The construction of a brand responds to a need for space and time. Space, because a brand is influenced by the culture of the country in which it operates and reacts to different stimuli and storytelling — time, because each historical period needs a contextual approach.
For this reason, branding manuals and marketing theories are not perfect.
Every company, therefore every brand is made up of a social group on one side and a hidden partner on the other: the customer. Each brand has its own character and an imprint left on the "social market". But a brand like every human being, before leaving its mark, takes a complex path before reaching its own maturity.
Like every person, the brand personality is formed in the first years of life and it is consolidated along the way by drawing the psychology of a person. A brand is characterized over the years creating its awareness and finally than will mark its territory.
The brand parable is an action that turns into a reaction every time it finds an obstacle on its way. At every clash between the brand and the obstacle, a part of the brand is built up until it will be totally defined. We can easily say that a brand is not only of those who conceive it but of the society in which it moves and the people involved.
Taking all variables into account, if the character of a brand is a child of society and the time in which it lives, we are also a brand. Every company is always the emanation of a single individual within its organization. The organic extension of the people who work in and their personal branding.
I believe once we understand that brands are not controlled by companies but by individuals, this will be the stepping stone to fully develop a proper strategy to develop the brand we want in the mind of the consumers and have them saying and thinking what we want them to say and think.
The brand is you.