New York Time’s best seller Debbie Ford, commissions Square One Branding with the creation of the package design and website for her newest release The Shadow Effect. Square One Branding meets the client’s dealine and surpasses expectations. The product launch is a great success and the website goes live as of June 26, 2009!
A strong emotional connection between your target market and your brand can increase sales volumes, increase customer loyalty and lead to higher profits.
Emotional connection is a powerful way to link the heart of your target market with the soul of your brand. This connection is the degree to which your customers care about your brand beyond its rational attributes. It is more psychological than logical and more unconscious than conscious. Above all, emotional connection can make a big impact on your business.
Brands that evoke a stronger emotional response than comparable goods are able to sell in greater volumes, create rabid customer loyalty and charge more than their competitors. Customers were willing to trade up to such products across many business categories, from coffee, beer and dog food to household appliances or professional services.
According to market researchers brands are now being forced into two distinct categories: (a) low-priced commodities or (b) brands you will pay more for because you care about them. Brands in the middle of the road will get run over, either by the low-price leaders or by the brands people love.
All Buyers Are Affected by Their Emotions. Few Buyers Are Aware of It.
Many businesses operate on the assumption that their customers make decisions consciously and
rationally. Even in technical categories (or in business-to-business), this assumption is largely false.
No human being is immune to the influence of their unconscious emotions. The rule of thumb among cognitive scientists is that 95 percent of all human behavior is unconscious. Emotional connection is even more critical if your target market is female. Women already control or influence over 80 percent of the purchases in the United States, a total of around $3.5 trillion every year. They base their decisions primarily on emotional characteristics such as relationships and on what your product will do for them personally. They don’t like reading lists of numbers, specs and statistics. (Then again, who has time?)
Emotional connection is easy to overlook because customers are often unaware of their deepest motivations, especially when those motives are not socially approved. Such motives can include greed, ambition, status-seeking, fear, anger, love, lust, disgust and pride, to name a few. What people can consciously articulate has only about a one in ten chance of being truly accurate.
Categories and Brands Differ in Their Emotional Opportunities.
Not every brand can be Nike or Harley or Madonna. Not every brand can have enthusiasts tattooing the company logo into their forehead. In categories like car repair or hemorrhoid medication, customers basically want the whole subject to go away.
In categories like candy and soft drinks, the driving emotion is really just a mood or whim. But even the most humble product or the most fleeting mood can have the right emotional connection. And every appropriate emotional connection can be maximized.
Two strategic questions any business should ask are:
(a) which emotion can we own? and
(b) how much emotional intensity does our category and brand merit?
Both answers are defined and limited by your target market. But within those limits, you can tailor almost every business decision you make to maximize the appropriate emotional connection.
Product design, price, distribution, packaging, promotions, media spending, co-branding, marketing communications, and staff recruitment and training can all be tweaked to get your customers to care more. The goal is to use all the touch points of your business to create a consistent emotional effect in your customers that will allow you to build brand trust and loyalty.
Expressive. Exotic. Inspired. Mother and daughter team, Rhonda and Tiffany Bartolacci wanted to have a strong presence at the JCK jewelry show in Vegas. These are some of the designs we created for them, following their now well established brand standard.
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May 2009 – Debbie Ford, New York Times’ best-selling author, creator of The Shadow Process, and founder of the Ford Institute for Integrative Coaching, engages Square One Branding with the re-branding of the DebbieFord.com website, plus branding, package design and website for her latest movie “The Shadow Effect.”
After a long time, a brand other than Apple is creating a global buzz about the impending launch of one its product. Sony with the launch of PlayStation 3 seems to have stuck a chord with consumers once again after a long hiatus. It was high time that one of the world’s iconic brands started reclaiming its rightful position as the leader of the consumer electronics market. Even though PlayStation 3 seems to have brought back some energy and zest for the brand, it is an irony that the life of such a strong global brand has come to depend on a single product. As one of the pre-eminent global consumer electronics brand which has enjoyed unparallel brand equity and loyalty, Sony is surprisingly a classic case study for what a brand should not do to erode its own brand standing in the market place.
One of the highly discussed topics in branding is the relevance of maintaining consistency for brands in the current market place which is characterized by diverse cultures, increasingly empowered consumers and ever changing trends and consumer preferences. Consistency is often mistaken by brands for complacency or static existence. Consistency in the branding lexicon refers to the ability of the brand to convey to the consumers in a single voice across all customer touch points, the fundamental building blocks of any brand namely the brand identity, brand image, brand personality, brand essence, key performance indicators such as quality, features, price points and such. But such a consistency should not come at the cost of the brand refusing to constantly adapt to the dynamic market structure. Obviously carrying out these two seemingly contradictory things becomes highly challenging. Such a complex maneuver proves even more difficult for an established brand such as Sony, as it will have entrenched brand structure, and brand management practices. Even though there are many specific reasons for Sony’s slide from the top, at a corporate level, Sony’s inability to manage consistency while constantly changing appears to be at the root of Sony’s decline.
An analysis of Sony’s ascent to global prominence and the reasons for its slide from the pinnacle during the last couple of years brings to fore some pressing reasons. Three major factors contributed to Sony’s ascent to global supremacy in the consumer electronics sector and they are:
As can be seen, each of these three factors lead into each other thereby creating a virtuous circle. The combination of these factor pushed Sony into the exclusive club of iconic brands. But over the last decade, Sony seems to have lost the magic formula. It has been gradually sliding down from its high seat. Many reasons have contributed to Sony’s decline:
From the discussion so far, it is clear that Sony has not been very prudent in managing its brand and its components very well over the last few years. But even then, Sony still continues to be one of the most valuable brands in the world. What should Sony do to regain its lost brand supremacy? It seems ironic that for a solution Sony may want to look at a brand that prides itself on structuring its brand plan based on Sony’s – Samsung Electronics. Samsung Electronics has been hugely successful in creating a brand from scratch and making the brand one of the top consumer electronics brand in the world. If Sony has to regain its lost brand supremacy, then it may want to follow some of the fundamental steps discussed below:
The brief market euphoria that would follow the launch of PlayStation 3 should not be confused with long term brand success or the return of Sony as it were. Even though this latest product will allow Sony a much need breather, it should just be a starting point for Sony’s resurgence. Sony, by methodically evaluating its brand culture and following the steps described above, could surely rejuvenate itself in the long run.
Create an identity myth: For any brand to attain iconic status, it has to create an identity myth. Every society invariably goes through phases of prosperity and crisis. Brands that resonate and shows directions to the masses through the brand stories and brand activities gets etched into the culture. These brands, by creating an identity for themselves, provide identity to the whole society.
Involve multiple story tellers: Dissemination of brand information through the many participants of the society is critical for an iconic brand. The four major authors of these brand stories are: companies, the culture industries, intermediaries and customers. Each of these authors facilitates the brand to blend into the fabric of the society. By associating the brand and its identity with the prevalent events in the society, these authors create an iconic stature for the brands.
Weave powerful brand stories: Great brands always have resonating stories that touch the lives of consumers. These stories could be of the brand’s unique history (Shanghai), myth (Jim Thompson), culture (Harley Davidson), fashion icon (Giorgio Armani), struggle (Li Ning), and underlying philosophy (Singapore Airlines). These brand stories offers consumers a good reason to elevate the brand beyond their mere utilitarian role in the market.
One of the important results of developing an iconic brand is the growth of brand communities. Brand communities are largely imagined communities that represent a form of human association situated within a consumption context. Brand communities are collections of active loyalists, users of a brand who are committed, conscientious and almost passionate. There is an intrinsic connection between members and the collective sense of difference from others not in the community. Members of the brand community practice rituals and traditions that perpetuate the community’s shared history.
Brand communities are liberated from geography, commercial in nature, possess communal self awareness and are committed that facilitates the brand to attain long term acceptability in the society and ensures that the brand attains iconic state.
By being an important resource for consumers, brand communities provide wider social benefits to consumers through interaction and provide social structure to the relationship between marketer and consumer.
About the author:
Many business categories have always used brand recognition to their benefits. Recently, a friend of mine was approached by a client who asked: “If branding is working, why am I still down?”
Here is a short anecdote that may answer that question.
Chuck, Chris and Dave were fishing and suddenly Chris noticed an angry grizzly bear across the stream. Chris signaled Dave and they slowly started backing out of the stream. Dave stumbled, spooking the bear, who started charging after Dave and Chris as they ran. On the way through camp, Chris paused to grab his shoes. As hard as they ran, the bear kept gaining on the barefoot fishermen. Finally, Chris stopped running and started putting on his shoes.
“Chris, are you nuts? What about the bear?” exclaimed a frantic Dave. “I just realized something,” Chris replied, “I don’t have to outrun the bear—I just have to outrun you.”
It’s an old joke, but it demonstrates my point. A client may be down for the year, but how are they doing against their competition? I urge that you ask around. The average drop in business among the others you know would be dramatically higher if they’re not marketing. You will lose ground slower than everyone else if you are.
Branding is all about building desire for your product. It has no control over the timing of the purchase. Just because sales are down, it doesn’t mean people don’t want that new ring or new boat or condo. It means they’re waiting for a more appropriate time to buy. The fact that a client is 7%-15% above the industry average means they’ll be getting more sales when the economy turns around. It takes guts and belt tightening to make it through a downturn, but cutting marketing will affect your recovery speed in the long term.
It’s a well-known reality in the marketing world that you grow market share in a down economy and grow sales in an up economy. That’s because many businesses stop marketing when things get lean, and that gives you a greater share of consumer attention. When things turn up again, and they will, you’re already first in line to earn their business. Remember that your business plan lasts through several economical cycles, and your marketing plan should, too.
Five Don’t for Marketing in Tough Times
As counterintuitive as it might sound, avoid discounting. Our columnist offers advice on positioning your company to survive and thrive
By Steve McKee
Unpredictable. Slow. Bleak. Grim. Gloomy. All words that have been used to describe the economic outlook for the balance of 2008—and depending upon who you talk to, the scenario for 2009 and beyond. Standard & Poor’s believes the economic difficulties we’ve been experiencing due to the mortgage mess and skyrocketing oil prices will be at their worst early next year (BusinessWeek.com, 6/13/08). And while the housing market is sure to recover, oil prices may never come back down. That means more tough times for the economy, both in the U.S. and globally.
What’s a responsible business leader to do? Perhaps the slowdown already has made an impact on your company. Or maybe you can see it coming but aren’t sure exactly when and how it will hit. In either case, the most important thing is to keep your wits about you and not succumb to five common mistakes companies often make when times get tough.
1. Be smart and thrifty, but don’t panic. This, too, shall pass.
Economies go through cycles of expansion and contraction. It’s what we all learned in college economics courses (back then, of course, we weren’t really paying attention). The trouble is, while academics can pontificate on the cyclical economy, real business people have to live through difficult economic events. We love the expansionary times, but the contractions can be painful. If you’re smart, you’ve managed your balance sheet well and can ride out a period of slow or no growth. If not, you may have to make some cuts. Just be careful to trim fat and avoid cutting muscle as much as possible.
2. Marketing is muscle, not fat. Be careful about cutting it.
Just as the savviest investors view down markets as a time to buy when everybody else is selling, the savviest marketers know recessions are a great time to pick up market share. They understand that by maintaining their budgets (or even increasing them) they may not come out ahead during the down times, but they can pick up market share that will pay off in the long run. Marketing dollars in a recession are like oxygen on Mt. Everest—the less there is in the surrounding environment, the more valuable the amount you possess becomes. Cutting your marketing spending is a sure way to give ground to competitors who may be more aggressive during the downturn.
3. Don’t lose focus by chasing business you wouldn’t normally want.
When clients and customers get nervous about the economy, they cut back their spending. For you that could mean fewer transactions, smaller purchases, or possibly both. But if you try to broaden your core product or service appeal to please a wider audience, chances are you’ll make your best customers even less satisfied, giving them one more reason to stay home or spend less. There’s a reason you don’t pursue certain types of customers when times are good, and that reason probably hasn’t changed. Do your best to stick to your knitting and enhance the value you provide to your best customers. They may decide to make their cutbacks in areas other than yours.
4. Don’t discount.
It’s easy to rationalize discounting during a downturn, for your company’s sake (“it helps to drive business”) as well as for the sake of your customers (“they’re struggling and need the help”). But whether times are good or bad, discounting your price discounts your product (BusinessWeek.com, 4/14/08) in the eyes of your customers. There was a time in the 1990s when McDonald’s (MCD) and Burger King (BKC) put their Big Macs and Whoppers on sale so often that they trained their customers never to pay full price. That created a margin problem from which it took them years to recover. If you need to make your products more affordable (to generate volume, goodwill, or both), do so carefully and deliberately. But lower the price instead of offering a discount.
5. Don’t neglect the elephant in the room.
We live in a 24-hour information cycle. When news breaks, people know it, and economic news breaks every day. You don’t have to be an economist to know the business environment isn’t in the best shape right now, and the point is brought home to your people in a personal way every time they go to the grocery store or fill up their gas tanks. Even if your company’s revenues have held up, your employees know there’s trouble afoot and they’re nervous. Make sure they know you’re on top of things and have a plan.
There’s no telling what lies ahead over the next several months. We may pull out of our economic rut more quickly than anticipated, or we may be in for a prolonged rough ride. But clients and customers will still need to eat. They still need transportation. They still seek entertainment, clothing, vacations, chain saws, pet food, perfume, office supplies, computer servers, tractors, and machinery. As the market tightens up, the best positioned players will survive and thrive. Avoid the mistakes above and you’re more likely to be one of them.
BATAVIA, Ohio (AdAge.com) — Household and personal care might once have seemed recession-resistant, but last year U.S.-based personal-care marketers actually cut ad spending faster than the general market. That could be potentially damaging for their brands, according to one study that shows that marketers that cut spending during a downturn lost share to private labels — share they didn’t regain.
Smaller, Nonpremium Brands at Risk?
According to TNS Media Intelligence data analyzed by Sanford C. Bernstein last month, eight U.S.-based household and personal-care marketers covered by the company cut measured media spending an average of 8.8%, compared with a 5% cut among advertisers overall. The fourth quarter, in particular, was the culprit, according to separate research by Goldman Sachs based on TNS data, which found that U.S.-based household, personal-care and beauty marketers slashed spending 14% on average in the quarter, reversing a 3% year-on-year increase in the third quarter.
The reasons behind this surprising turn of events vary, but the implications are potentially dire. Research presented by University of North Carolina marketing professor Jan-Benedict E.M. Steenkamp in a Bernstein conference call last month indicates that companies that maintained or hiked ad spending generally, and TV spending in particular, lost limited share to private labels in recessions between 1985 and 2005.
Companies and brands that went with the flow of the boom-bust cycle by cutting ad spending — as data suggest household and personal-care players did last year — tended to lose more share to private labels both immediately and longer term.
Companies whose ad spending didn’t vary according to economic cycles — based on an analysis of Ad Age data on global ad spending — also tended to increase their stock prices an average of 1.3 percentage points annually ahead of others from 1986 to 2006, said Mr. Steenkamp, who analyzed global results of 26 marketers across multiple industries.
‘Takes courage’
“Companies and categories that are able to turn a recession into an advantage are [those] going against economic trends,” Mr. Steenkamp said. “Ultimately, it takes courage. But it pays off in share and in terms of the stock market.”
About half the share lost to private labels in past recessions has never been recovered, he said.
A variety of factors likely played into last year’s spending retreat by package-goods marketers, and some contend the U.S. measured-media numbers don’t tell the whole story.
The pullback by U.S.-based marketers in the fourth quarter was likely prompted in part by the sudden strengthening of the dollar, which drained earnings from overseas almost overnight and spurred cuts in one of the only budgets that can be cut quickly: marketing. By contrast L’Oréal, a French company for which a stronger dollar boosted U.S. earnings in the fourth quarter, hiked media spending in the quarter.
TNS data showed only a 3.6% spending decline for personal-care marketers overall last year, according to an Information Resources Inc. presentation in March, vs. the 8.8% decline for the U.S.-based group covered by Bernstein. That suggests spending by foreign multinationals lifted results pulled down by U.S. companies.
The Goldman report showed some signs of strategic spending hikes in the fourth quarter. Procter & Gamble Co. — and, to a lesser extent, Kimberly-Clark Corp. — upped measured spending in paper categories facing the most erosion from private labels. And P&G hiked spending on laundry detergent, particularly on Gain, a midtier value brand that can benefit from trade-down but also is more vulnerable to private labels.
COMMENTS:
By daphne | london April 6, 2009 11:45:21 am:
There is also a truth to the proverb that you must spend money to make money. By cutting back, you send a message that your business is hurting and that there is reason to be afraid. That belief creates a self-fulfilling prophesy. However a captain steers, he takes his whole ship with him.
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By paynetaylor | ANDOVER, MA April 6, 2009 10:05:41 am:
What part of building brand equity while others are sticking their heads in the sand, don’t marketers understand? Media is being reduce to belly fat ads, so renting space only gets more affordable. Competitive presence is lessening, so it’s easier to cut through the clutter.
There are only two real obstacles to building brand equity in a down market: actual lack of cash (hard to imagine even in the current downturn from the likes of P&G), or plain, old-fashioned fear.
If there ever was a brand opportunity to take advantage of, this is it. But, unfortunately, a majority of brands seem to prefer ducking for cover and waiting for the economic clouds to break over a sunnier landscape. They don’t seem to know, or want to acknowledge, what a lot of fishermen have always known; rain brings out the fish. You just have to be willing to brave the wet and the cold to go reel them in.
