A first rate resource for nonprofits [Branding: The Jeweller's Story] - particularly when read with your original 'Polishing the Diamond' report. Case studies that put the theory into practice are often of the most interest to practitioners and I'm not aware of anyone (anywhere!) assembling high quality material on this subject.  Am very jealous!

Adrian Sargeant, Indiana University

I thought that after 18 years working in FMCG I had a good understanding of branding. I knew that pet ownership was an emotional territory but nothing prepared me for the passion and emotion surrounding branding in the charity sector (on ‘A strong charity brand comes from strong beliefs and values’)'

Helen Nott, The Woodland Trust

 

As nfpSynergy clients who attended our March Insights event and heard the presentation that forms the basis of this editorial will be aware, one of the themes to emerge in recent waves of our research is that while charitable giving levels in 2012 remain volatile, the picture is not bleak.

"I found working with nfpSynergy a pleasure and had complete confidence in them."

Susanne Levy, Acting Director, Remember a Charity

The public have a level of choice in almost every aspect of their lives that was unthinkable 20 years ago. But charities have largely ignored the rise in consumer choice in the way they treat their stakeholders. So how should charities respond to consumer choice - and even exploit it?

MPs recently talked about large charities being the Tescos of the sector. It was meant as a rebuke for the way that the sector was developing: that larger charities are taking an ever-increasing share of the sector’s resources. There is no doubt that small charities are finding it harder and harder to survive. But that shouldn’t disguise the fact that charities have a huge amount to learn from Tesco. And any charity that is compared to Tesco can decide whether to be thrilled for all the things that are good about them, or devastated for all the things that people dislike about them.

In one of our previous Insights exploring the value of the notion of brand equity for the charity sector we have argued that the nature of charitable giving – which is such that donors do not have direct experience of the benefits generated by their own choice of giving – means that trust in the brand becomes a crucial aspect of the relationship between supporters and the charity in question. In this Insight we will look more in depth at the notion of trust in charity brands and what its key drivers are.

The significance of brand and how to research it, drawing on the experiences of two national charities and nfpSynergy's experience in tracking charity brands over time.
 

That the brand is one of the most important assets that a charity has been widely recognised not only by experts but also by the charity sector itself. Now more than ever charities are increasingly taking responsibility for devoting more and more resources to the process of building strong brands.