BRAND BUILDING AND MANAGEMENT

Brand Management
The process by which marketers attempt to optimise the 'Marketing mix' for a specific brand.
Branding involves decisions that establish an identity for a product with the goal of distinguishing it from competitors' offerings.
What is a Brand?
In Principles of Marketing, by Philip Kotler and Gary Armstrong a brand is defined as ‘a name, term, sign symbol or a combination of these, that identifies the maker or seller of the product’ ..
Brand Switching:
A consumer that purchases multiple brands of a product. For example, a consumer that purchases Pepsi one week and Coke the next week

Brand Impact:
A technique used to measure the effectiveness of advertising.


Brand manager - The individual in an organization responsible for planning, implementing, and controlling the marketing program for a particular brand. Brand managers are sometimes referred to as product managers.

BRAND BUILDING MODEL :BRAND BUILDING MODEL 4 Steps of brand building Brand building blocks Brand building implications

4 Steps of brand building :4 Steps of brand building Building brands, according to CBBE model, can be thought of as a sequence of steps, in which each step is contingent on successfully achieving the previous step: Ensure identification of the brand with customers & an association of the brand in customers’ mind with a specific product class or customer need Firmly establish the totality of brand meaning in the minds of customers by strategically linking a host of tangible & intangible brand associations with certain properties Elicit the proper customer responses to this brand identification & brand meaning Convert brand responses to create an intense, active loyalty relationship between customers & the brand

4 Steps of brand building (contd.) :4 Steps of brand building (contd.) These 4 steps constitute fundamental questions customers ask about brands: Who are you? (brand identity) What are you? (brand meaning) What about you? What do I think or feel about you? (brand responses) What about you and me?

Brand building blocks :Brand building blocks Resonance Judgement Feelings Performance Imagery Salience 4. Relationship What about you & me? 3. Response What about you? 2. Meaning What are you? Identity Who are you?

Sub dimensions of brand building model :Sub dimensions of brand building model Loyalty Attachment Community Engagement Quality Warmth, Fun Credibility Excitement Consideration Security Superiority Social approval, Self-respect Primary characteristics & User profiles Secondary features Purchase & usage situations Product reliability Personality & values Durability & serviceability History, heritage Service effectiveness & Experiences Efficiency & empathy Style & design, Price Category identification Need satisfied

Brand building blocks :Brand building blocks Salience Performance Imagery Judgment Feelings Resonance

Brand salience :Brand salience What basic function does the brand provide to customers? Breadth & depth of awareness Product category structure

Breadth & depth of awareness (eg Tropicana) :Breadth & depth of awareness (eg Tropicana) At the most basic level, its necessary that consumers recognise the Tropicana brand when it is presented or exposed to them Beyond that, consumers should think of Tropicana whenever they think of orange juice, particularly when they are thinking of purchase in that category Additionally, consumers ideally would think of Tropicana whenever they were deciding which type of beverage to drink, specially when seeking a “tasty but healthy” beverage – some of the needs presumably satisfied by orange juice Thus , consumers must think of Tropicana in terms of satisfying a certain set of needs whenever those needs arise.

Product category structure (beverages) :Product category structure (beverages) Beverages Water Flavour Alcoholic Nonalcoholic Milk Juices Wine Distilled spirit Hot beverages Soft drinks Beer

Product category structure :Product category structure To fully understand brand recall, it is important to appreciate product category structure, or how product categories are organised in memory, for example beverages: As the configuration for beverages show, consumers often make decisions in top down fashion Implications: Understanding the hierarchy gives a clue on how to increase awareness, as well as position the brand In some cases, the best route for improving sales for a brand is not by improving consumer attitudes toward the brand but, instead, by increasing the breadth of brand awareness & situations in which consumer would consider using the brand. For example: - to increase consumption, Tropicana is extending orange drink to occasions beyond breakfast

Brand performance :Brand performance product itself is at the heart of brand equity, because it is the primary influence on what consumers experience with a brand, what they hear about a brand from others, & what the firm can tell customers about the brand in their communications: Designing & delivering a product that fully satisfies consumer needs & wants is a prerequisite for successful marketing To create brand loyalty & resonance, consumers’ experiences with the product must at least meet, if not actually surpass, their expectations

Brand imagery :Brand imagery Brand imagery is how people think about a brand abstractly, rather than what they think brand actually does. Imagery associations can be formed: Directly: from consumers own experiences & contact with product, brand, target market, or usage situation Indirectly: depiction of these same considerations as communicated in brand advertising or by some other source of information, such as W.O.M. 4 categories can be highlighted: 1. User profiles 2. Purchase & usage situations 3. Personality & values 4. History, heritage & experiences

Brand judgement :Brand judgement How customers put together all the different performance & imagery associations of the brand to form different kinds of opinions. 4 types of summary judgments particularly important: Brand quality Brand credibility Brand consideration Brand superiority

Brand feelings :Brand feelings emotions evoked by a brand can become so strongly associated that they are acessible during product consumption or use: Researchers have defined transformational advertising as advertising designed to change consumers’ perception of the actual usage experience with the product Following are 6 important types of brand-building feelings: Warmth Fun Excitement Security Social approval Self-respect First 3 types of feelings are experiential & immediate, increasing in level of intensity Later 3 are private & enduring, increasing in level of gravity

Brand resonance :Brand resonance resonance is characterised in terms of intensity, or depth of the psychological bond that the customers have with the brand, as well as the level of activity engendered by this loyalty: Behavioural loyalty Attitudinal attachment Sense of community Active engagement Finally, perhaps the strongest affirmation of brand loyalty is when customers are willing to invest time, energy, money, or other resources in the brand beyond those expended during purchase or consumption of the brand Strong attitudinal attachment or social identity or both are typically necessary, however, for active engagement with the brand to occur

Brand building implications :Brand building implications Customers own brands Don’t take short-cuts with brands Brands should have duality Brands should have richness Brand resonance provides important focus


Brands should have duality :Brands should have duality strong brands blend product performance & imagery to create a rich, varied, but complementary set of consumer responses to the brand by appealing to both rational & emotional concerns, a strong brand provides consumers with multiple access points to the brand while reducing competitive vulnerability

Brand should have richness :Brand should have richness the various associations making up the brand image may be reinforcing, helping to strengthen or increase the favorability of other brand associations, or may be unique, helping to add distinctiveness or offset some potential deficiencies: Strong brands thus have both breadth & depth At the same time brands should not necessarily be expected to score high on all the various dimensions & categories making up each core brand value

Building blocks can have hierarchies :Building blocks can have hierarchies Brand awareness: It is typically important to first establish category identification in some way before considering strategies to expand breadth via needs satisfied or benefits offered Brand performance: Often necessary to first link primary characteristics & related features before attempting to link additional, more peripheral associations Brand imagery: Often begins with fairly concrete initial articulation of user & user imagery that, over time, leads to broader, more abstract brand associations of personality, value, history, heritage, & experience Brand judgment: Usually begin with positive quality & credibility perceptions that can lead to brand consideration & then perhaps assessment of brand superiority Brand feelings: Usually start with either experiential ones (i.e, warmth, fun, excitement) or inward ones (i.e., security, social approval, self-respect) Brand resonance: Behavioural loyalty is a starting point but attitudinal attachment or a sense of community is almost always needed for active engagement to occur

Brand resonance provides important focus :Brand resonance provides important focus brand resonance is the pinacle of cbbe model & provides important focus & priority for decision making- regarding marketing: To what extent is marketing activity affecting the key dimensions of brand resonance? Is marketing activity creating brand performance & imagery associations & consumer judgments & feelings that will support these brand resonance dimensions? In a application of CBBE model, the M.R. firm, Knowledge Network, found that brands that scored highest on loyalty & attachment were not necessarily same that scored high on community & engagement (see Chart in next slide) However, by defining the proper role for the brand, higher levels of brand resonance should be obtainable



Principles
A good brand name should:
• be protected (or at least protectable) under trademark law.
• be easy to pronounce.
• be easy to remember.
• be easy to recognize.
• be easy to translate into all languages in the markets where the brand will be used.
• attract attention.
• suggest product benefits (e.g.: Easy-Off) or suggest usage (note the tradeoff with strong trademark protection.)
• suggest the company or product image.
• distinguish the product's positioning relative to the competition.
• be attractive.
• stand out among a group of other brands.