5/20/2021 IGN ITOR Student

Marketing
Communications

NOTES
Top
of Mind
(TOMA)

Brand Recognition

Unaware—oi

SouaoE: David A. Aaker, Managing Brand Equity (New York: Free Press. 1991). 62.

m The Brand Awareness Pyramid

the good times that he and his high school friends had when enjoying each .other's company
after school or following football and basketball games. To this day Henry loves McDonald's.
About the only thing he dislikes is the fact that clerks sometimes are poorly trained, ineffi-
cient, and not particularly friendly.
All of these thoughts and feelings represent types of associations in Henry’s memory about
McDonald’s. All of these associations, with the exception of occasional mediocre service and
rude employees, represent favorable links with McDonald’s as far as Henry is concerned.
These associations are held strongly in Henry’s memory. Some of the associations are unique
in comparison to other fast-food chains. Only McDonald’s has golden arches and Ronald
McDonald. No other fast-food chain has, in Henry's mind, fries that taste nearly as good as
McDonald's.
From this illustration and in the context of the specific elements portrayed in Figure 2.1,
we can see that Henry associates McDonald’s with various attributes (e.g., golden arches) and
benefits (e.g., great tasting tries), and that he possesses an overall favorable evaluation, or atti—
tude, toward this brand. These associations for Henry are held strongly and are favorable and
somewhat unique. McDonald's would love to have millions of Henrys in its market, which it
undoubtedly does. To the extent that Henry is typical of other consumers, it can be said that
McDonald's has high brand equity. In contrast to McDonald's, many brands have relatively
little equity. This is because consumers are (1) only faintly aware of these brands or, worse
yet, are completely unaware of them or (2) even if aware, do not hold strong, favorable, and
unique associations about these brands.
Although a brand's image is based on a variety of associations that consumers have de-
veloped over time, brands—just like people—can be thought of as having their own unique
personalities. Research has identified five personality dimensions that describe most brands:
sincerity, excitement, competence, sophistication, and ruggedness.“ That is, brands can be
described as possessing some degree of each of these dimensions, ranging from ”the dimen-
sion doesn't describe the brand at all” to "the dimension captures the brand's essence." For
example, one brand may be regarded as high in sincerity and competence but low in sophisti-
cation, excitement, and ruggedness. Another brand may epitomize sophistication and excite-
ment but be regarded as lacking in all other dimensions. & ! l
Mama! 27

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