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Branding

[jnakul]

Although Calvin does a great job at defining Personal Branding, on a more serious note - I strongly believe the first step in building a personal brand is determining what one wants to achieve and then outlining the specific qualities that would help her/him get there. Also, I strongly believe that personal brand is not really a static thing - it is constantly evolving as people go through different experiences in life. And these experiences are what make each person unique.

[jnakul]

Rise of Online advertising and social media marketing

I worked in a digital marketing firm in India for a few months, Invariably, we would have to pitch to clients who did not understand what it meant to build a brand on this platform.

All they knew and expected was - Online advertising/social media - was some magic potion which would suddenly increase their sales. I often had to hand hold them through an education process of what online/social media marketing meant.

I agree - online marketing channels allowed for much better targeting and hence expecting a better ROI was logical. But, just expecting footfalls on your site/registrations on your landing page led to brand dilution - since you did not control who is landing on your website. Further, buying likes for your FB page or # of followers for your twitter page was not really social media marketing. But, somehow it had become a race to have the most # of likes on your FB page and not how you engaged with your consumer on these new platforms.

[jnakul]

Intel Inside

Intel Inside campaign for the PC market was an incredibly smart move by Intel. It was indirectly targeted at OEMs, even though it was advertised to the end consumer.

It served two purposes - 

1. Letting the end user know what is inside their computers that makes it work in a very simple way helped Intel became a household name. It created a huge brand loyalty for the company. .

2. It eventually led to the consumers demanding for Intel chips in their computers which then led to an increase in demand by the OEMs.

However, the problem was that it did not extend in the new era of mobiles. But, I believe, it was less about branding of the product and more about customizing it for the mobile market/ striking the right deal with manufacturers that caused them to fall behind in this market segment.

However, they seem to be making a comeback with the very same strategy for the mobile market now -

The Logo on the backside of this Motorola phone says "intel inside". I believe it - the same campaign - should work with the mobile market too. But, more than that I was fascinated by the new Intel commercial that ran a while ago - Rockstars at Intel -

There were a bunch of such ads in this series that speak about the culture at Intel. I thought it was a great series of ads for attracting talent at Intel and trying to shake its image as this dormant un-cool place to work.

[jnakul]

Brand Spectrum

Would you trust/favor a company that sells Trucks <refer the pics below>, to also sell you luxury cars? I wouldn't.

Yes, that's the same company now. TATA acquired Jaguar and saved it from bankruptcy, which is a great point in their favor. But then again, I can never forget the image of Jeremy Clarkson(Top Gear) trashing them.

I encountered this dilemma first hand when I was about to buy a pendant for my sisters's birthday and realized that the brand I had seen on the television so often was also owned by the same company that sold trucks <as mentioned above>.

Now, it had always been mentioned as a "TATA Product" but I had never quite noticed it. And it isn't a very obvious correlation that one would make - of trucks and jewelry. It did not quite appeal to me.

[jnakul]

Singapore Airlines

Singapore airlines have been at the forefront of setting the standards for premium customer service in the airline industry for over 2 decades. They were the underdog when they entered the market, but soon set high standards with programs/strategies like customer service training, Singapore Girl brand image, youngest fleet of planes, lie-flat beds and other such efforts.

However, this led to increasing costs. The competitors were pricing similar service at much lower prices. But, more than that - the definition of customer service had changed a bit. Airline industry had moved from being served for premium customers to more and more of middle class customer segment. These were valued low price more.

Further, companies like Southwest Airlines had taken the standard to a new level - they tried to hit the wow factor and transform customer service into customer joy. Here are a couple of examples of that -

1. Airline Attendant video

2. Airline Attendant video

This is the new age customer service. Something that adds joy to the journey and can go viral on social media. Not the conventional premium treatment of getting fresh fruit juice when you board the flight.

I believe, SIA should concentrate more on that aspect than investing more in adding the new spacebeds, which do not seem to be any more comfortable.

[jnakul]

To add on to the discussion from last class - a great movie - BottleShock, a story about the start of vineyards in the Napa.

[jnakul]

Concha y toro

There are a few interesting things that Concha y toro did that made an impact, I believe -

1. Entry Strategy : As the CEO mentioned, the first step they did was to inundate the market with good quality wine for low-price - to create a sense of "value for money". This helps create a brand in a new geography where no one knows about the brand. It gives some resources for the company then to move up the ladder and upgrade their offering.

2. Developing channel partners : This is the most critical part about the wine purchase experience. Developing relations with distributors, providing them more revenue per bottle sold - helps build those relationships that would ensure your brand gets the visibility it deserves. If you are small, distributors dont pay attention to you. You need to incentivize them.

3. Brand Image: The Ad above is a theme Concha y toro have been using for a while. Now, it definitely does not seem to portray a Chilean image. Instead - it seems more European. Concha y toro is probably building up to that image that customers usually associate with a good wine brand - being European.

[jnakul]

Predicting Diffusion :

According to me - following are the rankings of diffusion for the products -

Silver Band-aid

Satellite Radio

PB&J Sandwich

iSmell (Will never take of) (Refer the April fool prank that Google did to illustrate it)

The criteria I considered were a bit different than Rogers' Five Factors. Since all of these products are incremental improvements in an existing technology/product the critical factors that would decide the success for the product would be (according to me) -

Value proposition - Benefits over existing solution

Cost - Both monetary and otherwise (ex. change in use, mindset)

Go-to-market strategy - Which segment to pick as initial adopters

These are very basic utilitarian set of factors which would drive initial diffusion for the product.

[jnakul]

Corona vs Heineken Branding

Both Corona and Heineken were imported beer brands in the US targeting the same market segment.

Corona on one hand had always been consistent with its branding message - Fun, sun and beach -

Relax Responsibly!

They also did a great job at creating a premium brand in the US. Further when there were changes in the tax structure, Modelo refused to pass it on to the customer. This helped build a loyal relationship with the customer.

On the other hand Heineken consistently experimented with their branding message -

[jnakul]

B&D

In late 1980s, Black & Decker was the largest producer of power tools, power tool accessories, electric lawn and garden tools and residential security hardware with sales reaching $4.8Billion in 1990.

However, Makita had been outselling B&D drills 8 to 1, in recent times. This was more so the case in the Professional-Tradesmen segment. B&D had products that serviced all 3 segments - Consumer, Professional-Tradesman and Professional-Industrial. The branding and tool colors for all these 3 segments were very similar and with very little distinction in physical appearance. Professional-tradesmen wanted to differentiate themselves from the consumers and this translated to purchasing tools from a different brand. So, the big market share that B&D enjoyed in the consumer segment was cannibalizing its other segments. Further, there was a possibility that this could eventually lead to losing market share even in the consumer segment - since they followed the professional recommendations. This was a downward spiral that B&D needed to avoid.

The problem - as noted by the research surveys - was not the quality of the product but the perception of brand. To counter this trend, I would recommend utilizing the DeWalt brand (which had received good ratings among the professional-tradesmen) to push the power tools in this segment and also change the physical appearance of these tools (different color - safety yellow maybe). This could help B&D not just survive but thrive with two different brands meant for different customer segments.