Calling it 'reputation' rather than 'brand'

Howard Lake | 24 March 2007 | Blogs

Thank you Mirella von Lindenfels, founder of Communications Inc, who argues in the 7 March issue of Third Sector magazine that the charity sector should ditch the word “brand” in favour of something more useful like “reputation”.
“I’m serious over the word [brand] because, first, most NGOs hate it, so you have to duck every time you mention it; second, many people still think it just means ‘logo’, so you have to preface it with an explanation of what it really means; and third, it is expanding all the time as a concept in the wider world.”
I too have long disliked the word ‘brand’ as applied within the voluntary sector. It might be due to its novelty to me, in that it wasn’t used when I started in fundraising in the 1980s. That’s not a good reason of course, but I also dislike it because it feels such a difficult concept to grasp. It is too amorphous. I am pretty sure I understand what it means, but then I hear some other brand expert talking about it and realise I still don’t get it. And I feel a little excluded from the club of those who clearly do get it.
Von Lindenfels adds: “so I’m up for renaming the concept of ‘brand’ because the current term locates it way too low on the organisational priority list and doesn’t go to the heart of what is at stake here.”
I agree. I too am in favour of using the word ‘reputation’ instead. I understand it and don’t feel it is jargon.

About Howard Lake
Howard Lake is consultant editor of UK Fundraising. He founded the site in 1994 and successfully sold it in 2022. As director of Giving X Ltd he is exploring growing giving on a massive scale. He is the founder of Fundraising Camp and co-founder of GoodJobs.