[tinymollusk]

I have no question that people who have built brands believe that it was successful. We can even look at "big brands" like Coke -- they sell sugar water + a brand -- surely that must be real.

My nuanced take is that a brand "exists" in the sense that we are able to understand it, what it represents, etc. What we do not know is if that's the best way to spend resources. All the money that went into Intel Inside -- what if they spent it on something else? No marketer can know that; the question as a marketer: "is this the best thing I can do with my resources?" Nothing about "building a brand" provides objective feedback or testable predictions about the usage of that dollar.

Suggesting that TV advertising can't be a scam because so many people have put so much effort into it is another fallacy. Old school TV advertising was done by people whose jobs dependent on the revenue stream -- even if branding were completely ineffective; if they got paid, I wouldn't consider that irrational.

Brands happen. They can have value, but we can only try to prove that value after the fact.

Direct response, on the other hand, tends to be less full of b.s.

https://conversionxl.com/blog/cro-vs-branding/