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Strategic
Marketing Forum
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FOREVER
BRANDS
There comes a point when consumers fall in love with
the brand and they start looking militant in defense
of the brand. But it need not be a large number -
Govind Pandey
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RD:
Are you suggesting that the things that must not change
must be defined beyond product, beyond current market
segmentations etc?
Balakrishnan: I don’t think it’s about things
that will not change. It’s about things that I will
not do. I will change... I will do a lot of things to
adapt to a lot of people. I will change the values if
those values are what people want. But I will not do
a few things that will confuse me in the minds of the
people.
RD: And those few things... are they related
to a broader mission? Broader things like the kind of
changes the brand wishes to bring to the life of the
target consumers?
Balakrishnan: Yes, of course! I think it is a
big, big issue and I think the greatest brands have
great social causes. By social cause I don’t mean curing
leprosy, or helping the blind or whatever. If you take
Nike, it is about keeping people fit. At the very, very
bottom level, it is about fitness. And great brands
have something like that about them. Take the case of
Seagrams: it is seen as a responsible alcoholic brand,
which is rare. There are brands that somehow connect
with some cause of the consumer and they become great
brands.
RD: Forever brands become ‘forever’ ultimately
because a large number of consumers has developed an
emotional bonding with that brand. Will you please comment
on that?
Deshpande: I tend to agree with that. As I have
been a consumer myself, I must give an example. About
a month ago, despite a good friend of mine advising
me not to go in for a Sony Flat 29-inch colour TV (mind
you, this friend is pretty reliable) I went to the retailer
and started looking at the television wall. You really
don’t know what to buy. Then, advice at the retailer
level follows.
He says, “Look, you’re going for this home theatre system.
But the Sony DVD player doesn’t really work with pirated
VCDs or other software. So my advice is that you go
for something else. Go for Philips, as that’s pretty
good. It’s equally good on technology and will play
no matter what VCD you slip in.” I lingered there for
30-40 minutes, as the purchase was phenomenally expensive.
But I ended up buying a Sony. Now I can’t rationalise
that. I am suffering because over the last three weeks,
we tried to play several VCDs but they just wouldn’t
play.
Now if were to ask me if I regret my decision, the answer
is no. I don’t regret it. I still have a Sony in my
home. This is not a theory, it is a personal experience.
If you fall in love with what I call a brand’s soul-Sony,
for instance, means lethal sharp technology-that’s grown
deep into the system, after that you’re not willing
to take any argument from any other brand. That is the
kind of marriage that takes place between your mind
and that brand. It goes beyond any rationale. So yes,
I tend to agree with the fact that the emotional appeal
of the brand can get entrenched deeply into the mind
and that is non-negotiable.
Govind: Surely there comes a point when consumers
fall in love with the brand and they start looking militant
in defense of the brand. But it need not be a large
number. There can be an extremely vocal minority, which
can tilt the brand, as, for example, happened with Coke.
When the entire re-formulation was worked out and all
the group discussions and taste results favored the
new formula, there was maybe 12 to 15 per cent of the
group which did not agree with the change. Coke, in
its infinite wisdom, decided to go ahead with it. But
it was that minority which had this intense relationship
with the brand, which decided to take up the cause.
So it could be that very small niche-the highly loyal
customer base-who are so emotionally involved with the
brand.
RD: And, with time, this minority becomes a huge
chunk and starts influencing others.
Balakrishnan: Coke is a great example. But you
know, in India, neither Coke nor Pepsi is a forever
brand. It is Thums Up. So, for a certain segment of
people, certain brands are forever.
Rohington: Just one small interjection here:
the emotional bonding is very much a part of the whole
game. But by itself it is not enough. You can lose it
very easily and that is something you have to keep in
mind. The sustainability may be suspect if all it does
is bank on this emotional bonding.
RD: Let’s turn our attention to another issue.
As we all know, business cycles do change and right
now we’re going through a recession. If a company has
a few forever brands in their portfolio, do you think
that such forever brands will be the last to resort
to price-cuts during recession and first to lead in
the price increase during the boom period?
Vivek: I think it is possible. It would also
be linked to what is the sensitivity of your target
consumer. For consumers of Lifebuoy, sensitivity will
be more compared to those of Dove. But in principle,
I agree with you. In actual practice, it depends on
what your goals are for the brand and you may decide
not to follow that logic.
RD: Let’s now move on to the second part of our
discussion. Do we see some of our Indian brands as having
the potential to become forever brands as agreed by
us during this discussion? Can we first list a few examples?
Audience and panel members: Tata, Bajaj, Amul,
Britannia, Raymond, Asian Paints, The Times of India,
Taj Hotels, Gandhi, Mughal-e-Azam, IIMs and IITs.
RD: Of the brands that we listed, which two brands
are definitely showing potential to become forever brands?
Srinivasan: Tata has good potential of becoming
a forever brand.
RD: Are you sure it meets all the conditions?
What about sustainability? In one business after another,
it is losing its competitiveness.
Rohington: We have to keep in mind that every
brand, like everything else, does go through cycles.
I think the resilience and the ability to bounce back
is also one of the factors that make a forever brand.
I am sure that all forever brands will not always be
at the top of the bunch.
RD: One brand that has the potential to become
a forever brand is Reliance, which, according to me,
fulfills all the conditions we discussed. It is a diversified
corporate brand. Another example can be The Complete
Man. Can you think of any brand that you think had the
potential to become a forever brand but mismanaged and
lost the opportunity?
Balakrishnan: I’ll tell you about a brand that
won’t be top of the mind for anybody but could have
become a forever brand. It was Amar Chitra Katha-one
of the more fantastic brands, which could have become
a cult like Disney. I think The Times group should buy
it over and market the toys etc. I think there’s huge
potential there that has gone waste.
Srinivasan: HMT, someone just said, is a good
example. HMT always saw a watch as a watch and nothing
else. They did not see a watch as a different value
proposition. They never went beyond that, when they
could have.
RD: Is it necessary that to become an owner of
forever brands, a firm has to go international? Must
it operate in a number of different national markets
to make sure that its brand becomes forever?
Deshpande: I don’t think so. I think the Britannia
brands are sold only in India (though they may have
tie-ups with players from other countries). But Britannia
is a forever brand.
RD: Let us now move to the third and the final
part, namely, is there an agenda for Indian corporates
and agencies to build forever brands?
Vivek: In most industries, when you create a
brand or when you invest in a brand, you want it to
be forever. There may be other industries, for instance
financial instruments, where you are quite happy if
it’s a two-year brand and after that it dies. But in
the FMCG industry or even durables industry, you want
the brands to be forever. I suppose you will start a
branding quest only if you are sure you have the wherewithal,
the resources and the will to actually make it a forever
brand. Because a lot of these brands have had tough
times, I think you really need to start on very few
such quests. So, firstly, don’t start on twenty different
adventures at the same time. Whenever companies have
done that, only one or two have survived. As we take
up the brand-building task, an important guideline will
be to always remember the few parameters we discussed
during today’s deliberations.
RD: Mr. Pandey, since you’re from an agency,
will you please you tell us, when you talk to a corporate
client, to what extent you are able to bring up some
of the issues we discussed today in relation to forever
brands and how receptive they are when you talk about
some of the fundamental issues which have long-term
implications? What’s your experience? Are they thinking
about it?
Govind: Most clients are fairly enlightened,
not just receptive. It’s not a question of the agency
teaching them a trick or two about branding. Most people
are cognizant that brands are their biggest assets.
So, more often than not, they push you to develop better
strategies, better ideas. I think receptivity is not
an issue at all. One would certainly like to believe
that. I mean, there are brand managers who are more
concerned about short-term sales—because they are answerable
for that—while agencies may want to stick to long-term
issues, but those kinds of conflicts happen. In principle,
I think the marketer is as concerned about the brand
as I am. The basic concerns regarding sustainability
and market share are never lost sight of.
RD: Mr. Balakrishnan, when you talk about some
strategic aspects of the brand and suggest to the brand
managers to invest in certain brand-building activities
whose benefits may not be quantifiable in the short-
or middle-term, do you think the said brand managers
may ask you to just shut up because of the 15 per cent
commission you’re getting? Do they resort to the usual
stuff such as: “Our bottom line is under pressure and
you’re only interested in pushing your own top line?”
Balakrishnan: No, I don’t think so. When two sensible
people talk, such things don’t happen. Everybody wants
to make a brand a forever brand. It’s only the methods,
the process that creates arguments.
Rohington: I think as far as the process goes,
any good company would look at the long-term perspectives,
which come from the vision and the mission that the
organisation has. One is assuming that we’re talking
of a company that has these things sufficiently and
properly laid down. Yes, at times there would obviously
be, as my friends from agencies have pointed out, disagreements
on, say, how much to spend on promotions for the next
year. But those are your day-to-day discussions, which
will always happen. But yes, most certainly it is the
long-term perspective that is clearly kept in mind tempered,
of course, by the fact that you have to ensure that
the right returns, the right top line, the right bottom
line continue to come in because without that there
may not be the long-term to think about.
RD: The tactical decisions are no doubt the building
blocks but if these are taken without proper strategic
perspective, what will happen is that it will look very
logical from today’s perspective but a forever brand
will never emerge. Given the linkages between strategic
and tactical dimensions so far as the branding process
is concerned, do you think the subject of building forever
brands does come up for discussion at the top management
or the board level?
Srinivasan: I cannot imagine a forever brand
not involving the CEO of an organisation. I mean, I
am sure somewhere he’s got to be an intrinsic part of
the marketing effort-it isn’t left to the concerned
brand manager or product manager. I can’t imagine the
top brass of a company not being involved in doing audits
of the brand, to check the health of the brand.
RD: We recently did a study among the Indian
corporate sector. We contacted a number of companies
and asked them how many times the board agenda contained
an item on brands. Surprisingly, not many companies
answered in the affirmative. I have a feeling that,
in India, a brand is still considered as a marketing
asset and hence is left to the brand managers or at
best divisional managers. The top management and board
members, it seems, are more at ease with the financial
and other broader issues. Brand management issues do
not feature there. Mr. Deshpande, when you visit your
clients, how frequently do you get a chance to meet
the CEO to discuss the longer-term issues relating to
their brands?
Deshpande: A serious brand-building process cannot
be imagined without a serious involvement of the CEO.
So we get an audience with the CEO in most cases, unless
the CEO has recruited very, very senior marketing professionals
to a level where they could step into the shoes of the
CEO. If you’re talking of that level, then yes, decisions
are made at that level. And then there is a blessing
from the top. And I don’t think there is any hurdle
in the process. Rohington: The CEO and the operative
top management of any company are extremely and directly
involved in any brand-building activity. There’s no
question about that not happening in any well-run company.
Vivek: If building your brand through advertising is
one of the strongest parts of building your brand and
making it forever, I would think for a brand like Pepsodent,
I would leave the subject to the concerned agency rather
than asking board members to tell them how to do it.
So there may be a level of engagement but the experts
should be left to do what they are best at.
RD: Do you think Indian agencies are making any
special efforts to know more about forever brands? One
needs concepts and frameworks to convince oneself first
and then the client. Is there any research being done
on an ongoing basis by your agencies as to why certain
brands become forever? Govind: In a manner of
speaking, yes, because if the basic unit that we deal
in is consumer-and that is the basis of creating any
brand-I think agencies do spend a lot of money, time
and energy on thinking about the consumer, creating
papers and acquiring knowledge. So I would say yes.
RD: I think we have discussed fairly exhaustively
a number of issues relating to forever brands and the
experts present here today have identified a select
number of parameters that can be used to determine if
a brand is a forever brand.
Parameters such as lifespan, sustainability of positioning
and presentation along six key dimensions, size of volumetric
sales, growth rate and market share and, finally, the
ability to extract price premium and purchase preference
were found to be important for deciding if a brand is
a forever brand or not. We also discussed how forever
brands must score high on four key dimensions of awareness,
equity, loyalty and sales for ensuring a successful
journey.
A number of other issues, such as focused versus diversified
forever brands and how the branding process can be managed
to facilitate development of forever brands, were also
deliberated. It was very heartening to know that both
Indian corporates and agencies are actively thinking
about this area and I am sure we are not far from the
day when India will have her own Sony, Microsoft, Washington
Post, Sheraton etc. On that positive note, let me thank
all the panelists for their contribution to this discussion.
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