The Brand Gap book review

I never thought that marketing would get to me. I always thought I was immune to it like nothing would ever attract me. I know everything about brands; if I want to buy them, that's fine. I was wrong—I was utterly wrong. Keep reading to learn the big deal about marketing and branding. 

Hey, it's Kyla Denanyoh. Today, I'm reviewing the book The Brand Gap. This is called a whiteboard overview by Marty Neumeier. This is a whiteboard overview because this is not a typical nonfiction book but nonfiction. The genre of the book is marketing and management, but the brand gap is all about what brands are not. Specifically, a brand is not a logo. 

Barbie is a type of doll under Mattel's brand. The logo, the script, and all can be copyrighted, but a brand is how you feel about a company. A brand is thinking about Coca-Cola and remembering, "Oh, I love frozen Coca-Cola," "Oh, they always wake me up," or "Oh, diet cokes are so sharp." A brand is a feeling, and that was shocking to me.

When I was younger, my mom would never buy brand-name food. My dad worked in grocery stores, and that's where it came from. But they're like, you know, Kellogg makes this cereal. They put it in a brand box and then sell it in a bag to a regular store. But it's the exact same cereal. 

However, I learned from the Brand Gap that branding includes multiple things that give you the feeling about a company. It consists of packaging that has Tony the Tiger on it. It includes the placement on the shelf, which draws your eye when you're in the grocery store, versus the 20-pound cereal bags on the bottom. Branding consists of the logo, that special cursive K, or this special cursive of Barbie that will make you know, I know what that is. All of those things, the colors, the copyrights, and all of the stuff, are included in branding, but a brand is not a logo. The swoosh for Nike is not a brand. That's the logo representing the company. 

I was like, okay, I mean, this is a textbook. It's tiny, but this is a textbook. I like how it's written; Marty writes in an obvious way where you're just like, I could take a quiz after this or even instruct or train another person via video or course because this is a textbook. It is a very. I was going to say no-nonsense, but that's not true. It is a simplistic writing style that cuts through all of the BS and fluff and just gets you to where the gap in branding is and how you can find it. 

The most significant branding gap in marketers is that branding includes a whole bunch of stuff. It's not just one thing. Even the tagline of the book talks about how to bridge the distance between business strategy and design. Business strategy is an aspect of marketing. Design is an aspect of marketing. So is a logo. So is packaging. So is placement on the shelf. All of those things. Right. For someone who enjoys marketing and helps other companies with brand visibility, finding out a brand is not a logo is fascinating. And Marty writes about that over and over and over again. So, I'm sure that's one of the biggest misconceptions he's seen. 

Okay, so take a look at this. I would definitely reread it. This is one of those books you buy and just have on your shelf. It's almost like a marketing encyclopedia. So yeah, I definitely would read this again. I definitely would grab it and just have it on the shelf. If you are interested in more books about marketing and branding and all that stuff, take a look at my review of the book Permission Marketing by Seth Godin on my YouTube Channel.  

Until the next book review, Kyla