“Brands are all about emotions. And emotions are all about judgment. Brands are signifiers of our emotional responses, which is why they are so important in the world of commerce.”
“We interpret, we emote. We can thereby believe that the object of our interpretation is sad or happy, angry or clam, sneaky or embarrassed. And, in turn, we ourselves can become emotional just by our interpretation of others.”
I read the above from Emotional Design written by Donald Norman. It is not only applicable to tangibles but also to service – timeliness, reliability, agile and beyond expectation are those quality of service to impress our customers which differentiate ourselves to competitors. But it is people to provide service, not system nor procedure to serve. The people is the brand which is to impress or emote customers.
Dick Lam's Blog 