in terms of the name, logo, color, or the design symbol. On the centrally, the brand image involves both the visual elements like the logo, design, and color, and other emotional brand associations like the reliability, availability, and quality.
5. The brand identity is much about the management of the company looking back and thinking about how they seal the loopholes and improve, whereas the brand image focusses much on bettering the experience of the customer with the brand.
6. Precisely, brand identity is all about how the company represents itself to the target customer, while the brand image is much about the experience of the customer after interacting with the brand.

References

1. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1362/026725799784870432
2. https://journals.co.za/content/mandyn/15/3/EJC69710
3. https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/Asian-Brand-Strategy%3A-How-Asia-Builds-Strong-Brands-Roll/6a61960cf04eb93a30f20d91dad09ba9b344ba59