Church branding?

Yesterday Cross Point was featured on the front page of The Tennessean in an article about church branding.  Pete got the call about doing the interview and because marketing and branding is part of my background, we did the interview together.  Unfortunately the subject can be a little “touchy” for some people in church circles.  Sometimes the idea of branding or marketing seems like we are commercializing the gospel… I don’t think so.  First of all, branding is about your identity.  Each of us has a brand.  Think about it… if you asked your husband, wife, best friend and a colleague to describe you in five words I bet that at least three out of the five words that each person says would be the same or at least similar.  Why?  Because you are you, a unique individual with specific qualities and personality that are yours.  Remember when you were a teenager trying to be everyone but yourself?  Until we learned to accept who we are, we fumbled around and weren’t comfortable with ourselves (some of us may still be fumbling). 

That’s what branding is about to me.  It’s about identifing who you uniquely are and displaying that consistently.  Bottom line is that is authenticity.  So with that in mind, why wouldn’t churches “brand” themselves?  Why wouldn’t we discover who God has called us to be as a church and then display that for all it’s worth?