This 600-page guide to the world of branding focuses primarily on the importance of marketing as a field within the industry of advertising. It begins with a history of the profession, focused on two specific developments, the postwar emergence of marketing and later advancement of Integrated Marketing Communication. The next section details the various types of marketing firms and agencies that exist in the contemporary scene. The final section attends to the question of how to successfully build brand identity, a process involving four steps: planning, implementation, media selection and evaluation/integration.
There are two characteristics that distinguish this book from the numerous other guides that set out to achieve the same goal. The first is its emphasis on interdisciplinary research. The editors address the question of consumer behavior from the vantage of biology, describing the neurological affects of advertising, specifically with respect to right-brain and left-brain functioning. Other units feature psychological approaches to the question of creativity and philosophical considerations of business logic. The second distinguishing feature pertains to the emphasis the book places on copywriting as a process. While much of this information borders on conventional wisdom, the editors make a sizable contribution to the field by means of their in-depth explanation of a selling strategy, in its three distinctive stages.
This visually stunning work targets both copywriters interested in art history and art historians interested in the aesthetics of advertising. The book is less a direct guide and more a well-curated overview of a single them: the intersection fine art and commercial design. It traces this relationship from the early twentieth century when advertisers sought to imitate the conventions fo fine art to the more contemporary scene, characterized by the consistent effort to revitalize pop art and its embrace of the mass-produced image.
