Product – Anything that can be offered in a market for

attention, acquisition, use or consumption that might satisfy

a want/ need.

1. Goods
2. Services
3. Ideas
4. Places
5. Persons
6. Organizations
Different Levels of Product

Core Customer
Value

Actual Product

Augmented Product
Different Levels of Product
 Types of Products

Consumer
Industrial goods
Goods

Purchased for further

Bought by final consumer processing/ use in conduct
for personal consumption of business
 Consumer goods classification

Convenience Shopping

Specialty Unsought
 Industrial goods classification

Materials and parts

Supplies/
Capital items
business services
 Product Decisions

• Product Line Decisions

• Product mix Decisions
• Individual Product Decision
Product Line Decisions

What is a Product Line?

A product line
• group of products that are closely related
• function in a similar manner
• sold to the same customer groups
• are marketed through the same types of
outlets, or fall within given price range
1. Product Line Length Too Short

Too Long

Influenced by company resources and

objectives:
1. Upselling
2. Cross selling
3. Protect against economic swings
Expansion of Product Line
• Line Filling
• Line Stretching
Line filling - adding more items within the present range.

 Reach incremental profits.

 Satisfy dealers who complain about lost sales due to
missing items.
 Try to utilize excess capacity.
 Plug holes to keep out competitors.
 Be the leading full line company.
Line stretching - the company lengthens its
product line beyond the current range.

• Down-market stretch
• Up-market stretch
• Both ways
 Product Mix Decisions
Product Mix - The set of all product lines and
items that a particular seller offers for sale.

1. Width
2. Length
3. Depth
4. Consistency
 The set of all product lines and items that a particular seller offers for sale.

Product-Mix Width
Home & Personal Care Foods
Product Line Length
Individual Product Decision
 Product Attributes
Level of
performance

1. Quality Consistency
2. Features
3. Style
4. Design
“Products are created in the factory, but brands
are created in the mind”
 Branding Decisions
Brand - A name, term, sign, symbol, design, or a
combination of these, that identifies the
products or services of one seller or group of
sellers and differentiates them from those of
competitors
Use of a Brand
• Identify products that benefit them
• Say something about product quality and consistency
• The brand name becomes the basis on which a whole
story can be built about a product’s special qualities.
• The seller’s brand name and trademark provide legal
protection for unique product features that otherwise
might be copied by competitors.
 Brand Equity
Brand equity - The differential effect that
knowing the brand name has on customer
response to the product or its marketing.

Positive BE – when consumers react more favorably to it than to a generic or

unbranded version of the same product.
Negative BE- if consumers react less favorably than to an unbranded version.
Brand Strength is measures along these four
consumer perceptions dimensions:-
1. Differentiation
2. Relevance
3. Knowledge
4. Esteem
Brand Valuation - Process of estimating the total financial
value of a brand.

Competitive Advantages of High BV

• Enjoys a high level of consumer brand awareness and
loyalty.
• Company has more leverage in bargaining with
resellers.
• The company can more easily launch line and brand
extensions.
• defense against fierce price competition.
Branding Decisions
 Brand Positioning
3 levels of positioning
- Attributes
- Benefits
- Beliefs and Values
 Brand Name Selection
Desirable Qualities:
• Suggest something about the product’s benefits and
qualities.
• Easy to pronounce, recognize, and remember: Tide,
Google, iPhone.
• Distinctive
• Extendable
• Translate easily into foreign languages.
• It should be capable of registration and legal
protection. A brand name cannot be registered if it
infringes on existing brand names.
Think of Brand names that have become generic
names.
 Brand Sponsorship
• National Brand ( Manufacturer’s Brand)
• Private Brand (Store Brand/ Distributors
Brand)
• Licensed Brands
• Co-Branding
 Brand Development
1. Line Extension
2. Brand Extension
3. Multi brands
4. New Brand
1. Line extension –
Company extends existing brand names to new forms, colors, sizes,
ingredients, or flavors of an existing product category.
Need -
• A low-cost, low-risk way to introduce new products
• It might want to meet consumer desires for variety, use excess
capacity, or simply command more shelf space from resellers.
Risks -
• An overextended brand name might lose some of its specific
meaning.
• Heavily extended brands can cause consumer confusion or
frustration.
• Sales of an extension may come at the expense of other items in
the line.
2. Brand Extension
Extends a current brand name to new or modified products in a new
category.
Need
• A brand extension gives a new product instant recognition and
faster acceptance.
• Saves the high advertising costs usually required to build a new
brand name.
Risks
• The extension may confuse the image of the main brand.
• If a brand extension fails, it may harm consumer attitudes toward
other products carrying the same brand name.
• Further more, a brand name may not be appropriate to a particular
new product even it is well made and satisfying.
Multi-brands. Companies often market many different brands in a given product category.

Need:-

• Offers a way to establish different features that appeal to different customer segments

• lock up more reseller shelf space

• capture a larger market share

Risks

• A major drawback of multibranding is that each brand might obtain only a small market

share, and none may be very profitable.

• The company may end up spreading its resources over many brands instead of building a few

brands to a highly profitable level. These companies should reduce the number of brands

they sell in a given category and set up tighter screening procedures for new brands.
New Brand :-

A company might believe that the power of its existing brand name is waning, so a new brand
name is needed.

Or it may create a new brand name when it enters a new product category for which none of its
current brand names are appropriate. For example, Toyota created the separate Scion brand,
targeted toward millennial consumers.

Risks

• As with multi-branding, offering too many new brands can result in a company spreading its
resources too thin.

• In some industries, such as consumer packaged goods, consumers and retailers have become
concerned that there are already too many brands, with too few differences between them.
 Packaging
Designing and producing container or wrapper
for a product.
Traditional Function – Hold and Protect
In recent times???
 Tool to catch customer attention
Focus- innovative Packaging!

Poorly designed packages cause customer

headaches
- Hurt customers
- Over packaging (what’s the problem?)
 Labeling and Logos
Ranges from simple tags to complex graphics

Functions??
1. Identification
2. Description
3. Promotion

Add personality to brand

Become important element in brand-customer
connection
Logos need to be redesigned from time to time
Examples ??
Problems associated with changing labels?
 Product Support Service
Customer Service important part of product
strategy.
Why keeping customers happy after sales is
important??

Medium can be phone, email, online, social

media, mobile etc