This topic struck me while I was washing my Car on a Sunday morning. The topic kindled interest in me and made me to go deeper and see the benefits of Brand building.
In this modern-day where distance doesn’t matter and usage of Internet and other devices makes communication and travel very easy, building a brand takes its place of significance. It is important that we build a brand for each one of us as an individual, for an organization or for something else. This is very relevant in today’s context and will make things easier to capture the attention of audience in a short time and the benefits are immense.
You can create a brand LOGO for yourself or for your organization or for your community. This perception of brand image will seep deep into the minds of people and will induce them to buy the product of that brand or Logo without even looking into the cost aspect. Thus the strength of the brand is the outcome of the results it generates by pulling the consumers and pushing the people go for the products of that brand, immaterial of the cost and price aspect.
Quality, Delivery, Point of Purchase, over the counter, Reach or Coverage and Service to customer are some of the areas to be focused and complete attention has to be given in order to derive the full benefits of branding.
Branding for an Engineering or Industrial ProductReaching out to customers and educating them is an important aspect which follows any developmental activity. It is the customer who decides whether to go for a particular product based on the product quality, unique characteristics that the product possesses, and the awareness created by the manufacturer in instilling in his mind the features of the product. In management parallels it is called branding and it has its value.
Let us see an example. For selling an engineering product like an Industrial Valve, the company sets the ball rolling by meeting a number of personnel from various disciplines say the oil and gas industry. This also gives them the opportunity to listen and understand the client’s material requirements and to formulate a strategy to meet customers’ needs. Having tasted success, they thereafter start moving into other unexplored territories towards achieving their objective of becoming a key player and a major supplier of Valves in that region.
Then the next step is to make paper presentation in international forums like conferences and Exhibitions. This is very important and more relevant today as this is one way of building your brand. Earlier the manufacturer would only produce the item and not get involved or be interested in Exhibitions, Seminars, and Paper presentations in International forum. They remained content with their limited involvement externally. Today one has to be involved both internally and also externally to achieve success.
Branding for a Chemical ProductBranding is not restricted only to consumer goods industry. A strong brand will create significant advantage for a company in their quest to become ‘the most creditable partner and employer in the industry’. It’s like building a ‘trust’ between the company and the stakeholders. A trusted brand is the single most valuable asset of a company, which can sustain and survive the company even in the worst market downturn (conditions). At the same time the company has to actively manage on Brand.
First, there are commercial advantages – when the salespeople approach target customers, the customers already have confidence in the company. At the same time, the vendors will provide better service at a preferential cost because they are proud to have this company as their client. In addition, a strong brand gives the resilience to recover more easily from any crises which are inevitable for any large company.
Beyond these obvious benefits, a strong brand can also play a crucial role in engaging top talent. The very best people will come to join the company because they believe in the brand and what the company stands for. IBM and BASF are the companies which can be taken as examples. We can feel the pulse of the market by asking someone in the target market of the company if they know the company by name.
Awareness and confidence in a brand is created by thousands of ‘touch points’, or places where the company’s brands touch the lives of their target groups. This includes advertising, media outreach, and sales. The target groups must see the company from their actions, not just from their words. Everybody in the workforce in all units and teams must become involved in cultivating that confidence and trust.
Branding for a Consumer Product
Here the term ‘Branding’ takes a different meaning as consumer products have a lesser shelf life in general and usage of the product is frequent. People buy the product from the retailers after the products have changed hands in the marketing echelon right from the manufacturer to the OTC or the retailer.
Thus by way of branding the product, one can save enormous time in reaching the consumer. Hence we can call branding as a time saving device. Thus by managing brands and communication, the choice-making by the consumer is made simple and less traumatic. We can see that most FMCG companies release their advertisements between the month end and the beginning of following month. This is the time that middle-class India makes its monthly shopping list and sends it either to the kinara at the corner of the street or to the big bazaar in the neighbourhood. As marketers, we want the home ministers to write the brand name of the item and that is why the advertising. The brands derive their power from the way it is delivered in the media consistently with boring repetition day after day , year after year, for as long as the consumer so desires.
Brands must maintain consistency and yet evolve to stay fresh. While there are a multiplicity of ways in which the brand can reinvent itself, the most palpable and visible way is the logo. The logo has been the point of entry to the brand and perhaps the most visible part of the brand, something that consumers recall. TATA has tweaked its logo a few times over, since its inception a century ago. TATA brand is worth several Billion US dollars and is known the world over.
Sachin Tendulkar is an excellent Indian cricketer. Was it sufficient to be a fantastic cricketer? No, because there have been other fantastic cricketers in the past who have not achieved such striking commercial success as Sachin. Something else was needed and it was the modern television. But even modern TV alone would not have been enough. In 1983 India won the World cup in cricket at lords in England followed by world Championship of cricket which also India won in 1985 and thereafter world cup of 1987 was played in India and Pakistan. Despite this, nothing even remotely resembling Sachin emerged.
Something more was needed and that something came with the economic reforms of July 1991 in India – just 18 months after Sachin’s debut. Reforms led to the growth of consumerism about 1995 onwards, just six years into his career.
As product competition grew, the need for product differentiation grew; as product differentiation grew, the need for advertising grew. As these grew, the need for a cheap way of reaching out to the audiences grew, which is where TV came in. It was this combination – his cricketing prowess, modern TV and the economic reforms – that propelled Sachin forward as one of the top product endorsers in the country. The other two are both film stars – Amitabh Bachchan and Shah Rukh Khan.
There is also the question of viewer competence. How many people who watch an ad featuring Sachin also know enough about cricket to truly appreciate Sachin’s performances? There is another question as well. Sachin does not always perform well. He went through a lean patch which was hurting India because he was not helping India win.
Finally, we don’t really know if people bought products Sachin endorsed or merely contented themselves with watching him with the brands.
Perhaps brands use celebrity endorsements as a habit. After all, where is the evidence that a Boost did better than Bournvita in terms of sales growth because it used Sachin?
I always tell my colleagues, “When you involve you will evolve”. This is for certain and by doing this, success is for sure and your brand will encompass the globe over a period of time.
The future will belong to those who build brand image. An indelible impression on the purchaser’s mind is made by building a logo for the company. For this we have to think differently and work for attaining market leadership and thought leadership. We should introspect and see if our brand is getting there.
S.SEKAR
Contact:
sekrajc@yahoo.comMobile: 9940617421
The Positive thinker, Sees the Invisible, Feels the Intangible and achieves the Impossible
