The Most Recognized Church Brands: Part Two

I wanted to do an experiment by asking you who you thought were the biggest church brands or most recognized churches that you knew of and what is the first thing that comes to mind when you think of them.

I shared some of my thoughts and some of you did too. Monday Morning Insight picked up the post and asked their readers their thoughts as well…thanks Todd!

The point of this particular post is not to do a power ranking of the most influential church brands (though that is something I am working on) but to gain your view on how branding works in your mind and how it applies to our churches and what it might mean to your target audience or people you want to reach.

I’ll review briefly what branding means in our current day’s context.

• Branding is about the emotional connection and positioning in the mind of your consumer (or church members, congregations, and community). Yes, branding is still associated with a name, logo, color scheme, and other visual identifiers but it also correlates with a non-visual connection as well.

I’m including Wikipedia’s definition on positioning because I feel it’s important to include:

Positioning is something (perception) that happens in the minds of the target market. It is the aggregate perception the market has of a particular company, product or service in relation to their perceptions of the competitors in the same category. It will happen whether or not a company’s management is proactive, reactive or passive about the on-going process of evolving a position. But a company can positively influence the perceptions through enlightened strategic actions.

In marketing, positioning has come to mean the process by which marketers try to create an image or identity in the minds of their target market for its product, brand, or organization. It is the ‘relative competitive comparison’ their product occupies in a given market as perceived by the target market.

Now let’s think of my starting question again. Who are the most recognized church brands or churches you can think of today and what is the position or perception in your mind when you think of them?

Throw out a few more answers if you like and think about these definitions. I’ll wrap up a long topic in part three of this series.

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