While brands are doing backflips to garner customer loyalty, could it be that the consuming public has reached a point where the collective noise of brand-song has become so deafening that it ceases to register? Or that many of the products in our lives are so commoditized that the customer/product relationship is all but irrelevant?
Are we moving toward a post-brand world?
What would this mean for companies? For starters, a focus on treatment of customers–service, support, retail experience–becomes paramount if a brand wants to create actual relationships with its customers. The brand is no longer just the product–it is the experience of interacting with the company that makes the product.