Monday, August 26, 2013

The Best Story Never Told - Part 2


A few years ago, I wrote a blog entry on the Best Story Never Told .   The story centered on taking the time to build an effective Brand Selling Presentation for your brand to use with outside partners.   Never assume that a retailer, brand partner or licensee has any pre-conceived knowledge about your brand before you meet them.   Don’t assume your brand sells itself.   My first blog post on this topic was admittedly a bit light on the most vital part of your Brand Selling Story: conducting primary Market Research to measure your brand’s awareness, equity, and extendibility.

 

When trying to sell any outside party on your brand, it is very important that you present them with real customer data from a statistically significant market research study that is conducted by an unbiased third party vendor.    Your main job above all else is to demonstrate your brand’s strength against its competitive set.    The typical brand health measures you want to discuss are unaided and aided awareness, brand purchase consideration, brand share, net promoter score and brand purchase intent in new product extension categories.   It is very important that you contract with a market research vendor that has both extensive experience in the branding industry and the market research discipline; a firm like my company, Brandar Consulting, LLC, is an example of one such firm.

 

Prior to starting your research project, you will need to work with your Brand team to “brandstorm” what you believe your brand stands for and the product categories you think your brand can extend into.  You then need to use your Brand Research to validate your perceived brand attributes, purchase drivers and extension categories.   I call this conducting Brand Permission research; it is research to determine whether your customer target gives your brand permission to extend into a new product category – whether that be through brand licensing, manufacturing it yourself or sourcing product.   

 

Once you conclude your Brand Equity & Extension Research, you next need to work with your research vendor to effectively package the results into Brand Selling Slides so that you can tell the story of your brand’s equity and extendibility through your customer’s eyes and not your own.   While you are paid to be your brand’s biggest disciple, your customer target is your brand’s true fortune teller.   Their feedback through your research study is what matters most to a potential brand partner looking to leverage your brand.   So take the time and expense to solicit your customer target’s opinions so they can tell the best story possible about your brand.