 As-Salam-Alaikum-Khawad-e-Nuh-Hazzat. Waseem Ahsan welcomes you to the Virtual University of Pakistan. The course is Brand Management MKT 624. We are into lecture number 11. In the previous lecture number 10, I talked about the first element of the brand picture and I did explain that the clarity of brand vision lays the foundation for developing the brand picture and brand picture is a snapshot which leads us to developing the right strategies for the brand in order to leverage it in relation to all strengths the brand has. If we do not have that picture right, the possibility is we may not have the right strategies and over the years we may damage the brand. And I also did talk about the fact that brand picture is externally driven meaning which must reflect the image that consumers have of your brand and it must reflect the promise that the brand carries and which the brand must deliver. And then I talked about different levels of associations to which consumers have the minds and the levels of associations develop into their minds as one component of the brand image and brand image being an important element of the brand picture that's what we talked about yesterday. We are still in that process and to be very clear on how different levels of associations develop into the minds we have to know the attributes and benefits that brands present and the values they address. I think we already have learned that the first level is the minimum level the second level of associations is the middle level and the top level is the one which we call brand pinnacle and every brand must try to occupy that position. Now the question is after being very clear about how these levels work the minimal level is all about attributes the second level is about the functional benefits which consumers receive and the top level is about brands addressing your values. The question is how do you determine these attributes these features and these benefits and how brands present or other brands address those values the determination of all these comes to you as a result of market research I mean that's the only way there are managers and companies that under certain situations may not go for the marketing research and may like to base the decisions on informal data that they have the past history, the trends and on the basis of all that information and data bank they may make decisions and the decisions may turn out to be right but that doesn't mean that you don't go for marketing research the only way to arrive at very logical findings in relation to the attributes and benefits that brands present and the values they address we have to go through a qualitative research which is based on needs like I talked about earlier and I will touch that topic once again the reason you carried out that research because you must try to determine the kinds of responses your brand or your brands evoke in relation to competition so in other words you are supposed to be looking into not only the responses relating to your brand you're also supposed to be looking into the responses which are evoked in the marketplace relating competitors or relating competitive brands because unless we can stack up our brand against competition we just cannot maintain and we just cannot ascertain the level of associations of a brand is bound to develop so in other words in the absence of a comparison with the competitive brands there is no way that we can establish a sustainable competitive strategy we have to have a competitive strategy and then we have to sustain that unless we do that we cannot really claim the benefits that the brand offers competitive strategies taken to account so many different variables communication being one if we do not have a very good communication strategy which talks about the point of difference and the benefits arising out of that differentiation we may do harm to our brand because some competitor may start talking about the same benefit by having a very effective communication campaign making you distressed and perturbed because that's all you can do at that moment so you have to be proactive and before you can be proactive you have to have all the facts and figures relating your brand and competitive brands having said that let us now talk about how we go ahead with the research process like I pointed out earlier this research has to be need-based it can be based on demographics alone it may also be based on psychographics alone but when you base the research on needs provided you have identified the needs correctly then there is a very high probability that you're going to encompass different important variables within the areas of demographics and psychographics so therefore need-based segmentation and need-based research becomes kind of all-encompassing we must identify the right need so that we can have relevant and cogent strategies that really can sustain our business so need-based is the most important and purpose-serving kind of research which is the driving force for all our strategies and remember all the strategies that we have meaning a complete set you will recall having learned about packaging strategy, pricing strategy communication strategy financial strategy and so many associated strategies that the brand and then the overall business is going to have another thing that we have to keep in mind we must not lose sight of the fact that all these strategies have to be very well aligned meaning one must lead to another if we are talking about being very price effective and quality conscious the reflection of these two claims must be seen in all the strategies that are at work that's what I mean by alignment so the alignment has to go across the strategic framework in order for us to be clear about the alignment across the framework meaning strategic framework I would like to develop a strategic brand management model the ones I'm done with explaining all the concepts that I'm talking about and that is going to be toward the end of the semester and I can assure you that we all can learn a lot from that model I'm talking about so many different concepts I don't really want you to be burdened by the weight of these concepts and in order to be clear as to how to be very succinct and very explicit and very brief while you're developing a plan so that there are no extra words within the planning framework so that every word that you use means either strategically or in execution terms tactically we're going to talk about all that so wait until that time we are clear that our research is going to be need-based and we're also clear that it is the need-based segmentation that we are working on now the question is what is the population we're going to talk with it goes without saying that it is the target audience who are the consumers who constitute the target audience it is your customers your present customers your past customers and your potential customers when I talk about past customers it automatically means that you're talking about those who are not very loyal or maybe who are disgruntled or dissatisfied due to one reason or another so we have to find out through the research process what is it that has made them dissatisfied and disgruntled what are the factors so the questions that you have to design and ask should be put forward in a way that you should get the intended answer I don't mean that you should get the answer which you like no you have to have the right hypothesis why you're designing one particular question maybe you know or rather you know that there are some lapses in the distribution system there are some lapses in the quality control and there are problems in some other areas because you keep getting those kind of complaints from the marketplace in the informal way when sales people are in the market and you are in the market you interact all the time with members of the trade with consumers and with all the influencers and therefore you know the kind of questions that you must ask in order to bring back to the fold of your brand the lost customers you must also talk with customers of your competitors because you are out to find out the levels of associations that consumers of your competitive brands have in their minds and that's the only way to compare your brand against competition you must also include in your research design category influencers like distributors retailers and also competitors staff talking with these people meeting them once in a while doesn't really hurt as a matter of fact that leads you to go for real credible market research there are certain markets where talking with competitors or their staff is against the business religion but that fortunately is not the case in our market people are friendly, they are receptive and this doesn't mean that they are going to provide you all the facts and figures and all the brands and companies on a platter it never will happen that way all I'm saying is during the process of conversation you might be able to figure out something relevant which will help you arrive at cogent findings the question still remains the level of associations in relation to ABVs attributes, benefits and values up until now we are clear who we are going to talk with meaning the portion of the population or the target audience now the questions that we are going to ask them let's discuss those in more detail you may start with naming your brand asking the respondent what is it that comes to the respondent's mind if the respondent can very easily talk about the identity of your brand or the image of the brand it means the respondent has top of the mind awareness there also is a possibility that you are selling a juice brand and the respondent might say I have heard this name and maybe you are selling milk or maybe you are selling chocolates leading you to believe or leading you to ascertain through the research that the respondent do not have top of the mind awareness and what is the fix what is it that you have to do lengthy process think of all the variables of the marketing mix what is it that you may have to do but a very very weighty question the next one is you may ask the respondent to name the strengths and weaknesses of your brand now nobody has that much time to start counting on their fingers well this is one this is two this is three the practical way of going about that is that you list down a few strengths which you think your brand should have or you think your brand does have along the weaknesses when you know that your brand does not have one particular strength chances are it will become your brand's weakness so you can list those down and assist your respondent tell you very honestly and candidly what they think are the strengths what they think are the weaknesses and I think it goes without saying having known that you are well set on the way to determining what really is right and what really is wrong the next question that you might ask them in relation to the question which I have just talked about is what is it that has contributed to your perception of our brand again in relation to strengths and weaknesses now this may sound like a very open ended question the answer to which may be in paragraphs but that is not the intention the intention again is to be very brief and list down a few factors that may contribute toward building up certain perceptions on part of the respondents those factors could be relating distribution factors could be relating the part of quality in the first place about very effective communication like your brand is very good good quality and at the same time the communication is so good the campaign that you have launched on the television and also in the paper etc etc makes such a good contact with us and it touches such an emotional card inside here that we remember what is going on in the market you are in a position to find out what really contributes toward their perceptions if you have designed your question very realistically and practically a few more questions you can ask respondents what are their expectations of your brand again a question the answer to which can be very open ended but the trick here again is to list down a few and why do you list those down those again have got to be very well aligned with all the things and with all the variables with all the aspects that you already have listed down in order to elicit and evoke answers from the respondents and don't forget these are the factors which are part of the strategies that you are going to develop and you are very clear about the strategic direction because you have the right vision you already have built that and you are now in the process of building up the brand picture you can frame the next question like what really are your expectations and again you have to list down a few things which you think should be forming their expectations you can ask them the benefits that your brand provides them with here again you have got to be very clever and very realistic when I say clever it doesn't really mean that you have to outsmart your respondent or your customer or you know competitor's customer no the objective is to find out what really are the benefits which the respondent is receiving and only if you know that very correctly that you can find out the right level of associations that the respondent has developed with your brand you can ask another question to your respondents like would you recommend a brand to others if you would why this again is a very qualitative kind of a question and the respondent will need some kind of assistance from your side and I would be able to answer this question do the same as I explained earlier maybe you have a multiple choice kind of answers and read those out to the respondent for them to give you one or a combination from within those multiple listings this question is asked because many consumers in the marketplace you being one as a consumer who always like to talk about brands you may not have seen a person who never talks about recommending one brand to their friends their relatives the neighbors so on and so forth what does that happen you have to be clear about that before you design this kind of a question you remember brands satisfy your decision process that your decision was the right decision to go for the brand because it was a wise decision you like to make sure that it was the optimal decision because you went for the best brand and when you go for the best brand to purchase that is a reflection of your personality you are important you are different and you have a set of values which really fulfills your self esteem and which makes you important and you like to convey that to others and when others follow you feel even more important that's the way the psychological process works so you have to ask this question if the respondents are going to recommend your brand to others why and when you ask why again you may as well have a small listing of different variables from within which they have to choose one or maybe more than one you may ask them a question like how would you describe of a brand to others this question also will fall within the domain of a brand persona which I am going to talk about in a short while this question will lead to respondents you or rather will lead them to describe your brand if you are selling a motorbike and you think that you are making something which is very sturdy and rugged and the respondents say they describe your brand as sturdy rugged, strong you feel confident that the positioning of your brand is right the attributes features that you added on to the brand are perfect and the benefits the features and attributes are translating into are just about the right ones and therefore the level of association which I want developed in the mind of the consumer is there excellent another question that you might ask your respondents says does your brand make them feel differently and this is very much related to one of the questions I talked earlier that people do have self image and when they buy brands they want to reassure themselves of the self image and they also like to portray that image to others so if they really feel differently by using your brand meaning important that gives you a very good lead into determining the level of association which your brand has developed in the marketplace this was a set of possible questions that you may incorporate into your research design while going ahead with determining the ABVs meaning attributes benefits and values now if you are working for a company which is very small or which is small and does not have the kind of budget to go for this kind of research because market research is carried out by the marketing research professionals this is not something which is generally taken care of marketing staff themselves but if you are a small company that may not be in a position to afford that then you might as well like to have answers to all these questions that I talked about yourself maybe in a formal way by designing a questionnaire or maybe in an informal way the objective is to have in any case answers to the questions because without those answers there is no way that we can determine the levels that we must know consumers have with the brands in relation to associations so we can summarize that the purpose this kind of research serves is primarily aimed at finding out the level of associations customers ascribe to your brand versus competition talking about the questions and the kind of answers which you should try to elicit from the respondents which you should try to well when I say try to elicit what I mean is you have to be realistic in getting those responses it is not that you have to evoke responses the way you want like I told you earlier the responses have got to be about your brand and the responses have got to be about competitions brands so that you can draw out comparisons we learnt while discussing collection of additional data from within the industry that definition of the industry you are a part of has to be broad enough to include all competitors and to include all variables that impact your brand but at the same time it has to be narrow enough to enable you to draw realistic and practical comparisons so the market research we are talking about leads you toward drawing those kinds of comparisons and while you do that you incorporate in your design maybe a couple of competitors not all the players who form the industry because then it becomes very cumbersome if you relate yourself with the two or three of the major players plus one of the newcomers I think the design of the research should be well serving so the analysis of the research that you have carried out you determine whether or not customers believe that your brand has reached the highest level of associations meaning the pinnacle as the kind of answer you must find out through that research no matter how qualitative the research design is the findings have got to be quantified if the answer is yes then it means your brand is very well positioned and the objective there is to maintain that position not to lose it not to let your competitors dislodge that position if the answer is no you've got to ask yourself a few more questions it's a lot of questions that you have to ask yourself and then seek answers in order to arrive at the right findings it is an ongoing process meaning you have to keep on asking yourself these questions sometimes in a very formal way and sometimes in a very informal way in other words even when you're not in the process of carrying out marketing research you still have to have answers to all the questions at all times because market is a dynamic place and in order to keep pace with the changes you've got to stay very alert and you've got to be right on top of things coming to the questions that you must ask yourself if your brand is not on top or number one why is it not on top naturally the answer which you must try to find out is what is to be done you have to bring into a very sharp focus the problem area meaning you have to identify the problem whether there is something wrong with the production process because of which something has gone wrong with the quality or maybe there is something wrong with the packaging meaning the way the product appears or the brand appears one of the objectives that consumers must get satisfaction out of the attractiveness of the package maybe there is something wrong with the distribution system and your brand is not available all over so you have to identify the problem area so that you can fix that the next question that you must ask yourself if competition is right on top what is the reason the answer to this question has got to be very pragmatic very practical you do not have to deceive yourself you do not have to feel bad about competition being on top you must strive very hard to dislodge that although it is difficult to do that it sets it sets into motion a whole new process maybe a very effective communication campaign that can negate what competition has gained or maybe improvement of quality meaning adding or rather laddering up a few more benefits and if you do that you have got to create awareness about that and again the process of communication starts if you cannot do that meaning if you cannot afford to do that whether you have some problems to fix those problems you have to answer some more questions so the process goes on you have to one way or the other find out why is competition on top and then the third question stems from the two questions that I have talked about and it is very obvious what is it that we have to do and we have talked about that you have to take into account different areas where things have gone wrong and fix those there are three fundamental keys to developing the right associations I mean after you have asked yourself so many questions, you have answered questions three fundamental keys that I would like to talk about are very important and that adds to our understanding of the concept of the brand value pyramid meaning the whole concept of development of associations in consumers mind because that is all we are talking about the first is that movement from the bottom block to the top meaning the pinnacle of the pyramid has got to be incremental what does that mean that means that when you are at the lowest level you just cannot jump to the topmost level so you have to be at the first level which is the primary or the elementary level in order to start the journey and then you move on to the next level which provides the higher level of association and from there you move on to the top level so movement to the next level is dependent on achievement of the previous level we can put that in these words and then the second fundamental is that there has to be complete alignment among associations meaning whatever your attributes and features are all about they must be translated the same way into benefits and they must lead to the kind of values which are very much related to the benefits which consumers are enjoying it just cannot be that you have one set of attributes and benefits and the values are very different for the ones they should generate there has to be complete alignment all across the levels and the third key is which is a very important fundamental make that alignment difficult for competition to follow and going back to the previous discussion when you are at the top it becomes difficult for a competition to imitate you to follow you because you have developed some very strong associations in the minds of the consumers to make the concept of alignment among all the levels of associations clear in your minds let me give you an example let us talk about the most popular car in the 1800 cc category in our market what are the features and attributes let's talk about those you might say it has good styling the price is reasonable it is spacious it gives the looks of a bigger car it is strong and sturdy these are a few features which you might think of while taking a look at that brand of car I leave it to your guess what that model could be having identified the features and attributes let us take a look at the benefits which these features and attributes translate into gives me good consumption it has resale value the spare parts are available at customer friendly pricing the car is dependable so these are the kind of benefits which a customer enjoy what are the beliefs and values which this model might touch the level it gives you confidence why does it give you confidence your decision to buy that model was right it is very friendly it makes you feel good and important people notice that and you get for example the approval of neighbors the approval of friends everybody talking about everybody endorsing your decision you've got a good car and this could have been the best decision that you have made this is one example of maintaining alignment across the various levels of associations that brands evoke in the hope whatever we have talked about the levels of associations is clear in our minds let us now talk about what happens after the brand has been at the pinnacle for a long time I did touch upon this in the previous lecture either you maintain it because you do not see yourself as a company getting into something else meaning creating another brand or creating another identity and therefore you may like to sustain that for a long time to come you might see a lot of potential for the brand to stay there there have been quite a few examples in our market of products in various categories competitors could have been guessing about a change they have been guessing about company XYZ coming up with another brand with another name because they have been very successful with one particular brand and thinking that the brand has been at the pinnacle for such a long time it is high time that they introduced something else but company XYZ did not do that why because they understood the market they understood their customers and they knew that the potential to maintain the brand at that point and to sustain it was there and they were proved right the next situation could be the company might think that brand is being threatened from all directions what is it that we should do well we might create another brand to what extent they succeed in that is a separate issue I gave you an example in the previous lecture if the company has very strong reputation the company can succeed with a new entry or with a new identity a new identity all together with a new brand name if the company does not have good reputation or if the company makes certain mistakes with the basic marketing philosophy the brand may not succeed but again this is a separate discussion what you have to keep in mind what is it that you should do either to maintain the brand or to introduce another brand and you have got to be very clear about the potential and you have got to be very clear about the threats and you have got to be very clear about the opportunities that those threats may offer having talked about all this let us now draw the conclusion of the levels of associations the conclusion is that any brand in any category must try to achieve the most slot of the pyramid it must start from the bottom and that is the only way it can start there is no other way and all the way through the top once it is there it has the power to charge price premiums because all the marketing effort that is being undertaken is not being undertaken for the sake of fun it is being undertaken for the sake of doing some real hard business so the brand has the power to charge premiums customers will accept that competitors will find it very hard to follow and that is where the research findings by pimps come into play that is why there is such a lot of difference of contributions offered by two different brands meaning the number one brand and the number two there is such a gulf because the top most brand has the power and therefore the privilege to go for a price premium and therefore good profitability and good price earnings as a brand manager you must strive to develop as strong associations as you can and the way to do that you know that now you have learned it that brings us to the next component of brand image meaning how to develop that I keep on rubbing in one point that we did talk about image at one time which was maybe lecture number one or lecture number two but we only talked about that a translation of your brand's identity and the need for it to be taken right and the need for the identity to be right we did talk about those things in a very micro form and now we are right now in the process of building that brand image and to repeat brand image has two components the one is associations which deals with brands characteristics its properties its strengths and weaknesses and other component is brand persona let us now talk about brand persona along with associations brand persona provides a complete understanding of the brand image you have this component which is associations and you have another component which is sitting right here and these two coming together for the brand image brand managers look at brands from the standpoint of human and other characteristics that can be easily identified the objective here is to personify your brand and let the consumers associate themselves with the brand and let the consumers express themselves about the brand in terms just as they would express themselves and associate themselves with humans for example you might talk about somebody being strong and rugged and you may also talk about a product being strong and rugged let me explain this with the help of a few examples let us talk about a car like I said you might say the car is very strong and sturdy just like people relate to other persons from a certain geographic area and call them strong and sturdy and that is the case with all the countries of the world there are certain parts people from where are known for their certain characteristics rugged, strong the warriors, the polite the cultured the difficult, whatever so by the same token you try to personify your brand by giving it characteristics which are very human in nature and therefore you can talk about a car which is strong and rugged an example could be the distinction between a four wheel drive and a nice token luxury sedan a four wheel drive vehicle can be described as warrior and tough for example whereas a luxury car can be characterized or personified as something very majestic and stylish and smart let us now talk about the brand of biscuits which is top of the line brand and it is basically positioned for afternoon tea time mostly to serve your honored guests meaning it is an expensive brand you may talk about that brand being sophisticated just like you talk about a person being sophisticated you will not call that brand funny you will not call that brand difficult for example by the same token you might take the example of a brand of biscuits which is positioned for fun loving kids and you might describe that as funny you may not describe that as serious as studious hard working no the objective is to describe your brands and to personify those in human terms so that it becomes easy for you as a brand manager to develop the right identity which can lead to developing right associations a brand which is meant for improving your skin for example in the female segment has got to look that way and you have got to describe that in those terms delicate sophisticated soft and by giving these personifications by characterizing your brand that way you can develop the right identity these are a few of the examples and when we start developing our model like I said at the beginning of this lecture which will be toward the end of the semester we shall develop a very clear understanding of what I am talking about that we do understand what brand persona is and why it is developed that way we should be very clear that brand persona while working along with the levels of associations with brand characteristics have developed in the minds of consumers we can develop the right brand and before that we have a picture which is a prerequisite to developing your brand now having said that we are done with the first element of the brand picture which is brand image just to make sure that there is no confusion the brand picture which I started talking about after being done with the brand vision is that we are discussing now we are still in the process brand picture has a few elements the first element is the brand image the brand image has two components which we have completed one is brand associations the other is brand persona brand associations and brand persona put together give us the right image and that is the lesson we have learned in this lecture thank you very much for your patience I look forward to talking with you in the next lecture Allah Hafiz