Iconic Brands: 13 Ways & Attributes to Create an Iconic Brand and Business
Every brand has the aspiration to become an iconic brand but what are the levers that a brand can pull? What are the attributes of a brand can use to become an iconic brand?
Brands are a ground-rule.
Most of the companies have a great product or an excellent service. It got to be flawless, and they have to deliver on that overtime consistently. That is the number one important part of a brand’s path to becoming iconic.
Another aspect of what a brand has to do is they have to have a laser focus on one key product or one key service that they’re really going to push.
They a tremendous amount of marketing effort behind it because that marketing effort over time is what’s going to cement their brand in people’s minds. They have to own it. They have to get behind it.
They can own a thing like a shape or color or service or a character or personality, and they have to be consistent with it over a long period of time.
Examples of Iconic Brands (Most Recognized Brands in The World)
Look at Coca Cola. Their logo has evolved over 100 years, their brand has evolved but it is remarkably similar to what it used to be, but it has changed it. They’ve done things to keep it current their product line is also expanded.
Coca Cola has expanded into a much broader range of brands and products, things like vitamin water and Dasani water, and Minute Maid orange juice.
Some Key examples of Iconic Brands include;
- Apple
- MacDonald
- Toyota
- Nike
- HP
- Disney
- Amazon
- Kentucky Fried Chicken
- Mercedes
- BMW
But you have to get behind that one key product or service that you are going to push to become iconic. Many of the brands have used all or any of the attributes that can make a brand iconic.
They might have used color and a product and a package; they might have used technology and a personality and a character. Any combination of aspects of these elements could be used to cement a brand’s iconic stature.
13 Ways & Attributes to Create an Iconic Brand and Business
Shape & Layout
Coca Cola has used the shape of their classic Coke bottle for over 100 years to cement themselves in people’s brains, and they have become an iconic brand because of it
The silhouette of this bottle is known worldwide and is probably the most recognized package in the world.
Brands can also use the layout as an iconic element. Marble cigarettes, for example, have used the layout of their cigarette pack very consistently over decades and decades, and it has become a very iconic symbol of their brand.
The red shape at the top of their logotype of the bottom, their crust in the center.
It has some of the same color blocking, but it has become a very iconic brand because it has stayed with the same layout over time.
The Functionality of Their Product
Another level that brands can pull is the functionality of their product. Example; Converse, and their Converse All-Star high-top basketball shoe.
That’s a very iconic product, and it’s because of the functionality of it. It’s also because of the color and its logo in the shape of it.
But the functionality of that ankle support was one of the critical things that made that brand very recognizable and, as they’ve used it over time, Incredibly iconic
Technology
Technology can also be used as an iconic aspect of a brand
Apple and maybe Microsoft is to technological brands that have used technology and leveraging and innovating around technology and how that technology is delivered either by iPhones, Macs, whatever that is as an iconic aspect of their brand.
Character
Characters can also be used as an iconic element in building a brand. Think of Disney and Mickey Mouse.
Mickey Mouse has been around for over 100 years and has remained relatively unchanged.
The drawing style of it, yes, has changed, but they’ve also leveraged and kept that silhouette of the two mouse years in a way that is absolutely recognizable even when it’s just a silhouette.
Characters like Tony the Tiger or Chester the Cheetah for Cheetos to other characters that air used to help make a product brand iconic.
Experience of A Brand
The experience of a brand can also be used as an iconic element. Disney is another great example.
The experience of Disneyland or Disneyworld and the characters and the rides and the colors and sounds. All create an experience that has become incredibly iconic over time.
And on the flip side of that, let’s look at Las Vegas. What happens in Las Vegas stays in Las Vegas. The flip side is this entirely different type of experience.
But when you say Las Vegas that brand the Las Vegas brand represents parting represents drinking represents nightlife, represents shows it is a brand experience.
Colour
Color is another aspect that a brand can leverage to use to make their brand iconic. If you look at this teal blue, I bet that you’ll come very close to thinking of Tiffany’s.
Tiffany’s has used this pale blue in this place. It’s turquoise blue in their packaging in their boxes with a white ribbon.
When you see this package, you immediately think of Tiffany’s. That’s because they’ve done it very consistently, and they’ve put in a lot of effort behind owning one particular color.
Symbols
Brands can also use symbols to become iconic. McDonald’s has used the golden arches on all their signs and all their products for decades and decades. Those golden arches have become incredibly iconic.
They’ve even simplified it to the arches themselves.
When you see them, you immediately think of McDonald’s Levi’s with their back-pocket patch red shape bathed on this as well with a symbol, Nike, with their tick symbol. The list goes on and on in terms of icons.
Packaging
You can also use packaging as a lever; you can pull to make a brand iconic.
Think about Kentucky fried Chicken and their iconic bucket of chicken. That package form is completely honorable by Kentucky Fried Chicken.
The method uses packaging clear plastic packaging with colored liquid inside for their shop that makes their package incredibly iconic.
Innovation.
A brand also can become iconic because of innovation.
Think about Volkswagen with their Volkswagen Beetle, which came about just during World War Two.
This car form was incredibly innovative at the time, very aerodynamic at the time, and they didn’t change it for decades and decades.
It is still being produced almost in this form in Mexico to this day. That innovation and the fact that they have owned it has made Volkswagen iconic, even though they have moved on to other forms of vehicles, and those vehicles, in some cases, have become iconic as well.
Lifestyle
A Brand can also build iconic stature around what is essentially a lifestyle. Harley Davidson has done a fantastic job of this with their motorcycles.
Some people live the Harley Davidson lifestyle entirely from getting tattoos toe wearing their peril to riding the motorcycles, Just about everything in someone’s life. They can reflect the Harley Davidson brand if they want to.
They start to be identified as Harley Davidson people.
Personality.
A brand can also become iconic because of its personality. Geico is a great example of this with the Geico gecko, even though Geico uses a tremendous range of different types of characters in their advertising.
That attitude, the attitude of the Geico gecko, accents.
How he talks has become a very iconic aspect of the Geico brand.
Old Spice has also done a really great job of using a personality to establish itself as iconic.
Noun
Inside, one way to tell if you’ve arrived as an iconic brand is your brand becomes a noun.
For example, Uber has also been really successful in becoming a now. Now people are saying, call an uber it’s not called a limousine or call a taxi.
It’s called an uber has become a noun.
A verb.
Another way to tell if your brand has become iconic is if it has become a verb. Google it. Google has become a verb around the world for meeting search on the Internet.
