This is one of the big issues in marketing? When is it time to change the brand’s differentiation?
Overall, it is always time to improve. It is rarely time to change.
No matter how good your position, you can always improve. I call your attention to Aflac. Their new campaign (woman on crutches coming to watch the kid’s soccer game) is the best yet at getting the point across on both their difference and why you need it, as well as building the linkage stronger (four quacks of the duck in 30 seconds.)
Aflac is still improving. Note: Here is the first question to research if you are Aflac. “What brand first comes to mind when you think of supplementing your health insurance?” Here is the second question to research if you are Aflac. “Do you have supplemental health insurance, and if you do not have it, why not?”
Here are the principles. Once you have compelling differentiation in place, manage it like this:
1. First, keep trying to increase the unaided awareness of the number of potential users who are aware of your compelling differentiation. Do this until there is no more room for increased top of mind awareness (90% of prospects are aware not just of your brand unaided, but of your difference).
2. Second, when there is no potential left to increase awareness, make your differentiation more compelling. Show aware prospects why they need your brand. Make your brand difference more important to the people who already know about it.
Only when you are have maximum awareness of the most compelling proposition, and it is as compelling as you can make it, is it time to change the idea. And then only if you are not reaching your volume or share objectives. Far too few brands lack this discipline. They change while there is still awareness not developed and sustained, and they change before they have maximized their differentiation.
After reading this I thought of Mary Kay (cosmetics). I have a background in brand marketing, so I tend to daydream about companies and their brand status from time to time. I passed the Mary Kay offices on Satellite the other day, and thought “now there’s a brand who could use brand facelift”, giggle. Their brand image, from my standpoint, has become “old lady make-up”. When I worked on the Coke account, there was reasearch presented for the development of a Fresca campaign, that stated that brand trail/adoption was not likely to occur from the younger demo’s (18-25) if you marketed to the 35+, however the 35+ will adopt brands that are marketed to the younger. Especially in the case of “cosmetics” and their target’s desire to appear and look younger. Plus who wouldn’t want brand adoption and loyalty at a younger age and get a life-long consumer! When I was a pre-teen our Girl Scout troop had a Mary Kay Consultant come and teach us how to take care of our skin and how to apply make-up, something I never hear of now. That should definately be a grass-roots effort they should push to create the pull, another giggle. XOXO
Audrey,
We worked on a minor change for Mary Kay about 15 years ago that allowed them to grow from $400 Million to over $2 Million. I would love to discuss this issue with you, but not in the pages of this blog. Call me at 770 329 0935 if you want to talk.
Frank