What is a Brand?

A brand helps to distinguish a company or product from competitors, aiming to create a lasting impression in the minds of your community. More than just its name or its logo, the brand is the way a product, company, or individual is perceived by those who experience it and the feelings that are evoked from the experience. A brand encompasses:

  • Expectations
  • Experiences
  • Beliefs
  • Subconscious thoughts

Why is brand important? The stronger the emotional response someone has to a brand, the stronger the loyalty they will feel.

Marketing & Communication Handbook
> Introduction and Purpose
> Section 1 – Communication Planning
> Section 2 – Communication Tips
> Section 3 – Communication Options
> Section 4 – Planning Your Marketing Efforts
> Section 5 – Sample Marketing Plan
> Section 6 – Branding
> Section 7 – Marketing & Communication Resources

The ASCLS Brand

*See Section 7 – Marketing & Communication Resources for downloadable logos, templates, and other tools.

The ASCLS Marketing and Communications Committee interviewed a variety of stakeholders representing diverse viewpoints to best understand the Society’s brand. The purpose of these interviews was to gain a broader perspective of what themes and values our brand evokes, the motivators that drive community members to choose ASCLS products or services, and deterrents to choosing ASCLS.

When examining your marketing and communication efforts, make sure you reflect on these elements related to the ASCLS brand and what your target audience values. Create messaging and use images that evoke their values, address their challenges, and will ultimately drive stakeholders to choose ASCLS and not deter them from engaging with your products or services.

Common themes and values that the ASCLS brand evokes:

  1. A community of like-minded passionate professionals
  2. Sharing knowledge and facilitating life-long learning
  3. Advocacy for our profession and our patients

Motivators that drive stakeholders to choose ASCLS products or services:

  1. Networking, camaraderie, and feeling valued as professionals
  2. Gaining a broader perspective of laboratory medicine; feeling part of a larger profession
  3. Envisioning future career possibilities in the medical laboratory profession

Items that stakeholders generally feel are deterrents to choosing ASCLS products or services:

  1. Not having enough in-person events
  2. Too much focus on association governance processes
  3. A lack of volunteer opportunities that provide meaningful ways to contribute and/or not understanding how they can contribute

Shared values among stakeholders:

  1. Caring for patients
  2. Working as a team with colleagues
  3. Curious, life-long learners
  4. Proud of medical laboratory expertise; like to teach and share with others; value being recognized for expertise

Shared challenges among stakeholders:

  1. Recruiting, training, and retaining laboratorians
  2. Limited budget and time off for traveling to meetings
  3. Interprofessional relationships within healthcare

Benefits that stakeholders value in other professional societies:

  • Practical, down to earth, meeting people who do what we do
  • Science topics that are very applicable
  • See how other labs do things