“Hurry up, Brother” is a hot game variety show in China, which was broadcasted on Zhejiang TV Station in 2014. Except high audience rating, total investment cost of it is also very high--at around four hundred million. Compared to other domestic reality shows in 2014, it has created more assets and had a larger influence on audience. It can not be so popular with no good brand management and marketing. So it is worthwhile to analyze “Hurry up, Brother” from the point of brand management. What’s more, this study also has some significance to the development of other reality shows.
     In 2001, Hislop defined branding as “the process of creating a relationship or a connection between a company's product and emotional perception of the customer for the purpose of generating segregation among competition and building loyalty among customers.” (Brand Management, Retrieved May18, 2015, from http;//en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brand management) Brand management is a function of marketing that uses special techniques in order to increase the perceived value of a product.
     Philip Kotler (2010), an American marketing expert, defines positioning as arranging for a product to occupy a clear, distinctive, and desirable place relative to competing products in the minds of target consumer (p.74). Buzz Marketing is defined by Philip Kotler in Principles Marketing as creating opinion leaders and getting them to spread information about a product or service to others in their communities. And Brand Extension is defined by Philip Kotler in Principles Marketing as extending an existing brand name to new product categories. Effective Brand Positioning is contingent upon identifying and communicating a brand’s uniqueness, differentiation and verifiable value. Awareness of the brand name and profitability from offerings in more than one product can be increased because the successful brand extension. Brand positioning is the premise for successful brand management; brand communication is the effective mean for creating, developing powerful brand and establishing its positioning; brand extension, as one part of brand strategy , is the inevitable choice for enhancing competitiveness of products.
     For Brand management is an extensive topic, this thesis mainly analyzes brand management in “Hurry up, Brother” from three representative parts: brand positioning, Buzz Marketing and brand extension.
Chapter Two Literature Review
 2.1 Domestic Research
     According to search results of key words--“brand management” “brand” “marketing of reality show” and “Hurry up, Brother” on CNKI (China National Knowledge Infrastructure), domestic researches can be pided into four major parts. They are theoretical macro-researches of media brand, theoretical macro-researches of reality shows, case studies of brand and marketing of representative reality shows and some journal papers which discuss reasons for the popularity of “Hurry up, Brother”. Firstly, definition, application, BIS (Brand Identity System), marketing, brand extension, risks, lifespan, brand equity and other parts of media brand are analyzed by scholars, which are the theoretical direction for reality shows. For example, Hong Lijuan (2012) summarized media brand strategies in her book Media Brand Management, which was published by China Radio and TV Press in 2012. She analyzes special features of media brand and points out that re-positioning is important for media brand to continue lifespan. Secondly, development, production, marketing and other aspects of reality shows are discussed by scholars. They provide theoretical guidance to research of reality shows. Yin Hong, Ran Ruxue, and Cheng Hong (2006) systematically present general development of reality show and discuss its production, marketing, types and other aspects in their book Entertainment Whirlwind-knowing More about Reality Show. Thirdly, five forms of reality shows are mainly analyzed, which are Job Searching Show, Dating Show, Game Reality Show, Talk Show and Talent show. “Job Comes Job Goes” is a representative of Job Searching Show; “If You Are the One” is a representative of Dating Show; “Dad Where Gong” is a representative of Game Reality Show; “Gold Mediation” is a representative of Talk Show and “Super Girl” is a representative of Dating Show. Branding, positioning, brand packing and extension are the main parts of studying brand management of reality shows. Fourthly, interesting content, good publicity, seven hot super stars, fine post production and reasonable brand extension are main reasons for the success of “Hurry up, Brother”, which are analyzed in some journal papers. In a word, researches of “Hurry up, Brother” are few. Specific and systematic studies on brand management of reality shows are rare in China now. 真人秀节目“奔跑吧，兄弟”品牌管理(2):http://www.youerw.com/yingyu/lunwen_21763.html