Introduction to Branding

Welcome to this session on "Introduction to Branding". In the last session, you

learnt about the concept of 4Ps which are Product, Price, Place and Promotion.
This means that you need to choose the four marketing mix elements in such a way
that they together send a consistent, powerful message to consumers about a
brand’s value proposition, ensuring that it builds a strong brand and is
commercially successful in the long run.

In this session

In this session, you will get a basic introduction to branding. The power of
branding can not be underestimated in today’s over-competitive world. In this
session, you will get an insight into the pillars of building a brand, as well as the
use of the 4Ps in building a brand.

The broad agenda of this session is:

1. Introduction to branding and its importance

2. The two pillars of branding

3. The concept of brand equity

Branding and Its Importance

For most of you, when asked to recommend a high-tech mobile phone, Apple’s
iPhone would be the most probable answer. Similarly, if granted a wish to buy a
high-end car, you will buy Audi or BMW or Mercedes for instance.

Brands are all around us, in every aspect of our lives. Throughout the last decade,
many organisations have tried to define the term "brand" in its most
distinct manner. One of them is the American Marketing Association, which
defines a brand as “a name, term, sign, symbol or design, intended to identify the
goods and services of one seller, or group of sellers, and to differentiate them from
those of competition.” Let’s get into understanding the importance of branding in
the session ahead.

In this video, you learnt how brands drive the choices of consumers. By winning
the trust of consumers in its products, a brand provides security to customers that
can help stay ahead of the competition in the long-run.

The first step for a company is to successfully influence the minds of consumers.

That is how consumers start associating themselves with a brand. You think of
toothpaste and Colgate comes to your mind. You talk about coffee and Nescafe
pops up in our minds. This is the power of branding.

In the next segment, let's learn how to go about building a brand.

How to Build a Brand

A memorable brand can reinforce a company’s edge over its competitors and can
help in encouraging customer loyalty. In order to achieve this, there are two layers
that marketing managers can influence: Brand Awareness and Brand Image. Using
the 4Ps of the marketing mix in the most efficient manner can help the brand create
this very image and awareness.

In this video, you learnt the two basic blocks of building a brand as well as how a
brand uses 4Ps to create a strong image in the market. Let's look at some more
examples of brand awareness and brand image.

Remember the 4Ps of Starbucks that you saw in the last session?  Well, as it turns
out, these 4Ps comprehensively give Starbucks a brand image of a premium brand
that is extremely customer-centric and at the forefront of innovation. Let's see how.

Starbucks Brand Building using 4Ps

Product

Starbucks entered India with Tata Global Beverages and tied up with the century-
old Tata Group. You learnt about the 4 P's that built that brand, the first being the
product. If you walk into a Starbucks and look at the menu, it's filled with so many
different options. Of course, you have the cappuccinos of the world, and you have
all the frappés too, but there is always something new that comes up every season.

For example, just last Diwali it launched a product that was focused on the Indian
consumer looking for dry fruits in his/her drinks. It focused on drinks that had
almonds as a part of their coffee drinking experience. Therefore, it always
innovates when it comes to their menu. But that’s not all. Starbucks also goes
beyond the food and drinks present in the store.
 

When you walk into Starbucks, that itself is a product worth experiencing. When
you go in, you listen to the music that's playing, you look at the baristas and the
way they present themselves. You notice how well trained the staff is when you
ask them a query. You notice how they replace a cup of coffee if it is not made to
your taste. You notice how they have intelligently personalised the experience. As
soon as you have placed your order, the next thing they ask you is, “What’s your
name?”, and they then write your name on your Starbucks Coffee cup. So, you feel
that they have prepared a customised drink just for you. Thus, the product not only
goes beyond what is being sold but also in how it is being served.
 
Next, let’s look at the product experience at Starbucks. In the U.S., it allows you to
mix and match recipes. For example, let's say you're someone who likes to
experiment with your drink. Imagine you get a Cappuccino and you want to add
some whipped cream on top of it. This is not something that’s common. So,
usually when you have a frappe you can put whipped cream on top, but here you
can do that on a Cappuccino too. In the same way, you can order a frappuccino and
add black lemonade to it. Starbucks is so customer-centric as a brand that a lot of
these experiments done either by their customers or baristas are added to the menu
if the customer starts liking it. That's how it has built a customer-centric brand.
 
Price
Let’s look at how Starbucks products are priced. The moment you walk into a
Starbucks and order a drink and a food item, your bill is approximately going to be
500 bucks. This is higher than any other coffee shop you might go to. If you go to
a Café Coffee Day or a McCafé, your bill is going to be lower than that. Therefore,
the pricing strategy of Starbucks is focused more on customer experience. 
 
That doesn’t mean that the quality of its items is inferior. It claims to use some of
the best ingredients available in the market. It sources its coffee beans from
premium coffee gardens across the world. In addition to this, it is also known to
provide you with different options in terms of size. So, you are more likely to find
the largest quantity of drink available at a Starbucks vis-a-vis a Café Coffee Day or
a Barista. Starbucks has a lot of different options. It also has an option called the
Venti, which is an extremely large cup of coffee that you can order. This is
generally not available at other coffee shops.  
 
Place 
Starbucks leveraged Tata’s distribution network and created a strategy to enter
India. Tata has a widespread reach. It already has an existing distribution network,
and moreover, it has a good reputation; this gives it an edge over its competitors.
When Starbucks tied up with Tata, it took advantage of this. 
 
So, to give you a simple example, if you were to open a store in India as an
international brand, there are many different approvals that you need to go through.
There are also many different bureaucratic processes that you need to go through.
This entire process was expedited by Tata and the partnership it had with
Starbucks. 
 
In addition to this, Starbucks was also able to have a fair understanding of the
market because of the tie-up with Tata. Thus, it exclusively launched its stores in
premium locations. For example, the international airport that you last went to is
more likely to have a Starbucks alongside a Café Coffee Day. However, Starbucks
essentially caters to international travellers and people who are well-travelled.
Later on,  it also rolled out stores in high-density areas. For example, commercial
areas or popular areas like Bandra in Mumbai or Cyber Hub in Gurgaon, where
customers who walk-in are consumers who can afford the premium experience of a
Starbucks.

Promotion
So now, let's look at the promotional strategy of Starbucks. Starbucks is not a very
mass appeal brand. So, TV commercials would not make any sense for them.
Therefore, it leveraged social media to a large extent to communicate with their
consumers, whether it is existing or new consumers. Every time a new seasonal
drink is launched, let's say the Pumpkin Spice Latte, you will see an update on its
Facebook page regarding it if you have liked their Facebook page. In addition to
this,  it constantly keeps sending emails to consumers who are loyalty cardholders
of Starbucks. 
 
Starbucks has a loyalty program where there are different levels or different tiers,
like a frequent flyer card or other promotion or rewards card you might get in a
retail store like Shopper’s Stop. In the same way, Starbucks has its own card. This
card, until 6 months back, was in the form of a physical card. So, you could carry
that card in your wallet and every time you walk into a Starbucks, you could
purchase a coffee using that card. You can do this by filling up the card with
money and in exchange earn points for every purchase. You will get promoted to
different levels based on your points. As and when you get promoted to different
levels, your status is upgraded and you get free drinks, free customizations and free
size upgrades. This makes a customer feel like he/she is being taken care of.
Additionally, it makes him/her feel like going back again and again since the more
you purchase, the more rewards you get. 
 
Now, this physical process has been turned into an app in India. As you all know,
Jio has come up with mobile-first customers in India. Keeping this in mind,
Starbucks realised that they need to go the app way to promote their program. This
makes it easy for a consumer to sign up for Starbucks’ loyalty program using the
app itself. Right now, if you go into a Starbucks and you are a loyalty member, you
don't need a physical card. You can directly use your app instead. That's how
Starbucks leveraged promotion in a big way and got repeat customers to come
back to its outlets.

Q: Building a Brand
Suppose you are a new e-commerce site in the market, by the name “giftease.com”,
selling personalised gifts. Now, your immediate objective is to increase brand
awareness and build your brand image.

Products involve mugs, photo frames, pillow covers and greeting cards with a
bouquet. Services involve free shipping, fixed date delivery, gift via email and
personalised gift wrapping. You have social media presence through Facebook and
have 24x7 customer care service.

Suggest ways you plan to use these 4Ps in terms of meeting your objective of
positioning it as the most trusted one-stop solution for all gifting needs for urban
individuals aged 16-25. (Word limit: 200)

A: To build a brand image using the product, you can use ensure high-quality prints, personalised gift
wrapping. You can also use a catchy name for the e-commerce site, a name that sticks with the
consumer. As service, you can offer fixed date delivery to build an image of promise and consistent
delivery for your customers. This will help build strong and positive associations. To build a brand
image using price, you can offer free shipping, a low price for gift wrapping to build a brand image of
a being a customer-centric brand that always takes care of their gifting needs. With reference to the
place strategy, you can make the website very user-friendly so that the consumers have a
convenient purchase journey. You can also think of having a mobile based presence as many
consumers use apps these days to place their orders. This would further enhance the brand image of
being a customer-centric brand. With reference to the promotion strategy, you can use Facebook to
increase the brand awareness and offer various discounts on festivals and special occasions like
Valentine's, Mother's and Father's day. You can also promote fixed date delivery and gift via email.
 Introduction to Brand
Equity
Every year, Forbes comes up with a list of the world's most valuable brands. For
example, look at brands like Apple and Google. Have you ever wondered what
makes these brands the most valuable? You saw previously that brand image and
brand awareness are the two pillars of any brand. But to build a truly valuable
brand, your brand needs to have more than just a brand image and brand
awareness. This is where the concept of brand equity comes in. Let's learn more
about this. 

In the above video, you looked at the qualitative aspect of brand equity which
essentially comprises of 5 main elements:

1. Brand awareness: This is the first step for any brand to build its brand equity. A high level

of brand awareness is when the target audience can recall a brand's name when the product

category is mentioned. Therefore, as a marketer, you need to aim for a high brand awareness

since that increases brand recall and makes it more visible to its target audience.  

2. Brand association: This describes the kind of association or the attributes of the brand the

consumers associate with it. As a marketer, you need to think that what kind of association or

memories do you want your consumers to associate with your brand. 

3. Perceived quality: This is the customer's perception of the overall quality of the brand. As a

marketer, you need to a create a high perceived quality of your brand so that consumers

ultimately start to have a high brand association. 

4. Brand loyalty: A high brand loyalty means that the customers are making repeat purchases

of a specific brand amongst a set of alternatives. The repeat purchases not only add to the

sales but also a sense of trust amongst the customers. Therefore, as a marketer, you need to
 aim for repeat purchases as this increases brand loyalty. You can achieve this basis your

product quality and perception.     

5.  Brand proprietary assets: This includes a brand's assets like patents, trademarks that give a

brand a competitive advantage over its competitors. Therefore, as a marketer, your brand

should come up with such proprietary assets that help you differentiate from your

competitors.  

Let's look at another example to understand this better.

Brand Equity: Patanjali Example

Brand Awareness
Patanjali was an underdog brand initially and is now dominating the FMCG sector.
It has given established brands like HUL a run for its money. But how did this
happen? One of the biggest factors is that Baba Ramdev is the promoter of the
company. In fact, while Patanjali as a brand was being built, all the TVCs and ads
featured Baba Ramdev. Baba Ramdev already has a magnetic audience around
him, and therefore, every time he shows up in an ad or commercial, he adds
credibility and builds brand awareness for Patanjali. This is one of the key ways in
which Patanjali built its brand awareness.

Brand Association
Patanjali has associated itself with natural and Ayurvedic ingredients. That's one of
the key reasons why the product sells so well. Another strategy it has adopted is to
call itself the forerunner in the Swadeshi Movement. This helps it associate itself
with a home-grown brand. It shows factories that locally produce and manufacture
its products in its ads. Baba Ramdev comes up there as well and talks about how
the multinational companies are taking away jobs and money out of the economy.
Thus, it associates itself as a Swadeshi brand that is not just natural, but also adds
value to the economy and helps India progress.

Perceived Quality
Perceived quality is another important aspect of the brand equity model. Patanjali
has created a fantastic perceived quality in the market for itself. Since it’s made of
natural ingredients, there is this sense and notion amongst consumers that it is
healthier in comparison to products from other FMCG companies that may have
harmful chemicals in them. In addition to this, it is also priced lower. This gives
the perception that it has been created and manufactured locally, and therefore the
pricing is lower. Additionally, the perception is that the appeal of this product is
with consumers in  tier-2 and tier-3 cities and mass consumers of India; and not
necessarily the metros. Therefore, because of this perceived quality, Patanjali has
been able to dominate this market. It is also growing more in terms of the market
share that it holds in the FMCG space.

Brand Loyalty
The brand loyalty for Patanjali stems from the fact that it has been an embodiment
of Baba Ramdev and his principles. Whether you talk about nutrition, yoga, health,
and fitness, or the fact that it is a home-grown company, these are attributes that
any Indian can relate to. Additionally, the spirit of nationalism is also there, and a
lot of people love the idea of buying something from a company which is home
grown and adds to the national economy. Thus, the brand loyalty is extremely high
when it comes to Patanjali. Additionally, there are other factors such as price,
quality, and taste which has made Patanjali get a loyal brand following.

Brand Proprietary Assets

The Brand Proprietary Assets for Patanjali are closely associated with Baba
Ramdev himself. Baba Ramdev as a personal brand has created and played a very
pivotal role in building Patanjali to what it is today. There is no other FMCG brand
in India which has an unpaid mascot who goes about preaching spirituality or
philosophy which is relatable to the consumer. Baba Ramdev is himself the
differentiator for the brand. You could also say it’s a huge personal branding
campaign, which continually helps Patanjali dominate and differentiate itself in the
market.
 
So, one of the key reasons why Baba Ramdev is considered a proprietary asset of
Patanjali is how he acts as a competitive edge vis-à-vis all the other brands. No
other brand has a spokesperson or brand ambassador with such a wide following
like Baba Ramdev. Therefore, when a user learns about spirituality or yoga from
Ramdev, he/she automatically feels that Patanjali is the right product for them.
And therefore, this is a huge competitive edge that Patanjali has over other FMCG
companies.

Additional Example - Mini

Cooper
Brand awareness and brand image example - Mini Cooper
Brand building using 4Ps example  - Mini Cooper

In the videos shown above, you understood brand awareness, brand image and
building a brand using 4 Ps through the lens of the English automotive brand Mini
Cooper.

Models of Branding
To build a brand and increase its perceived value in consumers’ minds, you need to
influence them effectively. This can be done through three models of branding.
Most brands utilise these three models to promote themselves and gain loyal
customers.

There are three models of branding. These are the different ways in which you can
promote your brand and influence your customers. You can connect with them
emotionally, you can promote your brand by stating its functional features, or you
could just build a culture associated with your brand. Now let us learn each of
these models, and how they were utilised by companies.

There are three primary models of branding - the rational model, the emotional
model, and the cultural approach. Let’s discuss each one of them. 

Rational Branding

The rational model talks about branding on the basis of product

attributes/functions. 
Here, you establish the superiority of your product/service over other competitors
by highlighting the difference in product performance and additional features. 

For example, consider the most loved instant noodles brand Maggi. The campaign
to promote Maggi started in the 1980s. The tagline for this campaign was “Fast to
cook, good to eat”. Their advertisement featured a mother cooking Maggi for her
children. This ad emphasises the fact that it takes just 2 minutes to cook Maggi. It
focuses on the taste coupled with the time taken to cook. It was talking about
Maggi's main features, that is the taste and the time taken to cook. Maggi used pure
rational branding in its initial campaigns. Maggi is the easiest breakfast for a
mother like Pooja to make for her children whenever she’s getting late for work.
She loves that it just takes two minutes and her children love Maggi.

Another such example is the Surf LalitaJi ad. This ad also follows the rational
model of branding. It focuses on the functional benefits of how ½ kg of surf is
equivalent to 1 kg of other detergents and also emphasises on another benefit of
how Surf-cleaned clothes are the whitest. Now housewives like Pooja prefers using
Surf to any other detergent in the market. That’s how much this ad has influenced
all mothers.

But sometimes just explaining the rational benefits to your customers might create
only a short-term impact and not help in the long run. If your customers find
another brand with better offerings, they might shift to using that product. So it
becomes essential to engage with the customers beyond the functional benefits. 
 

Emotional Branding

This is where the second model of branding — emotional branding — comes into
play. Along with offering good functional benefits to customers, a brand also needs
to connect with its potential customers on an emotional level. This increases the
brand loyalty amongst the customers. This is called emotional branding.

We considered the Maggi example in rational branding. But then soon there were
many other instant noodles brands to compete with Maggi. It had to brand itself in
other ways apart from just its functional characteristics to stand out. 

This is where emotional branding comes into the picture. Maggi released another
campaign in 2015. This ad builds on how Maggi can be used as a “Khushiyon Ki
recipe”. The tagline also included the hashtag moms-Maggi.

Pooja’s family makes Maggi whenever they want to eat something special. The
momsmaggi hashtag attracted many more mothers like Pooja. 

Using these campaigns, Maggi wanted to connect with its customers on an

emotional level. Customers could instantly relate to it and Maggi succeeded with
its emotional branding strategy. 

 
Likewise, every brand needs to change its branding strategy from time to time to
stay on top of its customer’s list. If it fails to keep updating its branding strategies,
it will fail to catch up with its competitors. 

If you take the case of Surf, apart from promoting its excellent cleaning capability,
it started to promote itself using the campaign “Daag achhe hai”. It encouraged
people to do good and be good even if it meant getting their clothes dirty. 

Ads like these gained an emotional connect with the people watching them.
Emotional branding is sometimes used even when there is no rational reason to buy
the product. Getting an emotional appeal to your brand is thus necessary and
impactful. 

Again, sometimes, only using the functional and emotional models to brand might
not suffice.

Cultural Branding

Then, there is a third approach to branding that relies on building a deep cultural
meaning that provides its customers with an identity. This is called cultural
branding. Such branding can be achieved by connecting thought leaders or
intellectual revolutionaries to the brand, who symbolise staying ahead of the curve.
In the first module, you learnt how culture can act as an influencer on the consumer
behaviour. Now let’s see how you can brand your products culturally to influence
the consumers. 

 
Branding of this form requires companies to position themselves as agents of
change, disrupting society in a positive way for social wellness, breaking the
mould, stepping outside the comfort zone of conformity, etc. The cultural branding
aspect makes customers see brands as icons. It creates a sense of community within
its consumers and enables a brand to provide an experience to its consumers that is
supported by the entire brand infrastructure and ecosystem. 

One great example of cultural branding is the Bajaj V. Released in 2016, this bike
grabbed the nation’s attention. So what extra branding did it do? Bajaj V was a
bike made from the metal of INS Vikrant, India's first aircraft carrier that played a
stellar role in the India - Pakistan war. It created a sense of patriotism amongst the
consumers. Bajaj came up with a marketing communication that urged Indians to
own a part of India’s history and feel proud every day. They branded the bike
among the audience such that it invoked national pride in Indian citizens. The ad
became more relevant in today’s context as well due to the high sense of
nationalism amongst today’s youth considering the emergence of India as a
powerful economic and political power. Seeing this ad, many people were
influenced and became a proud owner of the Bajaj V. It gave people a feeling of
being an Indian culturally. Once the marketing campaign went viral, consumers
started purchasing without a second thought because they found the story behind
the product compelling. The owners felt as if they were riding on the feeling of
pride. 

Another brand that shot to fame in a short period because of cultural branding is
the Patanjali Ayurveda. Consumers made an instant connection with this brand as
it is tied strongly to the Indian way of living and the Indian culture.
 

Baba Ramdev, the brand ambassador of Patanjali has a strong follower base in the
country. They leveraged this to build a culture around Patanjali. All his followers
are loyal customers of his brand. If you look at Pooja’s household items, they are
mostly Patanjali products as they connect with this brand and its Indian culture of
organic and herbal products. 

Patanjali leveraged this cultural aspect to build themselves as a brand and have
been quite successful.

The other company that used cultural branding is Nike, it has built up its brand by
associating itself with various inspirational athletes over time, and also by
supporting the ideas of women empowerment.

In one of its campaigns, called Da Da Ding, Nike focuses on inspiring the young
women to be unstoppable by playing a sport and tried to invoke it as a part of the
culture amongst Indian women.

The campaign featured many inspiring women athletes including Deepika

Padukone. This ad promoted the idea that you can be any girl and even an
athlete. This campaign hit the right chords as a lot is being talked about regarding
the changing role of women in the country.
Summary: Introduction to
Branding
So what did you learn in this session?