Marketing

Capitalizing
Effect on the Underdog
by Anat Keinan, Jill Avery, and Neeru Paharia
From the Magazine (November 2010)

Everyone loves a scrappy underdog. J.K. Rowling created an

appealing underdog character in Harry Potter. In the 2010 World
Cup, teams such as New Zealand and Uruguay, and the two finalists—
Spain and Netherlands—who had never won before, inspired fans
around the world. And both Barack Obama and John McCain
positioned themselves as underdogs in the 2008 U.S. presidential
election.
Brands, too, can profit from this positioning—in fact, stores are
teeming with underdog products. The label of Nantucket Nectars
informs us, for example, that its creators started “with only a blender
and a dream,” and Clif Bar proclaims that its founder once lived in a
garage. Brewery Samuel Adams reminds us how small it is compared
with behemoth Anheuser-Busch—while avoiding mention of how big
it is compared with most craft beer makers.
The biographies of underdog brands share two important narrative
components: a disadvantaged position (they highlight a company’s
humble beginnings and portray it as being “outgunned” by bigger,
better-resourced competitors) and a passion and determination to
triumph against the odds.
What Makes an Underdog

Underdog brands share a common narrative that

highlights the brand’s disadvantaged position, which is
overcome ...

To understand what makes underdog brands powerful, we devised

online and live experiments that looked at how consumers’ self-image
and circumstances affect their reaction to underdog and top-dog
brands. We hypothesized that consumers not only would prefer
underdog brands but would do so because they identified with the
brand’s underdog characteristics. Subjects did in fact show a
preference for the underdogs, most dramatically in a study involving
chocolate. One brand had an underdog story: We described it as small
and new, competing against powerhouses like Lindt and Godiva. The
other brand had a top-dog biography, characterized by experienced
founders and a big marketing budget. The result: 71% of subjects
chose the underdog chocolate.
And the stronger a subject’s own “underdog disposition”—a sense of
struggling in tough circumstances—was, the greater his or her
preference for the underdog brand. That may be why such
biographies appeal strongly to people in traditionally disadvantaged
segments, such as women, blue collar workers, and ethnic minorities.
(This effect held in subjects from both of the cultures we studied—
American and Singaporean—though it was stronger in the former
because, we suspect, the triumph of the underdog is so deeply
embedded in the American Myth.)

The stronger a person’s own sense of

struggling is, the greater the preference
for the underdog brand.

Not every brand can benefit from an underdog story. Some brands—
Rolls-Royce, for instance—derive much of their strength from their
top-dog lineage. Others, such as hospitals, could run into trouble if
consumers perceived their disadvantaged position as negatively
affecting quality or safety. And for brands like Microsoft that can’t
credibly claim underdog status, attempting to employ such a
narrative could backfire badly.
But for brands with a plausible underdog story to tell, the timing is
good for rolling it out. Even as the Great Recession wanes, consumers
continue to feel under siege. Smart underdogs will turn the zeitgeist
to their advantage.
ABusiness
version Review.
of this article appeared in the November 2010 issue of Harvard

AK
Anat Keinan is an associate professor of
marketing at HBS.

JA
Jill Avery is a senior lecturer at Harvard Business
School and a former brand manager at Gillette,
Samuel Adams, and AT&T.

NP
Neeru Paharia is an Assistant Professor of
Marketing at Georgetown University.