The Secret of Disney’s Brand (2024)

Since its creation in 1923, the Walt Disney Company has continued to capture the attention of consumers around the globe. The company attracts people of all ages, reaching a broad audience through various media and entertainment outlets.

Disney’s power lies in its brand. With a market capitalization hovering near $200 billion, the Disney brand is constantly expanding and growing.

According to Business Insider, Disney’s brand value has grown 11% in the last year, “after a mammoth year in film with ‘The Lion King,’ ‘Toy Story 4’ and ‘Avengers Endgame.’”

How has Disney created such a powerful brand? And how can we learn from the company’s marketing strategy?

Let’s break it down.

For Disney, storytelling is key. Storytelling requires an emotional component that will appeal to consumers of all ages, and Disney has mastered the ability to create those emotions. Every advertisem*nt, commercial, and billboard must remind consumers of those emotions and stories.

As Geoffrey de la Bourdonnaye, the chief executive of Chloé and a former executive at Disney put it:

“We’ve all known the power of attracting emotions through strong storytelling, and that’s what makes Disney so unique. At Disney, it’s about the power of narrative and being able to create a world with a theme and characters, to draw emotions that are common to all people around the world.”

But how does Disney manage to separate itself from its competitors?

The answer lies in a unique content marketing strategy. Disney has a one-two approach by first creating the story and then building a whole line of products around that story.

As an article from Forbes states, “Disney’s ‘content marketing’ strategy goes in reverse compared to most brands. Meaning, where most brands start with a physical product and then build a story around it in the form of ‘content marketing,’ companies like Disney do exactly the opposite.”

This is how Disney has separated itself from its peers. By adopting such a simple strategy, the company has…