“Can you imagine a world without brands?” enquires the recent ad for Zeiss. The commercial shows a puzzled man jogging by a billboard with a nameless shampoo bottle. Next, a waiter displays a blank labelled wine bottle with exaggerated flourish to a miserable couple at a dinner table. These faintly eerie scenes can’t help but make you wonder…what would the world be without brands? Confusion, chaos.
TCS today is launching its $10million global branding campaign to differentiate its services from the usual, cheap cost efficient image that Indian IT companies suffer from. Their tagline would be ‘Experience Certainty’ and through this campaign they hope to compete with IBM and Accenture in bagging challenging assignments.
What do brands mean for the consumer? You may hear complaints during casual shopping conversation about the number of brands flooding the market and the confusion it creates. But I think consumers are secretly pleased. They love being offered so many choices and feel powerful with the choices they make. Companies are bending over backwards in an effort to satisfy them and instill trust.
Many consumers form an identity based on the choices of brands they make, and this shapes their lifestyle. As lives become more rushed, brands simplify decisions and reduce risks. Satisfied customers choose the products again. This loyalty results in predictability of demand for the firms. This loyalty also translates into a willingness to pay a higher price. A brand is thus an invaluable asset for a firm.
Companies that can reap the benefits however, are the ones that have well planned and executed brand strategy and brand management programs. But at the end of the day, the truly successful ones are those that deliver on their brand promise. After all, as David Ogilvy put it “The consumer’s no idiot...she’s your wife!”
Posted By : Neha Deshmukh
5 comments:
Hey Neha, well written, specially the 'brands simplify the decision in our rushed up lives'. Brands do a lot for companies, case in point would be A Skoda Suberb vis-a-vis Merc C Class, the Suberb offers lot more then the 'C' class at a lot lesser price, but people who can afford a C class wouldnt buy the Superb.
In the end, Wow!
definately brands help people in decision making but i think future will belong to companies who will concentrate on the customer relationship means servicing them at door, reaching them at offices,meeting them in hotels..
ya that really fancy..but why do i think that bcoz see today every company is associated with brand-building exercise,lot of money going into these kind of exercise..what s the result..one more brand is available to consumer....it s really becoming brand-clutter there.
rejoy.....why should i pay crore of Rs to buy that merc-c class of car when suberb skoda is available..what s my purpose..a car or merc-c..i think i buy merc c bcoz i want to have merc -c and not bcoz it s best available brand there...
ok u deny that...ok no problem..let me explain further..
why should buy a car at first place when i can own a jet..looks foolish..correct but technology changes the perception..what is not available today will be available in big way tomorrow....
and what s more exciting...referring to our mr kotler ....products have life cycles..so should have brands also..why not? can u deny that? all arguments against this will be mere exceptions...they have to be there otherwise there will not be fun in life..calculations of future what excites human beings and makes them live...
ok coming back to the point,that, is not that i m only choosing between cars when i want to buy a car...point is brands are not everything and first thing what consumers look for..
what i feel its the impression and comfort with which he gets get associated with that particular product-brand.
will u use the same brand after 1 year,5 years,50 years that u r using today?
and r u using the same brand what u used when u were a kid...and not having any knowledge of brands that time..correct..did u know about the brands that time as a kid...if yes u belong to different league...
so why u r using the same thing today..or not using it...bcoz at both moments u have the liberty to choose the best brands...isn't it??
possibly brands have life cycles and every brand also have life cycles depending on the product category ..meaning brands in footware have different life cycle pattern than brands in automobiles and financial services..
it will be great challenge to everyone if someone can make some mathmatical model to proove this theory of brand clutter and brand life cycle??
thats just a very wild imagination..but let it be..bcoz science is a great mystery in the beginning but looks obvious when it get solved...why newton knew that apple falls to the ground bcoz of gravity ..bcoz science at the highest level turns into an art..and as a marketeer u also have to make ur art piece....
so brands are just beginning and not an end...so dont stop there...think beyond brands..
otherwise a 8 year old google will take over 33 year old microsoft..dont tell me brands dont have any importance in software industry..
Before rejoy replies to your senseless crap. Let me tell you Mr. anonymous that you dont understand the concept of brand at all otherwise you would not have talked about him not using the same brand that he used as a kid.
Confused?..... let me explain...
Brands are about meaning ...meaning that a brand gives to the consumers who were confused ... Do you think that a brand can give meaning to a adult doing mba and a kid ....
products have lifecycle and so do brands but brands rejeavunates themself.... and brands dont die... ..they live forever..unless a brand stop doing what a great brand should do....i.e. Understand...
oh really... sorry..i forgot that i m posting on marketinggods......and such craps are not allowed here....
now i got the true concept of brand..it was a eye opener 2 me..
u told something brands are about meaning..ohhh..i never knew that..i ll chk meanings of some brands and will come back..
whats the other great point u told..i loved it..u told brands never die..that means even if google dont exist after 50 years...(assume)..means company die,people die,product die but brand remains....GREAT...people will buy the product with name google even if its biscuit and not a software..
oh really worth remembering those points at marketinggods....
not much crap....its true gyaan...i cant forget it..
sorry for my earlier mistake of putting some crap..but in return i got something eyeopening..
keep it up...
People first things first, have the courtesy to put your names after your comment!
Everyone has a point of view, all i am saying is every brand stands for a certain value, and this value perception of the brand helps people decide which brand to buy according to their requirements. So even if i can afford a Skoda, but my requierments from a car would be far from safety, comfort, air conditioning, etc, it could be prestige, portraiting social standing in the society etc. which a brand Merecedes does better then a brand Skoda, please read the article carefully and at easy you will understand what i mean.
Rejoy PG 1
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