ABSTRACT
The opponents of corporate image and corporate advertising argue that this is irrelevant for companies; that people buy products, they buy brands, but they don’t buy companies. First, it will attract and retain better quality employees. Second, corporate image can and does affect the company’s stock price. Corporate communication plans and corporate image development can be used strategically for both offence and defense. The most astute companies track the perceptions of their own shareholders—individual as well as institutional. Research may reveal, for example, that people know the reader only as a manufacturer of one product and they are relatively unaware of the much larger scope and size of people company or its product range, or that it competes in many other product categories. In this era of environmental concern and corporate responsibility, the ‘green’ movement has had a real impact on corporate communication philosophy.
