"Brand management is about managing the quality of customer experiences. Co-create the experience with customers and build the brand," Prof Venkat Ramaswamy, University of Michigan Business School, said addressing the valedictory session of the CII's Brand Summit.

"Don't go to customers with your products and services. But create customer experiences and design your products. Customers are looking for compelling experiences. But companies don't understand (this)," he added.

He also cited some of the companies' experiments in creating customer experiences that include Apple, Starbucks and Commerce Bank in the US.

He referred to the CEO of Starbucks saying that the brands were built on experiences and not on advertising or marketing.

"There is no substitute for direct customer interaction," he said adding, "Indian customers are far more demanding and better than the customers in Western countries."

He said that value creation was very important. "We can't talk of future brands without building the value creation," he said.