Corporate Brand Management in

Global trends have shown a shift in marketing emphasis from productbranding to corporate branding. Some of the reasons cited by prior researchfor this shift were: high consumer expectations; anti-branding movementsthat demand a visible link between product brands with companies thatproduce them; high rising costs in advertising; commoditisation of products;and highly competitive and unstable markets.There is limited practical evidence in the corporate branding field. As suchthe purpose of the research was to identify the critical success factors ofcorporate branding in the South African context. In addition the degree towhich South African companies have adopted a strategic and crossfunctionalapproach to corporate branding was investigated.A structured questionnaire was designed and analysed using quantitativeresearch methodology. 100 respondents from 4 industries completed thequestionnaire. The research findings identified 3 critical success factors ofcorporate branding. They were the important role that employees play; topmanagements’ role and cross functional team alignment; and customerinvolvement and interaction.In addition the research found that the surveyed South African companieswere still far from adopting a strategic and cross-functional approach ofcorporate branding. Only 3 out of a possible 10 principles were identified asbeing in place towards the adoption of a strategic and cross-functionalapproach to corporate branding. The 3 principles identified were:respondents agreed that they were aware of their organisations’ identity;that their organisation’s vision was realistic and that their organisations usedcontact points with stakeholders to build relationships. In addition therespondents felt that their organisations were not giving adequate attentionto corporate branding; providing adequate resources to implement acorporate brand strategy, and there was not enough understanding of theparadoxes of their brands