UNIT III- Designing and Implementing Brand Marketing

Programs
 Criteria for Choosing Brand Elements
1. Memorable (Easily recognized, Easily Recalled)
2. Meaningful (Descriptive, Persuasive)
3. Likable (Fun and Interesting, Rich Visual & Verbal Imagery, Aesthetically pleasing)
4. Transferable (Within across product categories, Across geographic boundaries and cultures)
5. Adaptable (Flexible, Updatable)
6. Protectable (Legally, Competitively)

First three are the marketer’s offensive strategy and build brand equity. The
later three, plays a defensive strategy for leveraging and maintaining brand
equity in the face of different opportunities and constraints.
 Designing & Implementing Brand Marketing Programs

Brand building equity process will depend on three factors

1. Choosing Brand Elements: The most common brand elements are
brand names, URLs, logos, symbols, characters, packaging and
slogans
2. Integrating the Brand into Marketing Activities and the Supporting
Marketing Program: Designing marketing programs as well as
issues in product strategy, pricing strategy and channels strategy.
3. Leveraging Secondary Associations: Such as Company, Country
of origin, Channel of distribution or another brand)
 Designing & Implementing Brand Marketing
Programs
Measuring & Interpreting Brand Performance: A brand equity
measurement system is a set of research procedures designed to
provide timely, accurate and actionable information for marketers so
that they can make the best possible tactical decisions in the short
run and the best strategic decisions in the long run. Implementing
such a system involves three key steps- Conducting brand audits,
designing brand tracking studies and establishing brand equity
measurement system
 Designing & Implementing Brand Marketing
Programs
Growing & Sustaining Brand Equity:
1.Defining Brand Architecture (Brand Portfolios and Brand Hierarchy)

2. Managing Brand Equity Over Time.

3. Managing Brand Equity Over Geographic Boundaries, Cultures and Market

Segments
 Reconciling The Different Marketing Approaches

1. Product Strategy
2. Pricing Strategy
3. Channel Strategy
 Product Strategy
The product itself is the primary influence on what consumers experience with a
brand, what they hear about a brand from others, and what the firm can tell
customers about the brand. At the heart of a great brand is invariably a great
product.
Designing and delivering a product or service that fully satisfies consumer needs
and wants is a prerequisite for successful marketing, regardless of whether the
product is tangible good, service or organization. For brand loyalty to exist,
consumers’ experiences with the product must at least meet, if not actually surpass
their expectations.
After considering how consumers form their opinions of the quality and value of a
product, we consider how marketers can go beyond the actual product to enhance
product experiences and additional value before, during and after product use.
 Product Strategy
Perceived Quality: Perceived quality is customers’ perception of the overall
quality or superiority of a product or service compared to alternatives and with
respect to it’s intended purpose.

The specific attributes of product can vary from category to category. Consistent
with the brand resonance model, research has identified the following general
dimensions: Primary ingredients & supplementary features; product reliability,
durability and serviceability; and style and design.
 Product Strategy
Aftermarketing: To achieve the desired brand image, product strategies should
focus on purchase and consumption. Unfortunately, too little marketing attention
is devoted to finding new ways for consumers to truly appreciate the advantages
and capabilities of products. Perhaps in response to this oversight, one notable
trend in marketing is the growing role of aftermarketing, that is, those marketing
activities that occur after customer purchase.

Innovative design, thorough testing, quality production and effective

communication through mass customization are most important considerations
in enhancing consumption experience.

The other means of enhancing consumption experiences are user manuals,

customer service programs and loyalty programs.
 Pricing Strategy
Price is the one revenue-generating element of the traditional marketing mix,
and price premiums are among the most important benefits of building a strong
brand. Choosing a pricing strategy to build brand equity means determining the
following:

1. A method for setting current prices.

2. A policy for choosing the depth and duration of promotions and discounts.
 Pricing Strategy
There are many different approaches to setting prices, and the choice depends on number
of considerations. Many firms now are employing Value pricing approach to setting prices
and an everyday-low-pricing (EDLP) approach to determine their discount pricing policy
over time.

Value Pricing: The objective of value pricing is to uncover the right blend of product quality,
product costs and product prices that fully satisfies the needs and wants of consumers and
the profit targets of the firms.

EDLP: EDLP, which stands for Every Day Low Prices, is a pricing strategy in which firms

promise consumers consistently low prices on products without having to wait for sale
events. In such a pricing strategy, a firm sets a low price and maintains it over a long time-
horizon (given that product costs remain unchanged).
 Channel Strategy
The manner by which a product is sold or distributed can have profound impact on the equity
and ultimate sales success of a brand. Marketing channels are defined as “Set of
interdependent organizations involved in the process of making a product or service available
for use or consumption.”
Channel strategy includes Channel Design (Direct/Indirect Channels) and management of
intermediaries such as wholesalers, distributors, brokers and retailers.

Indirect Channels: Retailers (Push & Pull Strategies)

Channel Support (Retail Segmentation, Cooperative Advertising)

Direct Channels: Manufacturers may choose to sell directly to consumers

Company-Owned Stores, Store-with-in-a-store, Other means (phone, mail or electronic means)
 Channel Strategy
Online Strategies: The advantages of having both a physical ‘brick & mortar’
channel and a virtual, online retail channel are becoming clearer to many firms.
Integrated channels allow consumers to shop when and how they want. Many
consumers value the convenience of ordering from companies online or over
the phone and picking up the physical product at their local store rather than
having it shipped.
 Information Processing Model of Communications
1. Exposure: A person must see or hear the communication.
2. Attention: A person must notice the communication.
3. Comprehension: A person must understand the intended message or
arguments of the communication.
4. Yielding: A person must respond favorably to the intended message or
arguments of the communication.
5. Intentions: A person must plan to act in the desired manner of the
communication.
6. Behavior: A person must actually act in the desired manner of the
communication.
Marketing Communication Methods/Tools
 Four Major Communication Options

Four vital ingredients to the best brand-building communication

programs:

1. Advertising & Promotion

2. Online Marketing
3. Events & Experiences and
4. Mobile Marketing
 Advertising
Advertising is any paid form of non-personal presentation and promotion of
ideas, goods or services by an identified sponsor. Although it is a powerful
means of creating strong, favorable and unique brand associations and
eliciting positive judgments and feelings, advertising is controversial because
it’s specific effects are often difficult to quantify and predict.

Advertising Medium: Television, Radio, Print, Direct Response (mail,

telephone, internet etc), OOH (Out-of-Home advertising), Movies, Airlines,
Lounges and other places, Product Placement, PoP (Point of Purchase).

Note: This is a self learning topic. Students have to read and explain pros and cons of the
above mentioned medium in next class. They can refer to III sem IMC notes
 Promotion

Advertising and promotion often go hand-in-hand. Sales promotions are short term incentives
to encourage trial or usage of a product or services. Marketers can target sales promotions to
either the trade or end consumers. Like advertising, sales promotions come in all forms,
whereas advertising typically provides consumers a reason to buy, sales promotions offer
consumers an incentive to buy. Thus sales promotions are designed to do the following:

1. Change the behavior of the trade so that they carry the brand and actively support it.
(Trade Promotions)

2. Change the behavior of consumers so that they buy a brand for the first time, buy more of
the brand, or buy the brand earlier or more often. (Consumer Promotions)
 Online Marketing

The first decade of the twenty first century has seen a headlong rush by
companies into the world of interactive, online marketing communications. The
main advantages to marketing on the web are the low cost and the level of
detail and degree of customization it offers. Online marketing communications
can accomplish almost any marketing communication objective and are
especially valuable in terms of solid relationship building. Three particularly
crucial online brand-building tools are:
1. Web Sites (Self Reading)
2. Online Ads & Videos (Self Reading)
3. Social Media: i.Message boards & Forums ii. Chat Rooms iii. Blogs iv.
Facebook v.Twitter and vi. Youtube (Self Reading)
 Events & Experiences
As important as online marketing is to brand management, events and experiences
play an equally important role. Brand building in the virtual world must be
complemented in the real or physical world.

Events and experiences range from an extravagant multimillion dollar sponsorship of

a major international event to a simple local in-store product demonstration or
sampling program. What all these different kinds of events and experiences share is
that, one way or another, the brand engages the consumers’ sense and imagination,
changing brand knowledge in the process.

Experiences can take all forms and are limited only by the marketers’ imagination.
Event marketing can be defined as public sponsorship of events or activities related to
sport, art, entertainment or social causes.
 Mobile Marketing
A fourth broad communication option has emerged in recent years and will
undoubtedly play a greater role in brand building in the future. As smartphones
are playing an increasingly significant role in consumers’ lives, more marketers
are taking notice, and mobile ad spending passed $1 billion in 2011. Because
consumers already use smartphones for information and entertainment as we as
communication- and are beginning to use them as shopping devices and
payment methods-investment in mobile marketing form a whole range of different
sectors looking to tap into a new revenue stream is expected to grow rapidly.

Handset makers are racing to produce ever better smart phones, with bigger and
higher definition screens, faster processors and easier access to social networks.
These new technologies are creating more targeted, interactive and useful mobile
ads than ever before.
Developing Integrated Marketing Communication Programs
• In assessing the collective impact of an IMC program, the marketer’s overriding goal
is to create the most effective and efficient communication program possible.
Following are six relevant criteria known as 6Cs for short:
1. Coverage
2. Contribution
3. Commonality
4. Complementarity
5. Conformability
6. Cost
Note: This is a self learning topic. Students have to read and explain pros and cons of
the above mentioned medium in next class. They can refer to III sem IMC notes or refer
textbook Strategic Brand Management by Kevin Lane Keller Page Numbers 229 to 232.
 Group Activity: Rebranding PGI (Presidency Group of Institutions)

Right now PGI (Presidency Group of Institutions) using the same logo and punch line.
Each group has to do a rebranding exercise by recreating a logo and punch line for
Presidency Group of Institutions (Mother brand), Presidency Schools, Colleges and
University.

It’s your choice to which group you want to retain the existing logo and punch line.

Basic knowledge of paint brush is enough to complete this assignment. Your group has
to do the in-class presentation on 09-03-2020