It's an argument that may never be fully resolved, in some minds.  Some of the objections to branding's place in B2B?

• B2B buyers are rational decision makers who make objective judgments -- and aren't swayed by emotional factors.
• B2B purchases are all about the relationship between the sales rep and buyer; any "branding" is driven by the sales rep.
• B2B products don't promise aspirational or self-gratificational attributes -- price and objective performance are all that matter.
• B2B companies sell to narrow audiences, so brandbuilding using advertising or other broad media doesn't make sense.
• B2B products are too complex to encompass in a mere tagline or ad.

There are counterarguments to be made against every one of these points that support the unassailable fact (one we've seen in action countless times) that branding matters in B2B...it's just branding that's based on a different set of positionings, priorities and concerns than in consumer goods.

IBM provides a clear example of how branding works in the business realm, and their Web site shows how branding and digital user experience are inextricably linked, and can do enormous good together in building perceptions.  Because branding isn't just a logo, or tagline, or style of copy or graphics...it's about how the brand walks its game, and there's no better place than to discern that than on the Web.

IBM often sells to the most senior of enterprise managers, at the very largest of enterprises...as well as to midmanagers and purchasing specialists.  There's plenty of track record for them to call on, lots of rationality that can be leveraged...and they do an excellent job of it.  But there's a basic understanding of human nature that percolates throughout the site, and of the customer-provider relationship, more specifically.  That baked-in understanding of what IBM customers want, and how they use the Web -- both as objective searchers and as people -- is extremely telling.

The IBM site is, first and foremost, a subtle but sophisticated example of solutions-based navigation -- there's an enormous complexity of products and services under their umbrella, yet this site makes it simple to find the answer that suits any user's inquiry, because the site is designed around that process of expeditious discovery.  Copy and content is directed toward the user's needs -- not toward bragging on IBM's own story, which is certainly considerable.

So what's this structure, content and approach say about the company?

• It knows how to manage and clarify complex topics and information
• It knows enterprise site design
• It's focused on the customer or prospect's needs, not on its own ballyhoo (which must have taken great discipline)
• It's sophisticated yet approachable; technological yet human, driven home through consistency of in how site integrates with the tone and humor of all other IBM advertising and communications

Add it all up...and you've got a case study in great B2B branding.

Consistency becomes exponentially more important when you're diversifying across multiple niches, of course.Caribou has chosen to make their brand less regional, less idiosyncratic; whether or not the new logo errs on the side of general palatability remains to be seen, but the concern here has to be that when you exchange the memorability and roughhewn qualities of your original branding for something that's designed to project a kind of intended whimsicality, you can take a hit to your stature with consumers who may have valued you for your authenticity and un-slickness.

That's why you're sometimes called upon to embrace a purpose-driven sense of commitment and patience in re-branding yourself: you may, whether you expect it or not, find yourself estranging some of your audience, but it may be a worthwhile sacrifice to get to something better...something clearer, more effective in the general marketplace, and with greater eventual headroom.

Better still was a 2001 U.K. campaign for Animal Planet in 2001, which featured ads that smelled like dog urine, apparently the one odor that drives dogs wilder than food.  In that instance, the odorous ads were placed at the base of lampposts, with companion ads at eye height for humans.

Work like this trips into the realm of guerilla and location-specific marketing, which make all the sense in the world for some B2B companies who regularly compete to stir up buzz and presence at trade shows, conferences and the like.  But you've got to embrace the opportunity, and not flinch when it presents itself.  And, of course, always try to exercise some modicum of insight and good taste.

Why do they do it? There are a few easy answers to that question...

• It warms and humanizes a brand and company that's pretty much grown into a colossus, with tendrils extending into nearly every aspect of digital -- and, increasingly, non-digital -- life.   And they do it very well; it's sly, never overbearing or precious, a form of designed spontanaeity that doesn't offend.  Think about some of the hamfisted ways Microsoft has tried to prove its warmth and accessibility over the decades; until the Windows 7 campaign, you could mark most of them with a big FAIL, because the entity behind them had grown so large and blusteringly intrusive, people had no patience with these efforts.  Google has been smart enough to depict itself as being noble and community-minded from the start.
• It demonstrates universality, but in (again) a subtle way.  There can be a doodle for any topic, because Google is pervasive and indispensable itself, woven into the matrix (ummm...) of our lives like no other resource.
• It communicates a culture -- or puts a very convincing face on that culture -- that would seem to embrace loose-limbed innovation and inventiveness and fun that's just this side of goofy.  And sometimes it even veers into silliness...but isn't that good marketing for a Google, too?
• It makes us smile, most of the time.

There's one lesson for this that every B2B marketer should clearly take under advisement: even if a company doesn't engage in proactive social media practices, it needs to have at least a workable understanding of the social media landscape as a contingency against situations like this.  Social media is becoming increasingly relevant and important to all B2B marketers, large and small, global to local, across all kinds of categories.  Without a grasp of how social media operates, or without the services of a good social media consultant, a firm is wearing blinders in an era when every message has the potential to become a meme, and to proliferate without regard for the facts.

In an age of social media, it's fatal to even faintly appear antisocial.

(Thanks to my colleague Marc Lefton, of Adholes and Half Fiction in NYC, for bringing this article to our attention!)

First of all, will tools like Chatter affect the traditional separation between vendor/agency and client?  A case could be made that the intimate, consistent collaboration fostered by platforms like this should be extended across the traditional divide between the servicer and the served, because it may* result in closer relationships and better work.

I'll (*)caveat that because the separation is, in the minds of many agencies, an important part of their ability to objectively develop breakthrough ideas and creative, because there's such a thing as being too enmeshed in a client's culture and day-to-day concerns.  They're paying their agencies -- whether they realize it themselves or not -- for an (informed) outsider's POV, extra spice for the synthesis that generates great marketing.

Putting the agency + client equation aside, however...what do collaboration tools like this mean for the future of branding? Brands articulate the home truth or character of what you're selling, but they also sometimes depend on that distance between marketer and user.  Brands serve as shorthand, placeholders -- or in some cases, facades -- for an organization and its offerings.

Salesforce Chatter isn't explicitly intended to bridge the distance between B2B marketer and customer, but there's every chance that it, or tools like it, will drive collaborations in ways that blur the line between both parties.  Some businesses -- consulting, certainly -- are already there, because it's baked into the very nature of their business.

Will branding and brand design matter if you're working so closely with your customer?  That probably depends on what you consider 'branding' -- if it's a false front, you're liable to be compromised by letting anyone peek behind the curtain.  If, however, your branding is an authentic extension of your true culture and deliverables, tools like Chatter will only serve to enrich your customers' experience of what makes you valuable to them.  Branding will still have potency...if your branding boils down to how you walk the talk.

A key component of the program is a fresh re-branding of Holiday Inn and Holiday Inn Express, moving the logomark into a cleaner, more modern place...recognizable as Holiday Inn, but injecting new vivacity and life into a logo design that had become a bit too synonymous with budget family travel.  Not that there's anything wrong with budget family travel -- but the work by Interbrand gave real energy back to the logo and the brand, along with a polish and dimensionality that shows up well against its corporate travel competitors.

It's familiar enough it feels like a natural evolution of the previous logo...the kind of change that signals something new to the corporate customer, yet a change in which a loyal customer could probably find very little to object to.   A Holiday Inn stalwart might even discover they appreciate the new logo as the kind of freshening an old, dependable friend deserves.

Case in point: Paul Rand is considered one of the true giants of 20th century graphic design, and this article from the New York Times tells of how he almost significantly revised what it nowadays one of the world's most recognizable logos.   But Ford -- literally, Henry Ford II, head of FoMoCo in those years -- thought that the update was "too radical."

1966 Ford logo proposal by Paul Rand

"...After some deliberation, Mr. Ford finally decided that, when it came to the family name, what was good enough for his grandfather was good enough for him.”

Interestingly, the story points out how the Ford oval logo was actually pledged as a collateral asset when Ford secured a multibillion-dollar credit line several years ago...a credit line that allowed them to avoid taking Federal bailout money.  Which may make it one of the only certified valuable brand marks in business history.

Thanks, TIME Magazine

"Comcast" into "Xfinity"?  When you've compromised your reputation and credibility through inferior business practices, there may be a crying need to do something...but changing a name won't improve the practices that brought you grief in the first place.  So it remains to be seen if it'll make a whit of difference.  Because to many consumers or customers, a re-branding can smack of evasion. In cases like these, at least in the short term, a new name or logo might do your image more harm than good.

As you  look through the list, you'll see a few instances where the main motivation for a new logo or new name was exactly that -- to distance the company from its prior ill repute.  It's a matter of circumstance, one supposes: there's a sincere effort to start anew, and the kind of 'nomenclature misdirection' that your audience will, unfortunately, find transparent.

So if you're contemplating a re-branding for the sake of distancing yourself from past problems, think hard and long about how your target market will react.  Test out your initiative with some of them beforehand, too.  It's better to be viewed as be making a sincere attempt at rebooting or renewal than it is to be seen as simply be hanging new pictures over old holes.  Customers will always spot the difference.

It's a textbook case of the consequences of a new brand identity being exposed before the marketer has the opportunity to roll it out with the proper PR and support, which costs them the opportunity to "acclimatize" their constituency.   In this case, it's alumni and students, but they could just as well be a company's customers, stakeholders or even the general public.

MSU and NIKE teamed up to create a new branding initiative on behalf of the university and its athletic department, to be debuted this April.  The Spartan helmet logo (on the left) would evolve into something purportedly more historically accurate (at the right).  Unfortunately, the new logo was discovered as it went through trademarking and got posted to the Web...stirring an immediate furor among the Spartan faithful.

The argument even involved MSU's renowned men's basketball coach, Tom Izzo, who took exception to those who raised a fuss about the logo, saying he was "disappointed" they didn't appreciate the opportunity for a distinctly fresh new identity.  But the damage was done...and Athletic Director Mark Hollis told the media in early February that there'd be no change to the established logomark.

It remains to be seen how this will affect the  rest of NIKE's apparel, uniform and branding program for MSU, but it shows how carefully a branding process needs to be managed, especially if you're dealing with an entrenched logo and identity.  The dialogue got out of control for MSU, and without the opportunity to premiere the new look the way they might have preferred -- gradually or with flash and splash -- the initiative was lost.  Other schools, like Oregon, have gone through the NIKE re-branding process and have minimized discord by managing the conversation.

Most marketers -- small or even large -- probably will never have to deal with similar outcries, since there's usually less emotional investment involved.  But the Pepsis, even the AT&Ts and Comcasts of the world, have learned the hard way to tread carefully and make certain their intentions and rationales are heard when they modify an identity that's had any kind of traction in the marketplace.