Brand and Advertising Strategies: Key Concepts

Brand Awareness and Advertising Strategies

Brand Awareness: How present is your brand in the market? Is it recognized by the public?

Brand Image: What image do you project to your customers?

Brand Loyalty: Dedication to purchasing the same product or service repeatedly, now and in the future, from the same brand, regardless of a competitor's actions or changes in the environment.

Brand Stretching: When a company tries to launch products outside its core group. Example: Zara / Zara Home.

Announcement vs. Advertisement: An announcement is an act of announcing or giving notice, while an advertisement is a commercial solicitation designed to sell a commodity, service, or similar (marketing).

What Makes a Good Advertisement?

A good advertisement is:

• Clever
• Powerful
• Catchy
• Inspiring
• Uses appropriate music
• Brief
• Unique

Product Life Cycle

1. Introduction/Development: The product is introduced and struggles to gain brand recognition; growth is small. Strategies include:
   • Raising product awareness through advertising and word-of-mouth.
   • Offering discounts.
   • Targeting early adopters and influential market leaders.
   • Finding suppliers.
2. Growth: Rapid growth, sales, and profits. Advertising and word-of-mouth help increase sales. As sales grow, more firms stock the product, accelerating growth. Firms need to capitalize on growth to extend product sales from small retailers to large supermarkets.
3. Maturity: Intense competition. The product reaches peak market penetration. The company needs to improve the product to gain market differentiation and extend the period of maturity.
4. Decline: The product cannot maintain market share; sales and profits fall. The product is eclipsed by new products.

Total Product Concept

The total product incorporates everything that a customer receives:

• Services
• Intangible associations (celebrity endorsement/brand values)
• Service, warranty, financing

Generic or Core Product: Delivers the essential benefits and addresses the basic needs of the customer.

Augmented vs. Expected Product:

• Augmented Product: Products that contain extra features, such as the updated camera in the iPhone XR.
• Expected Product: Today’s augmented product (iPhone XR) will become tomorrow’s expected product. That is, all phones will have high-powered cameras in the distant future.

Bundling

Combining several products in the same package. This can also help you get rid of old stock. Example: Happy Meal: beverage + burger + fries + dessert.

Place

Place involves distribution and delivery channels. How does the product get from the factory to the customer? Most consumer goods are purchased from a retailer who purchases them from a wholesaler/distributor, who purchases them from a manufacturer. There are often middlemen in the distribution chain. By selling directly to the end-user, such as on the Internet, you can increase profitability.

Product/Brand Extensions

Launching a new or modified product in the same general market. Example: Coke / Coke Zero.

Promotional Products

Coupons, discounts, loyalty programs.

Public Relations

Setting up and maintaining favorable relations between a business organization and the general public.

Slogans

One-line phrases that are often put to music (alliteration, rhymes).

Trade/Brand Names

Brand names need to be unique and fit the company and its image.

Advertising Methods

• Repetition
• Endorsement (a popular person endorses a product)
• Emotional appeal (advertisements appeal to basic emotions like mother-love, sex, femininity)
• Scientific authority (an authority discusses the benefits of the product)
• “Keeping up with the Joneses” (appeals to the snob in us, telling us that we can be just as rich and successful as our neighbors)
• Comparison
• Association of ideas
• Product placement (putting the product in a movie or TV show)
• Hooks (a hook in the form of a question to raise the problem in the reader’s mind)