Corporate Image Building a Corporate

Corporate Image

Building a corporate image can be difficult. The process involves creating an image that is in keeping with the type of business in which the corporation is engaged. It may also involve seeking to appeal to potential customers. Building a corporate image is part of the process of branding. Such branding usually takes place for the company as a whole but might also involve differing images for specific products or services offered by the corporation. Employees at all levels are expected to be part of the corporate image and to promote it in word and deed. A good image is sustaining, while a bad image can be damaging even if the product is desirable, the company beneficial, and the service required.

Williams (1997) suggests a different view of the process of image budling when she writes,

In contrast to established, long-held conclusions that corporate image is determined mostly by the organization, recent findings suggest that image is also determined by both environmental and personal factors of the audience member. Studies suggest, further, that these factors combine in novel ways as a part of an impression-formation process and produce an overall perceptually-based audience image. This study's purpose was to further explore the factors that make up an audience's perception of corporate image and any underlying structure of these individual factors. Further, the combined factors were tested for their relative influence in an overall positive or negative image(s) of the organization (p. 237).

Corporations polish their image with specific images like logos, with sponsorship of public service events, with an ethical company framework that appeals to the customer base, and by being a responsible corporation. Companies benefit from a good image by drawing in customers, by improving their position in the industry, by coming to represent a level of service and quality, and by using their brand as a way of advertising more immediately and more effectively simply by presenting the image.

Balmer and Wilson (1998) point out that the primary objective of corporate-identity management is to secure a competitive advantage for an individual organization and that this process "is based on the notion that the effective management of an organization's identity results in the acquisition of a favorable corporate image and, over time, of a favorable corporate reputation, which leads an organization's key stakeholders and stakeholder groups to be favorably disposed toward it" (para. 2). A company that achieves this position finds that stakeholder groups are more inclined to use the organization's products and services.

Observers note that one way to develop a good corporate image is to be a good company that provides a needed product or service for a long period of time, and any number of companies have been highly successful in this way even when their business has developed increased competition over time. IBM was once the number one manufacturer of computers in the world, and while the business has changed, the image of IBM has remained strong, at least in the corporate world where the company still provides large-scale computer hardware for business use. IBM is one of the trademarks that is known throughout the world, along with companies like Sony, Hewlett-Packard, NEC, and other makers of computers with an international reach.. The best-known logo in the world is that of Coca-Cola, a company that crated an image over many years of selling its product.

A recent effort to crete a corporate image for a product has been successful, though that success has recently been challenged by suits and government complaints.

Airborne is a cold medication produced by Knight-McDowell Labs of Carmel, Californiam, a laboratory created to produce this product, which is its only product to date. The product is widely distributed and features its creator, Victoria Knight-McDowell, in advertising and promotions, citing her story of being a second-grade teacher who developed this product to protect herself from the colds brought to class by her students. The product is promoted for anyone who spends a lot of time indoors with crowds, and this means it is marketed especially for use in airports, planes, trains, and similar venues. As the promotional material states, "Crowded environments like Airplanes, Offices, and Schools are spawning grounds for germs that cause colds and sickness! Take at the first sign of a cold symptom or before entering crowded environments!" (Airborne, 2005, para. 1).

In reporting on the primary users of the product, Knight-McDowell indicates much about its target market:

Frequent flyers, business people, teachers, vacationers, working actors, professional and amateur athletes, flight attendants, hospital workers, Hollywood celebrities, people working in closed ventilation systems, commuters, students, restaurant & theater goers, and ANYONE for whom good health is a top priority (Airborne, 2005, Who uses Airborne?).

This product was developed by a school teacher, not a scientist, and was first sold in 1997. The product is made up of vitamins and such additives as zinc, selenium, and herbs including forsythia, ginger, isatis root, and echinacea. Airborne is an herbal remedy intended to prevent colds from developing, and since the company does not claim that the product cures colds once they develop, Food and Drug Administration approval was not required and no testing has been done by the FDA (Konrad, 2003, para. 15).

The corporate image created immediately was related to the back story of a school teacher making a product fro scratch and finding a company to produce and distribute it, not an entirely true story, but a highly effective one, creating an image of the underdog achieving more by not being "corporate" at all. The product has sold well and made the founders of the company wealthy, though claims for the product are now being challenged. Still, the image has been a success.