Common Brand Problems

Over the past twenty years, I have helped more than 200 brands in a wide variety of product and service categories. Here are the most common problems that brands seem to encounter.

• A disruptive technology has made the brand's core product obsolete. Example: Kodak.
• The brand's level of service and product innovation has not kept up with the competition. Example: Burger King.
• Stuck in the middle. The brand is neither low cost/high convenience nor does it deliver a high-end or unique customer experience. Example: Sears.
• The brand has extremely low customer awareness. Example: many start-up brands.
• The category has matured and all of the brands in the category seem to offer the same product quality, functions and features. Example: this has occurred in many categories.
• The category has been infused with new life through investment in advertising/marketing, but the brand in question has not participated in that investment. Example: any insurance brand that has not begun advertising at a fairly high level.
• The CEO or other organization leader has created a dysfunctional culture. Example: more brands than you would think.
• The brand's leadership is risk-adverse and so the brand (and its products and services) has not been proactive about reinventing itself. Example: numerous brands, Hallmark being one of them.
• A venture capital firm buys the brand, strips out costs and assets, dresses the company/brand up for sale but has not really invested in the long-term viability of the brand. Example: I have encountered many examples of this. I do not want to name them.
• Profit-focused management driven by Wall Street demands has gradually reduced the quality or increased the price of the brand's products (or both) until the perceived value is noticeably diminished. These actions can also be influenced by retailers such as Walmart that have huge leverage over manufacturers and how they price their products. Example: Newell (Rubbermaid). 
• In the effort to increase sales significantly, a more upscale brand broadens distribution to a mass channel, significantly diminishing its brand cache. Example: Columbia (vs. Patagonia or North Face).
• A brand walks away from or ignores its primary differentiating benefit in an effort to broaden its offering and gain more sales across more customer need segments. Example: Volvo (safety).
• A premium brand extends its product line down to the mass market but in so doing risks decreasing the social status associated with the brand. Example: BMW, Mercedes-Benz and Jaguar have had to grapple with this tradeoff as they try to extend down into the aspirational or mass luxury market
• Through rapid expansion and wild success, the brand becomes ubiquitous increasing the difficulty of maintaining uniform quality standards and feeling more commonplace in peoples' minds. Examples: Nike and Starbucks.
• The company and brand have been complacent for a long time, so much so that they have not kept up with evolving customer needs or the competition. Examples: Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts.
• The brand's product or service is so new, revolutionary or complex that people really don't understand what it does or how it works. This is a communication problem. Example: I have encountered this with several high-tech start-up brands that are based on new product concepts.
• Management does not have a good understanding of who their target market is, what they really want or what messaging or product configurations would work best for them. Example: I have encountered this more often than one might think. Stuhrling (watches) is one example of this.
• The brand has a ill thought through pricing or distribution strategy that does not support the positioning of their brand. Example: I have had a few clients that have had these problems. 
• The brand's founder, leader or spokesperson has encountered personal problems that reflect negatively on the brand. Examples: Anita Bryant and Sunkist and President Donald Trump and the Trump brand.

Hopefully, none of these problems seem familiar to you or applicable your brand. If they do, you need to take action before it is too late.

  

Implicit vs. Explicit Purchase Motivations

Whether in qualitative research or quantitative research, people don't always tell the whole truth about what motivates them to purchase or use a particular brand or product. Sometimes this is because they are unaware of their underlying motivations. Sometimes they are aware of their underlying motivations but don't want to say for fear of embarrassment. Sometimes they say what they think they are expected to say or what they believe to be the norm so that they don't feel like an outlier. Sometimes they are trying to be helpful or positive and give the researcher the answer they think the researcher wants to hear. For a number of reasons, explicit answers to direct questions do not always yield the full answer to human motivations.

This is one of the reasons we use projective techniques in qualitative research. We don't ask people "Why do you do it?" but rather "Why they think some other people do it?" taking the focus and pressure off of them and their personal motivations. Have you ever heard a child ask a question for a friend? "My friend wants to know..." Is that question really for his or her friend?

Likewise, in quantitative research, while you can gain some insight from scaled responses to purchase motivators, this should be supplemented with analysis of correlations between the purchase motivator ratings and purchase intent, or better yet, actual purchases. This can only be determined through analytical correlations techniques. 

So when someone says they really like driving a Mercedes-Benz because of various creature comforts and the way it drives, you may find out through projective techniques or correlation analysis that the dominant reason is that driving a Mercedes-Benz gives the person more confidence because it is perceived to confer more social status. 

Make sure in your research that you are probing not only for explicit responses but also for implicit ones. The implicit ones are often the more important of the two. 

Automobile Purchases and Self-Image Reinforcement

Research has shown that at least some people choose specific automobile brands to reinforce their self-image, project a certain social status, and enhance their self-esteem. They also choose them to “fit in” with their chosen social group. Other factors contribute to choice, including constraints such as income and capacity to acquire.1

Think about this. What might each of these brands say about the purchaser’s self-image and intended social group/status:

• Audi
• BMW
• Chevy
• HUMMER
• Jeep
• Mercedes-Benz
• MINI Cooper
• Subaru
• Tesla
• Toyota
• Volvo

1. Source: Liza-Jane Sowden and Martin Grimmer, "Symbolic Consumption and Consumer Identity: An Application of Social Identity Theory to Car Purchase Behavior" (Australian and New Zealand Marketing Academy Conference 2009), http://www.duplication.net.au/ANZMAC09/papers/ANZMAC2009-206.pdf.

Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs

Every marketer would do well to understand Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs. First, people's physiological needs must be met, then their safety and security needs. Next, they need to feel as though they belong somewhere. After they have found their tribe, they seek the respect of others. When they become fully confident about their social status, they refocus their energies on achieving their highest potential, emphasizing ethics, creativity, spontaneity and other higher ideals. 

Most, but not all, brands focus on the top three rungs - love/belonging, esteem and self-actualization. Think of the brands that focus on belonging. Certain beer brands do this. Part of Harley-Davidson's brand position is the "comradeship of kindred spirits." Friends was a television show completely based on the concept of camaraderie. A significant portion of people are focused on achievement and self-esteem. Because of this, many brands primarily confer social status. Consider Mercedes-Benz, Gucci and Salvatore Ferragamo. Others are focused on self-actualization. Patagonia and Newman's Own are examples of this. Some brands straddle different needs. Tesla operates in both the esteem/social status and self-actualization rungs as does Apple. With its fun designs and high price points, Vilebrequin also straddles the esteem and self-actualization rungs. Dove's Real Beauty campaign both promotes self-esteem and an enlightened view of "real beauty," causing it to span the top two rungs of Maslow's Hierarchy. Robert Graham's tagline is "knowledge wisdom truth." This, together with its highly creative designs, places it on the self-actualization rung.

Historically, Volvo focused on a safe ride especially for family members, putting it on the safety and love/belonging rungs. Because of its price point, it was also partially on the esteem rung. With its frequent repositioning over the past decade, its owners have pushed it up more to the esteem rung.

Where does your brand operate on Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs?