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Remember the saying “two is better than one”? When it comes to branding, many businesses agree, opting into co-branding engagements with other companies can multiply impact for their own.

Co-branding—also known as relationship and partnership branding—is a strategic relationship between two (or more) distinct brands that helps raise both of their profiles. From product collabs to digital integrations, co-branding has become common among enterprises across all industries—whether it’s healthcare and finance, technology and culture, or another combination. Why? Joining forces allows each partner to tap into the other’s customer base and brand equity, expanding reach to audiences that might otherwise be difficult or expensive to access alone.

Given both its potential impact and inherent risks, co-branding shouldn’t be treated as an executional bolt on. Doing it right requires an intentional, rigorous approach to brand architecture. But before we get ahead of ourselves, let’s start with the basics.

The foundations of a strong co-branding partnership

In any co-branding initiative, all parties should share strategic goals and audiences with shared values. But these elements are just the baseline.

A compelling co-branding relationship also requires mutual purpose. Consider the countless co-branding pursuits executed by NASCAR. Many of these sponsorships were first formed with the simple goal of increasing visibility by featuring brand logos on the race cars and tracks.

But now, NASCAR’s partnerships are focused on more than just awareness. Toyota, for example, is working with NASCAR to develop next-gen vehicle safety features, a venture that strengthens Toyota’s reputation for safety engineering while elevating NASCAR’s commitment to driver protection.

Before embracing a co-branding collaboration, it’s important to ensure the relationship is truly aligned. The partnership should feel natural to both audiences and advance each brand’s core strategic objectives, not just create buzz.

Key co-branding considerations: Minimize risk, maximize impact

Co-branding inherently creates risk by connecting your brand to another ecosystem. Even successful partnerships can turn problematic. Remember McDonald’s hugely popular Travis Scott collaboration? It became a liability after the Astroworld tragedy, forcing McDonald’s to distance themselves from a previously profitable relationship.

The key to managing co-branding risk lies in understanding your impact vs. control matrix before structuring any partnership.

This framework is fairly straightforward. When you have high impact potential and high control over the partnership, maximize your brand visibility. When you have lower impact or less control, create separation and distance to protect your brand.

High impact + high control = Maximize brand visibility

MD Anderson Cancer Center, for example, partners with Banner Health by providing hands-on clinical expertise, resources, and quality oversight. This gives MD Anderson significant control over outcomes while dramatically expanding their reach and reputation. They chose full integration as “Banner MD Anderson Cancer Center” with shared branding and identity.

Lower impact + lower control = Create separation and distance

Mayo Clinic, on the other hand, created their Care Network member program, which provides expert consultation and advisory services to member hospitals, but doesn’t involve the hands-on operational oversight that MD Anderson maintains. With less control comes more risk, so Mayo Clinic created a separate “Care Network Member” badge rather than direct brand integration. Members get Mayo’s endorsement, Mayo gets broader reach, but Mayo maintains protective distance from their core brand.

Before entering any co-branding relationship, assess how much control you have over the experience and outcomes, then determine the potential impact on your strategic goals. Use this analysis to decide your brand’s visibility level, from full integration to protective separation.

Co-branding: What’s the best approach?

Co-branding isn’t a one-size-fits-all scenario. There are multiple ways that these partnerships can manifest, and each of these variations come with their own set of architectural implications.

Before making any decisions, consult the existing co-branding guidelines you may have, and get your legal and business teams’ takes. Once you know what kind of partnership you want to enter into, all the other pieces, including brand architecture, will fall into place. Below are a couple examples of different kinds of relationships:

Sponsorships

A sponsorship is a co-branding strategy where one company provides financial support or resources for another event, organization, offering, or individual in exchange for building its own awareness (think: H&M sponsoring Coachella or Nike sponsoring Serena Williams).

The sponsor seeks out these relationships for the positive associations and visibility that come with them. But typically, the spotlight in these scenarios is actually not on the sponsor. Visually, the primary focus remains on the event, organization, product, or individual, while the sponsor’s name and logo often appear in a secondary position on branded materials and in sign-off lines.

From an architecture perspective, this means that typically you just need a standardized sponsorship logo (or logo system) ready to go. This often includes the standard sponsor lockup with your brand on the left, partner brand on the right, and some form of “official sponsor” language below.

That being said, there are some sponsorships where the sponsor is more elevated within the brand architecture. Take New York City’s Citi Bike program. Today, the program is run by Lyft, but Citi pays Lyft for naming and branding rights across all its stations and bikes. This makes Citi feel like the most prominent partner, even though they’re less involved in the program’s day-to-day operations. This was an opportunity that provided meaningful impact for the Citi brand from a visibility and social responsibility standpoint. Since the risk was fairly low, they found an opportunity where they could take more ownership and visibility.

Endorsements and certifications

Though similar to sponsorships, endorsements provide an additional level of risk since one brand is actually leveraging its reputation to vouch for another brand. In these scenarios, a brand seeks external support for themselves from a third party, such as a trusted or well-liked individual or celebrity who acts as a brand ambassador (think: Oprah Winfrey’s long-running endorsement of Weight Watchers or George Clooney’s work as the face of Nespresso).

The brand architecture for endorsements can take many different forms and usually differs based on which partner is communicating. For example, influencer-led communications usually highlight the influencer’s brand first, then reference the offering being promoted. Conversely, offering-led communications usually prioritize the offering’s brand first, with the endorser referenced secondarily. Since these scenarios lack shared ownership or integration, the brands should remain distinct to preserve separation and mitigate risk.

Certifications are another form of endorsement where brands seek creditability from established institutions, consortiums, or ratings organizations. These are typically simple stamps to demonstrate the offering achieves certain standards and requirements. This can include LEED certifications, UL Solutions certifications, and even Rotten Tomatoes “Certified Fresh.”

Whether it’s an influencer-driven social media campaign, a series of celebrity-saturated ads, or a measure of quality, the objective is to explicitly communicate the endorser’s “seal of approval” to customers. While this can have a meaningful impact on your brand, it’s important to be intentional and diligent to avoid associating with someone whose values conflict with yours or who could harm your brand’s reputation.

Network affiliations

Network affiliations involve deeper integration than endorsements, with members typically receiving tangible benefits and having more influence over the partnership.

The earlier examples of MD Anderson Cancer Center and Mayo Clinic’s Care Network fit into this category, showing that architecture solutions vary widely. These organizations also demonstrate how co-branding can not only enhance reputation but also serve as a strategic tool to drive revenue.

Since each relationship is unique, you will need to assess each one on a case-by-case basis. Evaluate the impact and control level for each partnership to determine appropriate visibility and integration. Approach these as negotiations with a prioritized range of options. For example, with high impact and control, you might prefer equal branding (like Banner MD Anderson Cancer Center). But be sure to prepare backup scenarios with gradually reduced visibility—from co-branding down to simple ‘affiliated with’ endorsements—if your partner won’t accept equal treatment.

In scenarios where you are looking to build your own network to establish your brand as a leading voice in the industry, you will likely want to explore creating a distinct brand to represent that effort, like Mayo Clinic’s Care Network.

Joint ventures

In a joint venture (JV), two or more brands join forces to co-develop a unique offering and share in this endeavor’s risks and rewards (think: Rivian and Volkswagen’s JV, which leverages Rivian’s software expertise and VW’s manufacturing capabilities to make strides in the electric vehicle market).

Every joint venture varies dramatically in how its brands are portrayed. Sometimes, elements and equity from both parent brands are integrated in the new JV. For example, both brand names may appear in the JVs name, and the resulting visual system may blend design elements in a way that feels truly balanced. Other times, a joint venture may adopt a distinct brand identity all its own, including a fresh new name, logo, and more. In some cases, the JV might even just take on one of the partner’s names and identities, so much so that consumers don’t even realize it’s a JV.

Given JVs involve significant investments and business-led decision-making, branding decisions are typically handled ad hoc. That said, entering these discussions with a clear brand perspective and impact/control analysis gives you an upper hand during negotiations and helps you achieve better outcomes than unprepared partners.

Product collaborations

Unlike in-depth, involved joint ventures, product collaborations are usually one-off efforts—with one brand serving as the “base” and another taking the lead as an exciting “add-on” component. In these scenarios the endorser brand is promoting a net-new product that they’ve helped shape. These relationships typically go beyond simple logo placement. Partners must understand each other’s core brand equities to integrate them meaningfully into the actual product.

Whether it’s a food pairing (like Taco Bell adopting a taco shell made from Doritos’ chips), a fashion mash-up (like the elevated Marimekko designing items for an accessible Uniqlo clothing line), an enhanced product (like Ray-Ban integrating Meta technology to create smart sunglasses) or a cross-category undertaking (like Mattel and Airbnb’s collaboration on a rentable Barbie Malibu Dream house to celebrate the release of the 2023 movie), these product collaborations come in all different forms and brand architecture variations. However, since the intention of product collaborations is to drive awareness and reach new audiences for both brands, the “ingredient” brands (i.e., Doritos, Marimekko, Meta, and Barbie) are often rewarded with significant visibility to communicate the unique draw of that special product.

Another flavor of this can be ingredient branding (which can also be viewed as its own category). The classic examples here are Intel, GORE-TEX, Teflon, etc. These are times when a component of a product has significant equity, and marketing that ingredient can elevate perceptions and likelihood to buy.

As the ingredient brand, a key architectural decision is whether or not to create a dedicated identity for this relationship, like Intel’s ‘Intel Inside’ program. GORE-TEX also created a variation of their corporate brand with a badge that includes their “Guaranteed to keep you dry” tag. This has been so successful it extended to their WINDSTOPPER products by GORE-TEX LABS – creating a “Labs” brand to position them more as a science and technology company.

Whatever route you choose, it’s important to treat co-branding not just as a temporary campaign or an executional logo placement, but as a strategic capability. Because when you engage in this kind of partnership, it can create positive value that goes well beyond the length of the engagement. But with opportunity comes risk, and the architectural decisions you make can determine whether these partnerships protect or expose your brand.

Remember: two is better than one, but only when you’ve built the architecture to prove it.

Gunnar Jacobs
October 16, 2025 By Gunnar Jacobs