Building a brand is:

• Expensive in the short run
• Cheap in the long run

But a strong brand can also become a crutch.

See: Nike.

When you’re trying to build a brand you’re aggressive. Focused.

Your focus is on meeting your customer where they are and doing the things that create moments of delight for them. On doing the things that make people, first, fall in love with your brand and, then, talk about it to others. To begin to incorporate your brand into their identity.

Once you’ve built your brand—reached that mountain top—you can start to lose focus.

You can start to forget about everything you did to get to this spot and start to think you deserve this spot.

You can make choices based on financial models and balance sheet forecasts and forget those dollars come from people.

And while you’re looking in the wrong direction, the next group of brands is doing all the stuff you did to get here.

Building a brand is the beginning. Once built, it requires maintenance.

Brands aren’t owed anything.
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Everything is customer service.