Branding should be about more than making a quick buck

It’s hard not to agree with much of what Adrian Shaughnessy says about businesses thinking they can ‘brand’ their way to success (Private View, DW 5 February).

He is also right to point out that, by hiding their identities behind brand ‘masks’ and not communicating what they stand for through what they do, they, and the branding consultants which enable them, risk achieving nothing but ultimately ineffectual brand noise and camouflage. Great brands reveal the ideas behind them and don’t hide behind the artifice of positioning.

Those of us in the business of branding often start dancing with our ideas before we establish what’s driving the companies we work for, and the brands we try to create with them.

If, as is sadly often the case, your clients only want to make money and aren’t driven by improving the quality of life or by delighting people, then you probably can’t help them, unless you, too, are only in it to make money.

Michael Wolff, Founder, Michael Wolff & Company, London WC1