Did The Penn State Brand Get The Death Penalty?

There are no shortage of definitions for the term “brand equity.” You probably have your favorite. This is one of mine, especially in the context of the Penn State brand: “A brand’s power derived from the goodwill and name recognition that it has earned over time, which translates into higher sales volume and higher profit margins against competing brands.”

The reason I like this particular definition when it is applied to the brand of Penn State is because of words like “goodwill” and “name recognition” and “earned over time.”

Clearly the Penn State brand, with Joe Paterno at the helm for over 45 years, wielded the power that came from goodwill while garnering name recognition, which in turn lead to higher sales and higher profit margins – that in the university world translates to an increasing level of enrollment and an increasing level of monetary donations from alumni. All of which makes the competing brands green with envy for sure.

At its peak, which for all intents and purposes was anytime right up until the world found out about Jerry Sandusky – the Penn State brand possessed a tremendous amount of brand equity.

Yet as we now know, this once seemingly invincible and impenetrable brand, has been reduced to a mere shell of its former self.

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The Real Value Of A Facebook Like

Trying to qualify the value of a Facebook Like for a given brand has been shown to be an incredibly elusive and often frustrating exercise. An exercise many brand managers and marketing managers would say ends more often than not, in futility.

Sure, having that large number of Facebook Likes is always great for the ego while standing around the water cooler with the brand managers and marketers – but what is the inherent value?

What good are all these Likes if it doesn’t correlate to increased revenue?

Two recent studies have shed some light on what the value of a Facebook Like truly is: “The Facebook Factor” via Forrester and the “Power of a Like 2” the sequel to comScore’s “Power of a Like” released last year.

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