SERVICES > Brand Development

BRAND DEVELOPMENT

These four steps represent a set of fundamental questions that customers invariably ask about brands - at least implicitly if not even explicitly - as follows (with corresponding brand steps in parentheses).

• BRAND IDENTITY Who are you?
• BRAND MEANING What are you?
• BRAND RESPONSES What about you? What do I think or feel about you?
• BRAND RELATIONSHIPS What about you and me? What kind of association and how much of a connection would I like to have with you?

1. BRAND IDENTITY

Brand identity refers to the producer's side of a brand. Having an identity means being your true self. This can be clearly defined by answering the following questions:

• What is the brand's particular vision and aim?
• What makes it different?
• What need does the brand fulfill?
• What is its permanent nature?
• What are its values?
• What are the signs that make it recognizable?

The answers to these questions constitute the brand's identity.

10 years ago Jean-Noël Kapferer developed a hexagonal prism as a useful model to reflect brand identity, consisting of six interrelated concepts:

• The brand's physique: The salient objective features which define the product, including its packaging and physical appearance. What is the brand? What does the brand do? What does it look like?
• The brand personality: What kind of person would the brand be if it were a human?
• The brand's own culture: The basic principles governing the brand in its outward manifestations (products and communications). This is a set of values that feed the brand's management.
• The brand's relationship: The brand is at the crux of transactions and exchanges between people.
• The brand's reflection: The perceived user type (the 'user image'). A brand will always tend to build a reflection of the buyer.
• The brand-user's self image: The target-group's own internal mirror; how they perceive themselves.

2. BRAND MEANING

To give meaning to a brand, it's important to create a brand image and establish what he brand is characterized by and should stand or in customers' minds. Although a myriad of different types of brand associations are possible, brand meaning broadly can be distinguished in terms of more functional, performance-related considerations vs. more abstract, imagery-related considerations. These brand associations can be formed directly from a customer' s own experiences and contact with the brand through advertising or some other source of information (for example, word of mouth).

Brand performance. The product is the heart of brand equity. It is the primary influence of what consumer's experience, what they hear about, and what the firm tells customers about the brand. Designing and delivering a product that fully satisfies consumer needs and wants is a prerequisite for successful marketing, regardless of whether the product is a tangible good, service, or organization. To create brand loyalty and resonance, consumers' experiences with the product must meet, if not surpass, their expectations.

Brand performance is the way the product or service attempts to meet customers' more functional needs. It refers to the intrinsic properties of the brand, including inherent product or service characteristics. How well does the brand rate on objective assessments of quality? To what extent does the brand satisfy utilitarian, aesthetic, and economic customer needs and wants in the product or service category?

Brand elements (Logo)

The impact of your logo and corporate identity is far-reaching and influential.

It's often the first and may be the only contact your potential customers have with your brand.

Externally, it's an opportunity to influence market perception and recognition of your product or service to resonate with your target market in relation to your competition.

Internally, it can change staff attitudes, increase 'ownership' and improve morale.

'A picture tells a thousand words'. Your business premises, signage, stationery, website, publications and advertising are all components of your identity conveying messages about your company.

The question to ask yourself is: are they conveying the right messages?

We can advise you on improving your existing identity, or develop a new approach to best achieve your objectives.

Intelligent creativity will ensure the integrity of your corporate identity and market positioning for a more successful branding or promotional initiative

To help you decide which direction to take, please consider the following when we present your NEW corporate identity options:

Six criteria for selecting Brand Elements:

1. Memorable - How easily is the image recalled and recognised (The key to building Brand awareness)
2. Meaningful - credibility and suggestive of the category, product, ingredient or type of person who uses it.
3. Likeability - Aesthetic appeal to your customer and end user
4. Transferable - Introduction of new products, across market segments and geographic segments.
5. Adaptable - Change with the times
6. Protectable - legally and competitively

Brand Image

What is Brand Image?

The perception in terms of the feelings, moods, emotions and connotations evoked b the consumer of your product or brand.

Why is it important?

Consumer behaviour is partly determined by BRAND IMAGE - consumers select product or service based on brand image amongst other things.

Particularly when consumers have no experience with a product, they tend to trust a well-favoured, well-known brand name. They often think well-known brands are better and are worth buying for the implied assurance of quality, dependability, performance, and service.

Consumers buy not only a product or service, but also the image associations of the brand, such as power, wealth, sophistication, and also association with other users of the brand. Not only with consumers but also with, for example employees, shareholders, interest groups, and suppliers. These relations arise because the brand is able to fulfill the ambitions and aspirations of its stakeholders in a meaningful way. And the better the brand is able, the higher the chance for a long-term relationship, which results in higher preference, loyalty and willingness to invest.

How can we manage it?

Firstly, by addressing ALL of the brand touch-points:

Four types of touch points

• Company - Planned marketing communication messages
• Intrinsic - Interactions during the process of researching and buying
• Unexpected - Word-of-mouth and 3rd party referrals - usually unanticipated
• Customer Initiated - Where the prospect or customer contacts brand

We can only control company created touch points, but use effective Integrated marketing communications to influence others. A favourable brand image can be built and sustained by brand communications such as packaging, advertising, promotion, customer service, word-of-mouth and other aspects of the brand experience.

But remember, it is only a supplement to the perceived quality of the product, service.

How do we measure it?

Good brand images are instantly evoked, are positive, and are almost always unique among competitive brands.

Brand images are usually evoked when asking consumers the first words/images that come to their mind when a certain brand is mentioned. This is sometimes called "top of mind". When responses are highly variable, non-forthcoming, or refer to non-image attributes such as cost, it is an indicator of a weak brand image.

Measurement questions:

Using both exploratory qualitative and quantitative techniques such as correspondence analysis based perceptual mapping we can provide a picture of how your brand looks relative to others in the marketplace. The following questions asked of your prospects and customers will provide great insights into your brand image:

• How are we perceived relative to other brands in the market?
• Which brands are most like us and which do we compete most closely with?
• Which image attributes drive customer loyalty?
• How does our brand perform on key statistics relative to industry norms?
• Which image attributes should we be focusing on in our advertising?
• What are the strengths and weaknesses of our brand?
• How do our customer's perception of competitors affect their buying behaviour?
• How does what people think about your brand effect whether or not they will continue to purchase your brand or switch to a competitor?
• What attributes do consumers associate with your brand?
• How does this fit relative to competitors in the market place?
• How does your positioning affect which competitors you are competing with?

3. BRAND RESPONSES

What do customers think or feel about the brand? Brand responses can be distinguished according to brand judgments and brand feelings (depending on whether they stem from the head or heart).

Brand judgments.

Brand judgments focus on customers' personal opinions about the brand based on how they put together different performance and imagery associations.

• Brand quality. Customers may hold a host of attitudes toward brands, but the most important relate to the brand's perceived quality. Other quality-related attitudes pertain to perceptions of value and satisfaction.
• Brand credibility. Brand credibility refers to the extent the brand as a whole is seen as credible in terms of three dimensions: expertise (for example, competent, innovative, a market leader), trustworthiness (for example, dependable, keeping customer interests in mind), and likeability (for example, fun, interesting, worth spending time with).
• Brand consideration. Favorable brand attitudes and credibility are important, but customers must also seriously consider purchasing or using the brand. Consideration depends in part on how personally relevant customers find the brand (i.e., whether customers view the brand as appropriate and meaningful to them).
• Brand superiority. Finally, brand judgments depend on whether customers view the brand as unique and better than other brands. Do customers believe the brand offers advantages that other brands cannot? Superiority is critical for building intense and active relationships with customers and will depend on the number and nature of unique brand associations that make up the brand image.

Brand feelings.

Customers' emotional reactions to the brand relate to the social currency the brand evokes.

The first three are more experiential and immediate, increasing in level of intensity; the latter three are more private and enduring, increasing in level of gravity.

• Warmth. The brand makes consumers feel peaceful, sentimental, warmhearted, or affectionate.
• Fun. The brand makes consumers feel upbeat, amused, light-hearted, joyous, playful, or cheerful.
• Excitement. Consumers feel energized about the brand and believe they are experiencing something special. Brands that evoke excitement may result in consumers feeling a sense of elation or a sensation that the brand is cool or sexy.
• Security. The brand produces a feeling of safety, comfort, and self-assurance without worry or concerns about the brand.
• Social approval. Consumers have positive feelings about the reactions of others (i.e., when consumers feel others look favorably on their appearance or behavior) to the brand. Approval may occur when others directly acknowledge the consumer using the brand or when the product itself is attributed to consumers.
• Self-respect. This occurs when the brand makes consumers feel better about themselves, creating a sense of pride, accomplishment, or fulfillment.

Criteria for brand responses. Although all types of customer responses are possible when driven from both the head and heart, ultimately what matters is how positive they are. Additionally, they must be accessible and come to mind when consumers think of the brand. Brand judgments and feelings can only favorably influence consumer behavior if consumers internalize or think of positive responses in any of their encounters with the brand.

4. BRAND RELATIONSHIPS

The final step focuses on the relationship and level of personal identification the customer has with the brand. Brand resonance refers to the nature of the relationship customers have with the brand and whether they feel in synch with the brand. It is characterized by the depth of the psychological bond customers have with the brand as well as how much activity this loyalty engenders.

Brand resonance can be broken down into four categories:

• Behavioral loyalty. Repeat purchases and the amount or share of category volume attributed to the brand are the main attributes of behavioral loyalty. How often do customers purchase a brand and how much do they purchase? For bottom-line profit results, the brand must generate sufficient purchase frequencies and volumes.
• Attitudinal attachment. Some customers may buy out of necessity if the brand is the only product readily accessible or is the only one they can afford to buy. To create resonance, the brand must be perceived as something special in a broader context. For example, customers with a great deal of attitudinal attachment to a brand may state they 'love' it and describe it as one of their favorite possessions or view it as a 'little pleasure' they look forward to.
• Sense of community. Identification with a brand community may help customers feel a kinship with other people associated with the brand. These connections may involve fellow brand users or customers or instead may be employees or representatives of the company.
• Active engagement. Perhaps the strongest affirmation of brand loyalty is when customers are willing to invest time, energy, money, or other resources into the brand beyond those expended during purchase or consumption. For example, customers may choose to join a club centered on a brand or receive updates and exchange correspondence with other brand users or formal or informal representatives of the brand. They may visit brand-related Web sites or participate in chat rooms. In this case, customers themselves become brand evangelists and help to communicate about the brand and strengthen the brand ties of others. Strong attitudinal attachment and/or sense of community are typically necessary for active engagement with the brand to occur.

Criteria for brand relationships.

Brand relationships involve two dimensions - intensity and activity. Intensity is the strength of the attitudinal attachment and sense of community. Activity refers to how frequently the consumer buys and uses the brand, as well as engages in other activities not related to purchase and consumption on a day-to-day basis. Examples of brands with high resonance include Harley-Davidson, Apple, and eBay.