BRAND MANGEMENT

BRAND MANAGEMENT

GUIDED BY: Dr.JELSY JOSEPH

DIRECTOR,DEPT OF MANAGEMENT STUDIES & RESEARCH

KARPAGAM UNIVERSITY,COIMBATORE

INTRODUCTION

    Brand management is the application of marketing techniques to a specific product product line or brand. It seeks to increase the product’s perceived value to the customer and thereby increase brand franchise and brand equity . The value of the brand is determined by the amount of profit it generates for the manufacturer. This can result from a combination of increased sales and increased price, and/or reduced cost of goods sold, and/or reduced or more efficient marketing investment.

  PRINCIPLES OF BRANDING

   A good brand name should

TYPES OF BRANDS

      BRAND NAME

A great brand name is one of the most powerful forces in branding, marketing and advertising. It is at once the story about what makes you different from your competitors and the emotional tug that connects you with your audience—all in one or a few words. consumers pay a higher price for brand-name products than for products that do not carry an established brand name.

The sound of the spoken name, regardless of what it means, is a big consideration for brand names. An easy-to-understand pronunciation translates across languages and is more likely to be remembered.

It introduces and characterizes a company to its customers and to the public at large. It also helps differentiate a company’s offerings from the competition’s. As a registered trademark, a great brand name will make these kinds of impressions an official part of a company with actual value on a balance sheet.

Brand-name quality assurance is especially important when consumers lack complete informationabout product quality at the time of purchase Moreover, the greater the value of a company’s brand name, the more likely the company is to take quality-control precautions. To protect its brand name, a company will want to make sure its consumers are satisfied. A consumer who pays a high price for a brand-name product is paying for the assurance of increased quality. When companies do not earn a large price premium on their products, the potential sanction the companies face for poor quality control is much lower than the economic cost borne by brand-name companies.

        Brand Identity is a full-service design agency offering marketing solutions with an environmental focus. The brand owner will seek to bridge the gap between the brand image and the brand identity. Brand identity is fundamental to consumer recognition and symbolizes the brand’s differentiation from competitors .The Brand Identity defines the visual representation of the brand. The primary identity is usually a logo for a company, service, product, group, etc. Well-designed and -promoted brand identities result in rapid recognition.

   There are thousands of products and services out there, but not many brands. Brands generally return better profits because they are less sensitive to price undercutting. They achieve a level of awareness and customer loyalty by building a set of emotional connections in the consumers’ mind.

Disjointed brandsLike immature brands, these may have a number of different ‘brand idea’ messages in the market place, probably because you haven’t uncovered one that resonates with the audience and everyone will commit to. Immature brands require guidance and a long-term view.Boring brandMaybe you haven’t managed to reveal the brand idea creatively? A good, strategically minded creative person can often see and express aspects of the brand you may consider mundane because you’re too close to it. We created huge impact for a shipping company because one of their people revealed to us in passing that their ships go 3 knots faster than the competition. The resulting campaign dramatised the message that meat exporters could get their money quicker because of the faster delivery. The proposition was a strong emotional promise based on a difference the client had not perceived as valuable.Plain old-fashioned brand Usually requires a straightforward design evolution to update the ‘clothes of the brand’. When St.George wanted to shift from building society to bank, this was the opportunity for us to contemporise the brand with a careful, evolutionary step. The objective was to broaden the bank’s purchase with the business world whilst retaining as much ‘friendly’ equity as possible.

Misunderstood brand Either you have failed to communicate the brand idea properly, or you need to change your own perception of what the brand is, by listening to what the customer tells you it is. Then strengthen that position.

BRAND EQUITY

Brand equity serves as the bridge between what happened to the brand  in the past and what should happen to the brand in the future.”1″Brand equity relates to the fact that different outcomes result from the marketing of a product or service because of its brand name or some other brand element that if that same product or service did not have that brand identification.”

Positive Equity

An interesting question is raised- can brands have negative brand equity? From one perspective, brand equity cannot be negative. Positive brand equity is created by effective marketing including via advertising, PR and promotion. A second perspective is that negative equity can exist. Looking at a political “brand” example, the “Democrat” brand may be negative to a Republican, and vice versa.

The greater a company’s brand equity, the greater the probability that the company will use a family branding strategy rather than an individual branding strategy. This is because family branding allows them to leverage the equity accumulated in the core brand. Aspects of brand equity includes: brand loyalty, awareness, association, and perception of quality.

To financiers, brand equity = retained earnings. To marketers, brand equity = retained customers

To a marketer, creating and maintaining brand equity can provide for increased profitability, reduced vulnerability to competition, the ability to charge premium prices, and a platform for introducing new to market products carrying the brand name.

A brand’s equity is comprised of its loyalty rate and its relative price.

Relative price reflects the perceived value of a brand. By using relative price in the calculation of brand equity, we introduce the element of perceived value for the money. Loyalty rate is defined as the percent of category purchases of the brand by people who buy the brand.

To its buyers, a brand is a promise

Its value to consumers is that it reduces risk, saves time and provides reassurance. Predictable results are the promise of a brand. As long as a product or service meets a customer’s expectations with no unexpected negative results, a buyer is likely to continue to buy the brand. It is the customer-oriented definition of a brand that is at the heart of the concept of brand equity.

Brand equity does not exist in nature, to be assayed like gold ore in rock. It’s      measurement depends on how you define it.

Brand equity is a concept. It does not exist in nature in the manner that the specific gravity of elements exists as a physical entity. It cannot be assayed like the gold content in a piece of ore. Those who argue that brand equity cannot be measured miss the essential point. Its measurement depends on how it is defined. That definition must have pragmatic value to a marketer of consumer products or services. It should help improve marketing effectiveness and efficiency by providing a yardstick with which to evaluate these things. Also, the definition should reflect the role of the brand in the dynamics of consumer choice in a competitive environment.

BRANDING TECHNIQUES

Companies sometimes want to reduce the number of brands that they market. This process is known as “Brand rationalization. companies tend to create more brands and product variations within a brand than economies of scale would indicate. A company may decide to rationalize their portfolio of brands from time to time to gain production and marketing efficiency, or to rationalize a brand portfolio as part of corporate restructuring. Repositioning a brand (sometimes called rebranding, may cost some brand equity, and can confuse the target market, but ideally, a brand can be repositioned while retaining existing brand equity for leverage. A recurring challenge for brand managers is to build a consistent brand while keeping its message fresh and relevant.

IMPORTANCE OF BRANDING

A brand is the one thing that you can own that nobody can take away from you. Technology will change. But your brand can go on and live. It creates a lasting value above and beyond all the other elements of your business.” The importance and value of branding becomes apparent when an entrepreneur wants to sell his or her company or take it to Wall Street for a public offering or other infusion of capital.

Pricing – a component of value; higher prices may signify to consumers higher quality, and lower prices may suggest decreased value.

Distribution – availability; limited distribution of a product or service may imply exclusivity to discerning consumers.

Quality – which impacts satisfaction; obviously, higher quality will translate to more satisfied customers who come back again and again to purchase your offerings.

Presence – prominence in the paid and unpaid media; products or services with a high-profile market presence will lead to brand recognition and increased sales.

Awareness – top-of-mind awareness, residual awareness and recognition, which are directly related to presence; the higher your offering’s awareness, the better your sales results will be.

Reputation – enduring public opinion of brand character, which is built over time and difficult to change once established.

Image – perceptions of brand traits or prototypical buyers; often represented by qualities the consumer relates to. Like reputation, image is difficult to change once established.

Benefits – consumers may equate certain positive and negative consequences with use of your product or service; these may be warranted or unwarranted.

Positioning salience – differentiation from the competition, which is established by a combination of all elements of the brand.

Preference – a predisposition to buy displayed by consumers who are establishing brand loyalty.

Share of market – increased market share is a direct result of a successful branding campaign.

Customer commitment – loyalty is built through long-term branding and close consumer contact.

Conclusion

Everything else, can steal. They can steal your trade secrets. Eventually, your patents will expire. Your physical plant will wear out. Technology will change. But your brand can go on and live. It creates a lasting value above and beyond all the other elements of your business.”Brand competence are required in order to create, develop, and protect brands that have an identity, and not just an image. Establishing a brand name is the goal of anyone introducing a new product, and maintaining a brand over time is even more profitable. A brand for a company is like a reputation for a person. You earn reputation by trying to do hard things well.” In sum, we believe that a brand is a promise made to its customers and to its owners.

 

 

 

 

 

Tagged as: BRAND, MANGEMENT