Brand Image

Brand Image
A brand is not a product!!
A brand is the umbrella name under which many products are marketed. A brand
may even be a company name.Examples: Coca Cola, Nestle, Nescafe, Adidas,
Kellogs, Andrex, and Kleenex.
Some of these examples are companies. Nescafe is not, Nescafe is owned by
Nestle but Nescafe is a brand all on its own because it is a name under which
many products are marketed: Nescafe gold blend, Nescafe Café Noir, Nescafe
Blend 37, Nescafe Cap Colombe.
Nestle makes many products; Coffee, Breakfast Cereals and Chocolate but the
brand name is the important thing, if people see Nestle on a product they may
buy it simply because Nestle has a good reputation for quality (though not for
political correctness – Nestle was controversial in its decision to sell baby milk to
the third world where starving mothers fed their babies using polluted water to
mix the milk and poisoned their children.)
A brand is created when a company has a popular product, then it creates many
similar products and launches them all under one brand name.
Advantages with a brand named product:
Consumers expect the same quality between products connected to the same
brand name, e.g. if people like Andrex toilet tissue they will buy the new Andrex
quilted toilet tissues rather than a similar product that they don’t know.
Consumers are more willing to try a new product if it’s got a brand name they
know and love.
Consumers connect brand names with certain ideologies/ lifestyles. E.g. Coca
Cola has created its brand image to have American connotations, associations
with the music industry and, through advertising, people associate it with ‘the real
thing’ or the best thing because it’s ‘always coca cola’.
Brand name products have a ‘snob’ appeal; it seems more middle class to buy
branded products rather than a cheaper alternative.
It’s often easier to buy a brand name product because you are assured of some
kind of quality, whereas buying an unknown product has a risk attached.
Disadvantages with a brand named product:

Branded products are more expensive due to advertising and packaging costs.
The cheaper alternatives are often just as good but their costs are less.
Corporate success may lead to company corruption; Nike has made trainers in
sweatshops in Indonesia to increase profits.
The ideology behind a brand name is all a constructed image and it can hide a
less than squeaky-clean company.
TASK: Can you think of any more advantages and disadvantages with
brand images?
BRAND IMAGE
This is the constructed ideology or connotations people are meant to make about
the brand.
Try to think of the brand image constructed for the following:
1. Coca Cola
2. Nike
3. Disney
4. Channel 4 (arguably a brand because it has umbrella products of
Film4, E4)
5. Budweiser