Chapter 4: Choosing Brand Elements to Build Brand Equity

Types of Brand Elements

Brand Names

Logo & Symbols

Must be chosen with the general criteria; memorability, meaningfulness, likeability, transferability, adaptability, protectability

Criteria for choosing Brand Element
Memorability, meaningfulness and likability are the marketer's offensive strategy and build brand equity. Transferability, adaptability and protectability play a defensive role for leveraging and maintaining brand equity in the face of different opportunities and constraints.

URLs

Characters

Slogans

Jingles

Packaging
Activity of designing and producing containers or wrappers

Memorability
Brand elements should be easy-to-remembering and must be able to grab the attention of the customers or potential customers.

Meaningfulness
The brand name or elements should be descriptive about the product. Brand elements should portray or describe the category of a specific brand product.

Likability
Brand elements can be interesting, colorful, fun, rich visual and aesthetically pleasing.

Transferability
Transferability means how much a brand can expand its product line. There can be an extension in the same category or even in other categories. Besides that, brand elements should be able to create a brand identity without any restrictions of geographical boundaries.

Adaptability
The term adaptability simply means how much a brand can adapt to the changing market trends. Greater adaptability means the brand can easily cope-up with changing customer opinions and market trends.

Protectability
Brand elements should be easy to defend or protect legally. That said, brand elements should be designed in such a way that a company can easily defend and protect those elements in local or international markets legally.

Brand Elements

Tactics in choosing different brand elements

Strongly protectable both legally and competitively

Enduring in meaning and relevant over time

Transferable to a wide variety of product and
geographic settings

Rich with creative potential

Inherently fun or interesting

Highly suggestive of the product class and benefits

Easily remembered

Definition of Brand Elements
Trademarkable components that help in identifying and differentiating the brand.

Brand awareness:

  • Simple and easy to pronounce and spell
  • Familiar
  • Meaningful
  • Different, distinctive, and unusual

Brand associations:

  • Implicit and explicit meanings of a name are important

Brand names can reinforce an important attribute or benefit associated that makes up its product positioning

A descriptive brand name should make it easier to link the reinforced attribute or benefit

Naming procedures:

  • Define objectives
  • Generate names
  • Screen initial candidates
  • Study candidate names
  • Research the final candidates
  • Select the final name

Specify locations of pages on the Web:

  • Commonly referred to as domain names
  • Owner of a URL must register and pay for the name
  • Protects a brand from unauthorized use in other domain names

Cybersquatting or domain squatting:

  • Registering, trafficking in, or using a domain name with bad-faith to profit from
  • The goodwill of a trademark belonging to someone else

Company can:

  • Sue current owner of the URL for copyright infringement
  • Buy the name from the current owner
  • Register all conceivable variations of its brand as domain names ahead of time

Visual elements play a critical role in building brand equity and brand awareness

  • Indicate origin, ownership, or association
  • Range from corporate names or trademarks written in a distinctive form, to abstract designs that may be completely unrelated to the corporate name or activities

Symbols: Non-word mark logos

Abstract logos can be distinctive and recognizable. They may lack the inherent meaning present with a more concrete logo. One limitation is that consumers may not understand what the logo is intended to represent

Special type of brand symbol:
One that takes on human or real-life characteristics

Introduced via advertising which can play a central role in ad campaigns and package designs

Short phrases that communicate descriptive and persuasive information about the brand. Function as useful "hooks" or "handles" to help consumers grasp the meaning of a brand

Designing slogans:

  • Designed so they contribute to brand equity in multiple ways
  • Can contain product-related messages and other meanings

Updating slogans:

  • Recognize how it contributes to brand equity through enhanced awareness or image
  • Decide how much of this equity enhancement, if any, is still needed
  • Retain needed or desired equities still residing in the slogan, while providing whatever new twists of meaning are necessary to contribute to equity in other ways

Musical messages written around the brand

Catchy hooks and choruses become permanently registered in listeners' minds

Enhance brand awareness by repeating the brand name in clever and amusing ways

Changes in packaging can be expensive but can be cost effective compared with other marketing communication costs:

  • Signal a higher price, or to more effectively sell products through new or shifting distribution channels
  • When a significant product line expansion would benefit from a common look
  • To accompany a new product innovation to signal changes to consumers
  • When old package looks outdated

From the perspective of both the firm and consumers, packaging must:

  • Identify the brand
  • Convey descriptive and persuasive information
  • Facilitate product transportation and protection
  • Assist in at-home storage
  • Aid product consumption

Packaging at the point of purchase:
The right packaging can create strong appeal on the store shelf, helps products stand out from the clutter, and can provide at least a temporary edge on competition

Packaging innovations can lower costs and improve demand for a product

Package design refers to "shelf impact" of a package, and has become a more sophisticated process where specialized package designers bring artistic techniques and scientific skills

Mixing and Matching Brand Elements

Meaningful brand names that are visually represented through logos are easier to remember than without reinforcement. The entire set of brand elements makes up the brand identity, the contribution of all brand elements to awareness and image

Each brand element plays a different role in building brand equity, so marketers should "mix and match" to maximize brand equity