From Building Brands comes this parable about the power of branding (I took some liberties with it):

You go to a party and you see an attractive girl across the room. You go up to her and say, “Hi, I’m great in bed, how about it?”
That’s Advertising.

You go to a party and you see an attractive girl across the room. You talk to a friend about it. She goes up and says “Hi, my friend over there is great in bed, how about it?”
That’s Media Relations.

You go to a party and see an attractive girl across the room. You recognize her. You walk up to her, refresh her memory and get her to laugh and giggle and then suggest, “Hi, I’m great in bed, how about it?”
That’s Public Relations

You go to a party and you see an attractive girl across the room. You stand straight, you talk soft and smooth, you open the door for the ladies, you smile like a dream, you set an aura around you playing the Mr. Gentleman and then you move up to the girl and say, “Hi, I’m great in bed, how about it?”
That’s Selling.

You go to a party, you see an attractive girl across the room. SHE COMES OVER and says, “Hi, I hear you’re great in bed, how about it?”
Now THAT is the power of Branding.

The Pinko Marketing Manifesto is on to something, a few highlights:

Commie Marketing is about the end of the Marketing Manager, Director and anyone else who thinks they have control over the message, market or ‘brand’

Having a corporate blog does NOT mean that you get it. In fact, it mostly means that you don’t.

The voices of the community, your employees and your competitors are more valuable than anything you could ever say. Listen. No…really…listen.

Put down the marketing plan and walk away slowly. It’ll be alright. I know. You have a tough job ahead of you. It’s called killing your inner control freak. I have the same issue.

Everyone is a marketer. They were right! All these years that I fought that and they were right! Everyone does it. I feel so much better…

Database marketing was when the marketers had the databases and the customers didn’t. Now the customers have caught up in the information technology race and they can link, subscribe, aggregate, recommend, block, and filter faster than marketers can track them.

Frame it in your cublicle, or better yet, help edit it on their Wiki.

If we can define brand equity, maybe we can begin to quantify and actually measure it. And then we could add it to the balance sheet like they do in the U.K. How much is your brand worth? Wouldn’t that be nice to know? Here’s my stab at a definition: a bunch of assets, like customer loyalty, perceived quality and name awareness, that contribute (positively or negatively) to the value of a brand. Those assets also include other intangibles specific to a brand. Like a Tiffany blue box is shorthand for quality and a really great gift and gift giver. The perception of that blue box is a brand asset. When we quantify that and other assets, we can begin to quantify brand equity.

Any other definitions out there?