Brand Identity Prism

(Kapferer)
KAPFERER represents brand identity diagrammatically as
a six-sided prism as shown below:
Constructed Source/Sender

E I
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Constructed Receiver
• Physique according to him is the basis of the brand.
– E.G. the physique of Philips is “technology and reliability” while for the
brand Tata it is “trust”

• Personality is same as Aaker, it answers the question “what

happens to this brand when it becomes a person?”

• Culture symbolizes the organization, its country-of-origin and the

values it stands for.
– E.G. traditional brands like balsara, dabur and zandu.
• Relationship is the handshake between consumer and the
organisation.
– E.G. the relationship with “safola” is safety.

• Reflection is the consumer’s perception for what the brands stands

for.
– E.G. coke’s image more attract youth.

• Self-image is what the consumer think of himself.

– E.G. benz Car owner think that since he has bought the car he is
treating himself to one of the best car in the world.
Let us understand the model in detail…
What is a Brand???

“ A Brand is a complex symbol. It is the intangible sum of a product’s

attributes, its name, packaging and price, its history, reputation, and
the way it’s advertised. A brand is also defined by consumer’s
impression of people who use it, as well as their own experience ”

- David Ogilvy
Now let us look at how Brand Experience is differentiated…
Brand Experience are of Two types

Brand Experience

External Internal
The External Brand Experience include

• Name
• Logo
• Advertising
• Brand Identity
• Environments
• Products & Service
The Internal Brand Experience include

• Business Process
• Customer Relations
• Brand Values
• Training
• Quality
• Staff Motivation
• Recruitment Policies
• Technology etc..
Now let us look at the Brand Identity Prism based on Kapferer model
and the 6 key dimensions in it
-Name -Logo -Business Process -Customer Relations
-Advertising -Brand Identity -Brand Values -Training
-Environments -Products & Service -Quality -Staff Motivation
-Recruitment Policies -Technology etc..
Constructed Source

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Constructed Receiver
• Physical
– Product features, symbols & attributes

• Personality
– Character & attitude

• Relationship
– Beliefs & association

• Culture
– Set of Values

• Reflection
– Customer’s view of the brand

• Self-Image
– Internal mirror of customer as user of brand
Let us now understand the prism with some examples…
For Sify India let us look at how they have built the brand basis the
Kapferer Model
Sify India
• Physical
– Kite Symbol, Online Access

• Personality
– Innovative & Tech savvy

• Culture
– Customer centric & Indian

• Self -image
– "net" way of life empowered

• Reflection
– Consistent & dependable performer

• Relationship
– Best guide to the net
Let us now understand the prism in more detail with a case study…
Adidas
 Case Study – Adidas (1)
The company Adidas was founded in the early 1920s as Gebruder Dassler Schuhfabrik, in
Herzogenaurach in Germany. Adolf Dassler designed a pair of sport shoes in 1925 and few years later
he and his brother Rudolph were selling special shoes for tennis players and began design specific
shoes for different sports. The family company split in 1948. After the split, Adolf (Adi) Dassler founded
Adidas and his brother Rudolph founded Puma. The three-stripe logo was designed in 1941 by Adi
Dassler and he registered it as a trademark for Adidas after the split.

The strength of Adidas was its product innovation. Adi Dassler registered more than seven hundred
patents. Adidas began selling its shoes in the United States after 1968 and in few years the company
dominated the American market. The most important marketing breakthrough was the active promotion
of global sporting events, especially the Olympics. The connection of Adidas to the Olympics has a rich
heritage. At the 1972 Olympic game in Munich, every official wore Adidas.

Activities: manufacture and distribution of textiles, shoes and appliances for sport and related products.
Adidas has 107 subsidiaries in 20 countries, and exports to 160 countries. Exploitation of the registered
trademark “Adidas” is made where ever it is an opportunity. Activities of the company and its
subsidiaries are directed from Adidas-Salomon AG's headquarters in Herzogenaurach, Germany.

Products: Adidas - Footwear, apparel, and hardware such as bags and balls. Salomon - Winter sports
incl. skis, snowboards, snowblades, ski boots and bindings, inline skates, hiking, apparel. Mavic –Cycle
components, Bonfire – Snowboard apparel. Arc'Teryx - Outdoor apparel, climbing equipment, Cliché –
Skateboard equipment, footwear and apparel, Taylor Made-Adidas Golf - Golf equipment, golf apparel,
golf shoes and finally, Maxfli - Golf balls, irons and accessories
 Case Study – Adidas (2)
In the early 1980s Adidas has sales of $1 billion, and their brand-building model began to lose power.
In America, the largest sports market, Nike had built a successful business in part of riding the
explosive growth of running and jogging among casual users. Adidas focused mainly on athletes in
team sports so they did not participate in the boom of the 1980s. Mostly therefore Adidas was
overtaken by Nike at that time.

In 1990, Adidas was holding on to just a two to three percent share of the U.S. market. Between 1988
and 1992 Adidas total sales dropped from nearly $2 billion to $1.7 billion. In the same period, Nike’s
sales went from $1.2 billion to more than $3.4 billion. From being the U.S. market leader in the late
1970s, Adidas’s market share dropped to 3 percent in 1992. The European market shares dropped
while Nike’s shares grew.

Adidas also have had problems with the upstream value activities in their value chain. Traditionally, the
company have their own factories and wholly owned subsidiaries. What happened in the '70s and
forward, during the Adidas recession, was that Adidas was unable to ship products when it was
needed, and they had a long supply chain - it took 18 months to get a new shoe into the market. This
time is now reduced by 50%. Methods used are e.g. reducing transporting times trough bypassing
warehouses and deliver directly to retailers. Today Adidas aims to have new products closer to the
market.

In 1997Adidas AG acquired the Salomon Group with the brands Salomon, Taylor Made, Mavic and
Bonfire. The new company is named Adidas-Salomon AG.
 Research Problem
How have Adidas used the instrument branding, and which roll did it play in the
competition between Adidas and Nike?

• The strategies of Adidas were based on advertising, sponsorship programs for team end events
and sub-brands
• Among the similarities between the campaigns for Adidas and Nike we can see their strategies to
advertise in a huge scale
• One difference is that Adidas Endorsement program is focusing on major global events, sports
associations, and teams, and Nike, in contrast, focuses on individual athletes and their success
• While Nike have Nike Town shops in the bigger cities in the world, Adidas have created “The
Adidas Streetball Challenge” which started out in Germany 1992 and five years later it had over
500.000 participants
• In the finals in Germany it attracted 3200 players and 40.000 spectators
• Both Nike and Adidas began their turnarounds by developing a brand identity
• In each case, this exercise led to a focusing of the brand and initiatives that built the brand in new
directions
Now let us do a Comparative analysis through Kapferer’s Prism model
 Two aspects of Brand Identity

Sender Receiver

Physique Personality Reflection Self-Image

Kapferer means
what the central
purpose of the brand
is (that is what the
brand does)
Kapferer means the Kapferer means how
soul of the brand the individual in the
targeted group
identify himself as a
person in relation to
the brand
Kapferer means how
the individual in the
targeted group
identify the brand in
relation to himself

Two dimensions are still left to be explained in the prism, the Relationship and the
Culture
The Relationship is, according to Kapferer, externalizing the brand from the
company outwards, and the culture is an aid for internalizing the brand in the
organization and in to the conscious of the customer

The Culture is, according to Kapferer, the strongest dimension in the prism. It
represents the difference between one brand and another

Now let us look at the prism of Adidas and Nike

 Adidas

Picture of Sender

Physique Personality
Sports and fitness Traditional, conservative,
collective
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a Relationship Culture a
l Quality and heritage European, Traditional l
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Reflection Self Image
True sportsmanship, A Relates more to competing
good team player, Strong than to winning
work ethic

Picture of Receiver
 Nike

Picture of Sender

Physique Personality
Sports and fitness Like Jordan, Woods…

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a Relationship Culture a
l Sponsorship, ethics American, Just do it! l
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Reflection Self Image
Aggressive, provocation, Cool, I am an athlete
in- your face

Picture of Receiver
 Adidas Nike

Picture of Sender Picture of Sender

Physique Personality Physique Personality

E Sports and fitness Traditional, I Sports and fitness Like Jordan,
E I
x conservative, n Woods…
x n
t collective t t t
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a Relationship a a Relationship
Culture Culture a
l Quality and l l Sponsorship,
i heritage
European,
i ethics American, Just do l
Traditional i i
z z it!
z z
a a a a
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i i i i
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Reflection Reflection o
n Self Image n n Self Image
True sportsmanship, A good Aggressive, provocation, in- n
Relates more to competing than Cool, I am an
team player, Strong work ethic to winning your face athlete

Picture of Receiver Picture of Receiver

Comparative Analysis
 Comparative Analysis (1)
• Nike centred their brand equity model on the platforms, the endorsement focus strategy, creating a
dominant media presence, development of Flagship stores, Nike Town and sub-branding
• The Adidas strategies were based on, endorsement focus strategy, advertising, sponsorship
programs focusing on major global events, sports associations, and teams, and sub-brands
• To create brand awareness both companies have been using endorsement strategies in their brand-
building programs
• What differs is that Adidas focuses on sponsorship of teams and events e.g. national teams and big
sport events like the Olympic Games and different World Championship events. This will help them to
create awareness with help from different types of media
• In contrast Nike has their focus on individuals like M. Jordan and T. Woods and their success stories
• About the second strategy, advertising… Nike’s advertising strategy was to create dominant presence
in media. Nike created media presence in several trend setting United States cities. TV ads linking
Nike to a city were used, but real drivers were huge oversized billboards and murals on buildings that
blanketed cities with messages featuring key Nike-sponsored athletes, not products
• Adidas took up the competition with Nike through raising their advertising budget to a level that made
it possible to compete with Nike on the same conditions and the same strength as Nike did to capture
the consumer interest
• Adidas did not just spend more money; they made an impact with brilliant executions. They
made TV and other advertising campaigns. The company communicate their heritage of innovation,
technology and big success stories with personalities like Emil Zatopek, Mohammad Ali
• Adidas tried to spread meanings like “We know then- we know now” and “There is nothing between
you and success, so exceed your own expectations and limitations” and “ Earn it”
• The success was obvious and after hard work and striving toward a top position in the industry Adidas
was back in business.
 Comparative Analysis (2)
• Nike’s third strategy was to develop, flag ship stores, Nike Town shops in bigger city’s, first
national, and then abroad
• Nike was the first company to establish flagship stores and it turned out to be a sensation
• Adidas choice was to experiment with sport events, with which they made great success.
Examples of that is the Adidas Streetball Challenge a local three-person team basketball
tournament, this event started out as a trail in Berlin in the beginning of the 1990s as one time
occasion
• In the mid 1990s it had become a huge sport event with about 500.000 participants all over the
bigger cities in Europe
• In the finals in Germany it attracted 3200 players and 40.000 spectators
• Adidas made hereby a brand-building success
• The Nike customer associated the Nike brand with words like sports, attitudes and life style.
Reasons for that is one can relate to or identify one self to Nike’s marketing campaigns like “Just
do it” and the companies front athletes like Michael Jordan and Tiger Woods. For Adidas one
image study of consumers found the brand very trendy, modern and cool
• The survey was made in late 1990s. All marketing actions that both companies are implementing
will hopefully result in loyal customers
• Adidas introduced a sub-brand in 1990 to serve the high-end products for all categories of shoes
and apparel. The “Equipment” sub-brand would represent the best, whatever the product was
• The low-end products, for the “normal consumer” still have a high technology and level of
innovation because of their inheritance of the older innovations and technology from the
Equipment line
• This strategy made the Adidas brand take on a different meaning; it still meant participation,
emotion and performance
 Comparative Analysis (3)
• This was a success strategy for Adidas so successful that Nike copied their idea and introduced
their own line, the Alpha line, based on the same idea
• Nike advanced from $1 billion dollars in 1986 to $ 9.9 billion in 2002, Adidas advanced from $1.7
billion in 1992 to $4.8 billion in 1998
• According to sales figures for the both companies, it seems that both Nike and Adidas companies
have succeeded to create a brand loyal customer who perceives the Nike and Adidas products as
top quality
 Conclusion (1)
• Both Adidas and Nike have used the same theoretical systems to create their brand building programs
• The companies are benchmarking each other, using the techniques from each others successes,
when Nike launched their sub-brand product Alpha line which was benchmarked on Adidas already
launched sub-brand of the Equipment product line for the elite of sports men
• We can find many similarities like endorsements strategies and the companies advertising strategies
but what differs in the endorsement strategies is that Adidas focuses in sponsoring teams and global
events, while Nike have their center of attention on stars in specific sport like basketball and Michael
Jordan or in golf and Tiger Woods
• About advertising both companies have about the same scale and scope of advertising but they try
to communicate different messages
• The messages from Adidas is; the only one you compete with is your self whereas Nike communicate
a provocative, aggressive winner attitude which can be related to the American sports attitude “You
don’t win silver, you lose gold”
• As we can understand the two companies are aiming at nearly the same targeted customer group but
with a slightly differentiation of attitude
• Adidas stand for a competing and winning over your self-attitude, and Nike stands for a winning over
everyone attitude
• The differentiation is based on the differences in culture between the two companies and between
Europe and USA
• As an overall reflection one can see that Adidas had to overcome, that the both companies had the
same target group. Adidas choose a brand-building strategy that built on the same theoretical
criteria’s as Nike. But they created a differentiation in identity of the brand (as seen comparing
analysis in the Kapferer Prism Model above) compared to Nike
 Conclusion (2)
• Adidas had the same strategy within creating equity value to their brand
• They challenged Nike in endorsement strategy, and in advertising, but with a slight difference in
communicated message, by doing it trough the same medias. To differentiate them self and make
totally own awareness activities, events like Adidas Streetball Challenge was created. Events like
those communicated the Adidas brand around the world
• According to the results and positions the brand-building programs have given both Adidas and
Nike in the sport industry, one can say that branding have been a totally determining factor. On
top of that they made it so good that they are used as models in higher education.