Social Product Branding Decision – BMS Notes

A series of intricate branding choices make up branding. Brand positioning, name choice, sponsorship, and development are important factors in brand strategy.

We need define a brand before discussing the four branding choices, often known as brand strategy decisions. A brand is an organization’s pledge to provide customers with a certain set of features, advantages, services, and experiences on a regular basis. Instead, a brand should be seen as a collection of opinions that a customer has about a certain company’s goods. As a result, the customer is at the centre of all branding choices.

We’ll examine each of these four branding choices in more detail.

• Establishing a Brand
• A brand has to have a distinct mental image for its intended audience. Three tiers of brand positioning are possible to achieve:
• Regarding product characteristics
• Regarding advantages
• Regarding convictions and principles.

Marketers may situate a brand based on product features at the most basic level. A automobile brand’s marketing may highlight features like powerful engines, eye-catching colours, and sporty styling. Still, when it comes to brand positioning, qualities are usually the least desired level. The rationale is that rivals may simply imitate these features, detracting from the brand’s distinctiveness. Furthermore, qualities per se are not of interest to consumers. Instead, people want to know what these qualities will accomplish for them. This takes us to the next stage: Benefits.

A desired feature might help a brand be more strategically positioned. The automaker should highlight the advantages that the consumer would get from the vehicle in addition to its technical features, such as easy mobility, a better lifestyle, and so on.

The best brands, however, transcend the features and advantages of their products. Their stance is based on principles and beliefs. Brands that are successful connect with their audience on an emotional level. Brands like Aston Martin and Mini are two examples. These companies focus more on generating passion, surprise, and excitement around the brand than they do on the physical qualities of their goods. They are now considered “cool” brands.

The three additional branding choices are built upon the basis of brand positioning. As a result, developing a brand goal and vision that embodies the essence of the brand should be part of brand positioning. The brand must make a straightforward, sincere commitment.

Choosing a Brand Name

The choice of a brand name could be the most apparent choice when discussing branding considerations. Since the name is the foundation of a brand, it’s possible that it comes to mind first when you think of a brand. Thus, choosing a brand name is among the most crucial branding choices. But it’s also a rather challenging job.

The product and its advantages, the target market, and the suggested marketing tactics must all be carefully examined before moving further. In light of this, we need to come up with a brand name that fits these attributes. Brand naming involves elements of art, science, and undoubtedly intuition.

Although it might be difficult, there are several rules that can help in the process of naming a brand. Qualities that make a brand name desirable include:

It need to provide a suggestion about the features and advantages of a product. Consider “Never Dull,” a wadding polish. The advantage of utilising this product is indicated by the brand name: the treated metal will never get dull.

It ought to be simple to recognise, say, and recall. The iPod and Nike are unquestionably superior than the apparel company “Troglodyte Homonculus.”

To prevent customers from confusing the brand name with another, it should be unique. Two notable examples are Bugatti and Rolex.

It need to be expandable as well. Consider Amazon.com, which started off as an online bookshop before deciding on a brand that would enable growth into other markets. It would not have been possible for Amazon.com to grow its company so quickly if it had picked an other name, such books.com.

Foreign language translations of the brand name should be straightforward. Given that the Ford Pinto was associated with “small male genitals,” the car experienced some difficulties in Brazil. Alternatively, the Mitsubishi Pajero translates as “guy who plays with himself and loves it a little too much” in Spanish. Even more well-known: Coca-Cola translates to “female horse packed with wax” in Mandarin.

It need to be able to be registered and have legal protection. Stated differently, it cannot violate already-registered brand names.

It is noteworthy that preferences for brand names are always shifting. Today’s trend is to create companies around names that have actual significance, abandoning the whimsical or fictitious names that were popular a decade ago (Yahoo, Google, for example). For example, names like Blackboard, which refer to educational software, make sense. Finding accessible new names might be challenging, however, since brand names and trademark applications are becoming more and more common.

Selecting a brand name is insufficient. It must be safeguarded as well. Many businesses make an effort to establish a brand identity that will ultimately be connected to a certain product category. These names include Kleenex, Tip-ex, and Jeep, as examples. Their popularity, meanwhile, has the potential to swiftly jeopardise the business’s name rights. A trademark loses its protection when it is “genericized,” or included into everyday speech. As a result, a large number of formerly protected brand names—including aspirin, the Sony Walkman, and many others—no longer have protection.

Promotion of Brands

Making judgments about a brand’s positioning and name is only one aspect of branding. The brand sponsorship is the third of our four branding choices. There are four ways a company might sponsor a brand.

A product might be introduced under the manufacturer’s brand. Another name for this is national brand. As an example, consider Kellogg, which sells its products under the Kellogg’s Frosties brand, or Sony (Sony Bravia HDTV).

Additionally, the producer may sell to retailers who may rebrand the goods under their own names. This is also known as an own-label, distributor brand, or retail brand. A significant store-brand explosion has resulted from the recent harsher economic circumstances. Customers are ready to prefer private brands over well-known and often more costly manufacturer’s brands as they become less brand-conscious and more price-conscious.

Manufacturers are also able to choose licenced brands. Rather than investing millions in creating their own brand names, some businesses licence trademarks or symbols that have already been registered by other producers. Names of well-known celebrities or fictional characters from hit novels and films may also be used in this. They may provide a fast and well-established brand name for a price. For instance, retailers of kid-oriented goods often affix character names to toys, clothes, and other items. A few examples of these licenced character names include Hello Kitty, Disney, and Star Wars.

Lastly, a product might be co-branded by two businesses. Using two distinct firms’ well-known brand names on a single product is known as co-branding. This may have a number of benefits, including increased brand equity and greater market appeal due to the merged brands. For example, Nestlé employs co-branding on its Nespresso coffee makers, which are branded under the names of well-known kitchen appliance makers like Siemens, DeLonghi, and Krups.

Development of Brands

Brand development is the last aspect of branding choices. A corporation may choose between four options for growing its brands: multibrands, new brands, line extensions, and brand extensions.

The term “line extension” describes the process of adding additional product categories, sizes, colours, ingredients, or flavours under an already-existing brand name. This is an inexpensive, low-risk method of launching new goods. There is a chance, nevertheless, that the brand name may be overused and lose its unique significance. Customers could get confused by this. When Coca-Cola releases a new flavour under its current brand name, such diet cola with vanilla, it is an example of line extension.

In brand extension, a new product category is combined with an already-existing brand name. As a result, a new product category gets associated with an established brand name. This may save significant advertising resources for building a new brand and provides the new product with quicker awareness and speedier adoption. It is important to consider the possibility that the expansion might distort the perception of the primary brand. Furthermore, negative customer perceptions of other items bearing the same brand name might result from the extension’s failure. Heinz pet food is an example of a brand extension that cannot endure for this reason. However, other brand expansions are effective. For example, Kellog’s has expanded the range of its nutritious Special K morning cereal brand to include a whole range of cereals in addition to a line of biscuits, snacks, and nutrition bars.

Marketing a variety of brands within a certain product category is known as multibranding. The finest examples of this are P&G (Procter & Gamble) and Unilever. Why does P&G offer five shampoo brands, four dishwashing detergent brands, and six laundry detergent brands in the USA? Establishing distinctive traits that appeal to various client categories may be achieved via multibranding. As a result, the business might increase its market share. But none of the brands may be very lucrative, and each may only get a very little market share.

When the popularity of a current brand name is declining, new brands are required. Additionally, when a corporation joins a new product category and none of its existing brand names are applicable, a new brand name is appropriate.

These four branding choices are connected, as you may have seen. Strong brands need alignment between brand positioning, brand name, brand development, and brand sponsorship.