My friend lived in a poorly renovated home in Fremantle, Western Australia. Like many houses in the area, it was built in the early 20th century.

我的朋友住在西澳大利亚州弗里曼特尔(Fremantle)一座装修不良的房屋中。 像该地区的许多房屋一样，它建于20世纪初期。

So the original structure — an adorable shack with limestone cladding, jarrah floorboards and ornate cornices — was beautiful.

因此，原始结构很漂亮-一个可爱的小屋，上面铺着石灰石覆盖层，jarrah地板和华丽的檐口。

But, in the 70s, the owners at the time built another room onto the back which was made out of red brick and, curiously, had a dome entrance and carpeted floors.

但是，在70年代，当时的业主在后座上盖了另一间用红砖砌成的房间，奇怪的是，它有圆顶入口和铺有地毯的地板。

The next renovation, by the next owners, saw a kitchen with linoleum floors and green walls.

下一位业主进行的下一次装修，看到了一个带有油毡地板和绿色墙壁的厨房。

Many more owners and distasteful changes later, the once charming limestone cottage became a bizarre amalgamation of subsequent owners’ preferences.

后来有了更多的业主和令人讨厌的变化，曾经迷人的石灰岩小屋变成了后来业主的偏爱的怪异组合。

The structure had an identity crisis and, in turn, looked like a shambles.

该结构存在身份危机，反过来看起来像是一团糟。

Let’s call that House A.

我们称它为A房。

Next to this home is another, an exact replica of the early 20th-century limestone cottage.

这座房子旁边是另一座20世纪早期石灰岩小屋的精确复制品。

Let’s call this House B.

我们称这个房子为B。

House B had a few makeovers too. But they were evidently aligned with the original design.

房屋B也进行了一些改建。 但是它们显然与原始设计保持一致。

The renovations and additions had similar details, quirks and materials. In fact, in the backyard (shhh, I just peeped once), there was a new granny flat made out the same limestone of the original house.

装修和增建有相似的细节，怪异之处和材料。 实际上，在后院(嘘，我刚刚偷窥过一次)，有一个新的奶奶公寓，用与原始房屋相同的石灰石制成。

Unlike House A, House B was an architectural marvel — all because the owners took the time to understand how the home could evolve and change with the times while continuing to stay true to the original design identity.

与A房屋不同，B房屋是一个建筑奇迹-所有这些都是因为业主花时间了解房屋如何与时俱进并不断变化，同时继续忠于原始设计身份。

As you may have guessed, in the business world, the art of creating Brand Architecture is similar to that of creating House B. Or, if you do a haphazard job, like House A.

您可能已经猜到，在商业世界中，创建品牌架构的艺术类似于创建房屋B的艺术。或者，如果您做随意的工作，例如房屋A。

After all, like old houses, companies change with the context of the times and with the people who own and run them. They expand, merge, reposition, and acquire other businesses.

毕竟，就像老房子一样，公司会随着时代的背景以及拥有和经营它们的人而发生变化。 他们扩展，合并，重新定位并收购其他业务。

In turn, there can be a lot of clutter and confusion, both externally (in the eyes of the market) and internally (how teams work with each other and streamline processes). This usually leads to the following challenges:

反过来，在外部(在市场的眼中)和内部(团队之间的合作方式和流程简化)都可能存在很多混乱和混乱。 这通常导致以下挑战：

• Customers don’t understand your full list of services or products客户不了解您的服务或产品的完整列表
• You have one product that vastly out-performs your other suite of products. Or vice versa (you have an underperforming one).您拥有一个产品，其性能大大优于其他产品。 反之亦然(您表现不佳)。
• You don’t know how to create efficient processes across various in-house teams.您不知道如何在各个内部团队之间创建有效的流程。
• Your marketing strategy is all over the place您的营销策略无处不在
• You’ve recently acquired a business and you’re struggling to seamlessly integrate the product or service into your existing portfolio of offerings.您最近已经收购了一家企业，并且正在努力将产品或服务无缝集成到您现有的产品组合中。
• You’re restructuring and you’re unclear about what is wise to cut loose and what to keep.您正在进行重组，您不清楚应该削减哪些内容以及保留哪些内容。
• The company’s identity is becoming diluted in a competitive market.在竞争激烈的市场中，公司的形象正逐渐淡化。

The list, of course, goes on. Top-level confusion filters down to countless issues around mismanagement, inefficiency, and an inability to communicate your value in the market with clarity, purpose, and oomph.

当然，这个清单还在继续。 顶级的混乱可以过滤掉无数的问题，包括管理不善，效率低下以及无法清晰，目的明确地传达您的市场价值。

When you’re able to zoom out and get a birds-eye-view of what’s going on, your life gets a lot easier. You can:

当您能够放大并鸟瞰正在发生的事情时，您的生活就会轻松很多。 您可以：

• Stay organized internally内部保持井井有条
• Manage perception管理知觉
• Clarify positioning and messaging明确定位和消息传递
• Reduce marketing costs降低营销成本
• Create harmony across every moving part在每个运动部件中创造和谐

To achieve that, you need to know the different types of Brand Architecture and choose the type of structure that suits your company. Before we go into how to do that, though, let’s define a few things.

为此，您需要了解不同类型的品牌架构，并选择适合您公司的架构类型。 但是，在进行操作之前，我们先定义一些事情。

品牌架构，定义 (Brand architecture, a definition)

Brand architecture is the organizational structure of a company’s portfolio. Almost like a family tree. But with companies. It includes three elements (most of the time)

品牌架构是公司投资组合的组织结构。 几乎像一棵家谱。 但是与公司有关。 它包含三个元素(大多数时间)

• The master brand: This is the top-level corporate brand of which all the brands, products, services sit under.主品牌：这是所有品牌，产品和服务所处的顶级企业品牌。
• Sub-brand: The product or service that is in the same family tree as the master brand but has its own name and identity.子品牌：与主品牌位于同一家谱中但具有自己的名称和标识的产品或服务。
• Brand extension: The process of using an established brand name on a new product品牌扩展：在新产品上使用已建立的品牌名称的过程

An artfully design brand architecture, then, is a structured system of names, symbols, colours, and brand voices that are informed by your customers and your overarching company’s identity (mission, purpose, promise, values, personality, expertise). It defines the breadth and depth of your company’s offerings.

因此，精心设计的品牌架构是名称，符号，颜色和品牌声音的结构化系统，由您的客户和您的总体公司标识(使命，目标，承诺，价值，个性，专业知识)告知。 它定义了公司产品的广度和深度。

品牌架构类型 (Brand architecture types)

The presumption is you’ve already established your company’s identity and have a clear understanding of how each sub-brand or brand extension fits under that larger narrative.

前提是您已经确定了公司的身份，并且清楚了解每个子品牌或品牌扩展如何适合更大的叙述。

So, given you already know that, let’s look at the (main) four categories of brand architecture:

因此，鉴于您已经知道这一点，让我们看一下(主要)品牌架构的四个类别：

品牌房子或整体式 (Branded house or monolithic)

The branded house is the classic model where every aspect of the company is led by the same identity. Each brand, division, product and/or service follows the master brand’s lead.

品牌房子是经典的模型，公司的各个方面都由相同的身份主导。 每个品牌，部门，产品和/或服务均遵循主品牌的领导。

The branded house capitalizes on customer loyalty where the emphasis is less on the specific features or benefits and more on the overarching brand mission, purpose, promise, and values.

品牌公司利用客户忠诚度，而客户的忠诚度将重点放在特定功能或利益上，而不是重点放在总体品牌使命，宗旨，承诺和价值上。

Seeing as everything is under the same banner, you can create an all-encompassing marketing strategy that spills over across your suite of offerings and, in turn, save on advertising.

看到一切都在同一旗帜下，您可以创建一个涵盖所有产品的营销策略，从而节省广告费用。

But there are downfalls. If you screw up and your brand is associated with negative connotations, everything suffers.

但是有失败的迹象。 如果您搞砸了，而您的品牌却带有负面含义，那么一切都会受到影响。

Also, in some industries — specifically, the food and drink world — being a corporate giant isn’t necessarily an advantage anymore. People want local, small, family-owned. That’s why you might have noticed a lot of big beer companies buying up the little craft breweries in the last five years.

此外，在某些行业(尤其是食品和饮料行业)中，成为企业巨头不再是优势。 人们想要本地的，小型的，家庭所有的。 这就是为什么您可能会注意到过去五年中许多大型啤酒公司购买了小型手Craft.io啤酒厂的原因。

Companies who have a branded house:

拥有品牌屋的公司：

• FedEx联邦快递
• Apple苹果
• John Deere约翰迪尔
• Harley Davidson哈雷戴维森
• Virgin处女
• London Science Museum伦敦科学博物馆

品牌之家(House of Brands)

On the other hand, you have companies like Proctor and Gamble (P&G) who have a house of brands model. Here, you have a master brand that takes the backseat and is relatively unknown, except for investors.

另一方面，您拥有像Proctor和Gamble(P＆G)这样的拥有品牌模型屋的公司。 在这里，您拥有一个靠后的大师品牌，除了投资者以外，这个品牌相对鲜为人知。

Instead, the emphasis is put on a collection of distinct, well-known, consumer-facing sub-brands. In the case of P&G, think brands like Olay, Oral-B, Tide, Gillette, etc.

取而代之的是，重点放在一系列独特的，众所周知的，面向消费者的子品牌上。 对于宝洁公司，可以考虑使用Olay，Oral-B，Tide，Gillette等品牌。

Similarly, the public audience isn’t really aware of LVMH (Louis Vitton Moet Hennessy). Yet, everyone is well aware of their suite of sub-brands which span over six industries, from wine to perfume.

同样，公众听众并不真正了解LVMH(Louis Vitton Moet Hennessy)。 但是，每个人都非常清楚自己的子品牌套件，这些子品牌涵盖了从葡萄酒到香水的六个行业。

The benefit of the house of brands model is that you can reach diverse and niche audiences with a hyper-specific brand story and value propositions.

品牌之家模式的好处是，您可以通过高度具体的品牌故事和价值主张来吸引多样化的利基受众。

But, unfortunately, you also need a big budget. The master brand has to create every sub-brand from scratch (unless they acquire an existing name) and, in turn, have to spend a lot of money on marketing to earn every sub-brand attention and trust in the market.

但是，不幸的是，您还需要大量预算。 主品牌必须从头开始创建每个子品牌(除非他们获得了现有的名称)，并且反过来，必须花费大量的营销费用来赢得每个子品牌的关注和对市场的信任。

The other challenge with this model is that the master brand’s identity can become diluted, especially when there are a plethora of brands that stretch over several industries.

这种模式的另一个挑战是，主品牌的身份可能会被淡化，尤其是当存在众多跨多个行业的品牌时。

You can solve this by creating a clear narrative that runs through each industry. In the case of LMVH’s brands, there is a clear luxury narrative across every sub-brand, which is clearly summed up in The LMVH’s tagline: The world leader in luxury.

您可以通过创建贯穿每个行业的清晰叙述来解决此问题。 就LMVH的品牌而言，每个子品牌都有一个明确的奢侈品故事，这在LMVH的口号：世界奢侈品领导者中得到了明确的总结。

Companies who have a house of brands:

拥有众多品牌的公司：

• Newell纽维尔
• Procter & Gamble宝洁公司
• Unilever联合利华
• Nestle雀巢
• General Motors通用汽车

认可(Endorsed)

The endorsed model is where there are individual brands that are endorsed by the master brand. This way, you can create distinct brands that target niche audiences or stretch into different industries. But you can still leverage the master brand’s established name in the market.

认可模式是指主品牌认可单个品牌的地方。 这样，您可以创建针对利基受众或延伸到不同行业的独特品牌。 但是您仍然可以利用市场上主品牌的既定名称。

Marriot is often a cited example of this architecture. The company has hotels, resorts, executive apartments, inns — all of which have a different name but have the Marriot logo underneath.

Marriot通常是此体系结构的一个引用示例。 该公司拥有酒店，度假村，行政公寓和旅馆-所有这些都具有不同的名称，但下面带有Marriot徽标。

The Olympic Games is another one. Each event is location-specific and has everchanging cultural themes. But they’re all endorsed by those famous rings.

奥运会是另一场奥运会。 每个事件都是针对特定地点的，并且具有不断变化的文化主题。 但是它们都被那些著名的戒指所认可。

The limitation is that you can’t diversify your offering as much. If you endorse products and services outside your niche and expertise you end up diluting your master brand’s identity.

局限性在于您不能尽可能多地实现产品多样化。 如果您在利基和专业知识之外认可产品和服务，那么最终将削弱您的主品牌身份。

Also, in some audience sectors, using the master brand logo might be a turn-off. In industries where people value local, boutique, homegrown, using a corporate banner can — in the eyes of the consumer — take the heart and soul out of a product or service.

此外，在某些受众群体中，使用主品牌徽标可能会被关闭。 在人们重视本地，精品店，本土公司的行业中，在消费者眼中，使用公司标语可以使产品或服务脱颖而出。

Imagine if the Moet bottle had on the label, “Brought to you by LMVH.”

想象一下Moet瓶上是否贴有“ LMVH带给您”的标签。

Ugh. That’s what.

啊。 就是那样

Companies who have endorsed architecture:

认可架构的公司：

• Olympics奥运
• Nabisco纳比斯科
• Kellogg凯洛格
• Ralph Lauren拉尔夫·劳伦
• Caterpillar毛虫
• Nestle雀巢
• Honda本田

杂种(Hybrid)

As you may have guessed, this is a hybrid of the above models. The hybrid model is often born out of necessity. A company pursues a business opportunity and only after has to reconcile the product and service under the master brand’s overarching narrative and portfolio.

您可能已经猜到了，这是上述模型的混合体。 混合模型通常是出于必要而诞生的。 公司寻求商机，只有在必须根据主品牌的总体叙述和产品组合调和产品和服务之后。

Take Alphabet (the master brand of Google). Google began with a Branded House approach with products like Google, Google Docs, Google Play, Google Maps, etc. But then the company acquired smaller brands like Lab, Calico and Nest, which run as independent organizations. To accommodate the restructure, Google rebranded the master brand as Alphabet. This way, they could buy and start other ambitious projects that don’t fall under the specialties (or even the industry) of Google.

以Alphabet(Google的主要品牌)为例。 谷歌从品牌之家开始，就使用诸如Google，Google Docs，Google Play，Google Maps等产品。但是后来，该公司收购了Lab，Calco和Nest等较小的品牌，这些品牌是独立组织。 为了适应重组，Google将主品牌更名为Alphabet。 这样，他们可以购买并启动其他雄心勃勃的项目，这些项目不属于Google的专业(甚至行业)。

Companies who have a hybrid:

具有混合动力的公司：

• Alphabet字母
• Coca-Cola可口可乐
• Microsoft微软
• Amazon亚马孙
• Marriott Bonvoy邦沃万豪酒店
• Telstra澳洲电信

将品牌架构应用于小型企业(Applying brand architecture to small businesses)

Brand architecture is traditionally considered a corporate thing. But it’s not, necessarily. It’s a structural framework that can be applied at a macro level (creating architecture around companies) or a micro-level (creating architecture around products and services.

传统上，品牌架构被视为企业事务。 但这不是必须的。 它是一个结构框架，可以在宏观级别(围绕公司创建架构)或微观级别(围绕产品和服务创建架构)应用。

Take a wine brand. They often have a number of product ranges. They will have, say, a premium range, an entry-level range, and maybe even an experimental range. So the different ranges can add to your overarching brand story (and not dilute your identity), you need to create clear brand architecture(or, maybe in this case, product architecture.) Do you create a monolithic model? Or do you allow each range to have its own identity?

拿一个葡萄酒品牌。 它们通常具有许多产品范围。 他们将有一个高级范围，一个入门级范围，甚至可能是一个实验范围。 因此，不同的范围可以增加您的总体品牌故事(并且不会淡化您的身份)，您需要创建清晰的品牌架构(或者在这种情况下，还可以是产品架构。)您是否创建了整体模型？ 还是让每个范围都有自己的身份？

Professional services are the same. At my brand storytelling studio, Brew Copy, I offer service packages for company’s who want to tell a better brand story.

专业服务是一样的。 在我的品牌故事工作室Brew Copy中，我为希望讲述更好品牌故事的公司提供服务包。

But if I wanted to add additional services like email marketing, educational workshops or online tutorials, I’d still have to create a brand architecture model if I wanted to strategically promote the extra offerings while still making sure I’m strengthening (not diluting) the messaging of the Brew Copy brand.

但是，如果我想增加电子邮件营销，教育研讨会或在线教程之类的附加服务，如果我想战略性地推广这些额外的产品，同时又要确保自己正在加强(而不是稀释)，那么我仍然必须创建一个品牌架构模型。 Brew Copy品牌的讯息。

Like many things in strategy and communications, brand architecture is a pretty damn simple framework but is hard to execute. By putting in the time and thought to understand the bigger picture, though, you will save headaches down the path and, ultimately, create a brand you’re proud of and, of course, a brand that customers want to be part of.

就像策略和沟通中的许多事情一样，品牌架构是一个非常简单的框架，但很难执行。 但是，通过投入时间和思想来理解更大的图景，您可以避免麻烦，并最终创建您引以为傲的品牌，当然也可以创建客户希望加入的品牌。

Until next time,

直到下一次，

Jayden O’Neil

杰登·奥尼尔

If you haven’t already, sign up for a free 5-day email series to unearth a bolder story, create consistent messaging and write on-brand, always. Yes?

如果您还没有，请注册免费的5天电子邮件系列，以发掘大胆的故事，创建一致的消息并撰写品牌故事。 是？