Creating and nurturing a brand is very like bringing up a surrogate child. It never entirely belongs to you. So who does it belong to?
The answer that most would give is that the company owns the rights to it. And to some extent they would be right.
After all Apple owns the iPod brand, as does Tata Motors the Indica brand (and possibly, by the time you read this the iconic Jaguar, Daimler and Land Rover brands too). So yes, the brand is officially “owned” by its parent company.
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| Rupin Jayal |
Creating and nurturing a brand is very like bringing up a surrogate child. You seem to make all the effort, you strive to protect and care for it, invest significant resources – time, money and talent to make it strong, resilient and distinctive. Yet it never entirely belongs to you. It exists outside the premises of your offices and factories. It thrives in an intangible ecosystem.
If the real value of the brand lies in the minds and imaginations of those who choose to buy it, don’t they own it since if it were to “disappear” from their minds it would immediately cease to have any value at all?
Actually both answers are true. Parent companies do own their brands but so do the people who choose them. Often when it is said that brand ownership has shifted to consumers the examples used are often those brands with a long heritage, luxury brands, or the few examples of iconic brands. Yet there are many successful brands that do not fall into any of these categories and yet are successful. Who truly “owns” these brands? Also when brands begin to lose their sheen either due to inherent problems or due to the category itself coming under threat, who owns them then?
The model that seems to fit the environment of brands today seems more like a joint venture. This has very significant implications. Like any successful joint venture this one too has to have certain critical factors to ensure its continued success. Today and going into the future, the most successful brands will be those in the nature of a joint venture between the brand and its customer base. If the customers who own them gain the upper hand it would usually mean that the brand is not doing enough to keep ahead of their customers’ expectation curve. In such a situation the brand would inevitably begin to suffer from consumer ennui.
If the reins remain firmly in the hands of the company that owns the brand then, while initially it would be a beacon and perhaps continue to be so for a small niche audience, scaling it up would become difficult. And the risk of alienation in the age of hyper-informed activist consumers would be very great indeed. Successful brands need a sense of ownership by their core audience.
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So what would make a truly successful joint venture brand partnership? The answer lies in the key factors that drive any successful joint venture. These are mutual interest, mutual respect, a truly symbiotic relationship, continually refreshing the relationship and sharing the success of the partnership. While many brand owners do espouse the cause of greater consumer involvement, how many view it as a genuine partnership?
Each one of the six key factors has important implications, both in terms of strategy and practical ground-level activities.
Mutual interest
This is the cornerstone of a successful partnership. While most people would not buy a brand if they did not “need” it in some way, how many companies actually demonstrate the fact that they not only “sell” to their consumers but actually need them in a far more fundamental way. Consumers are the only source of information on brand performance. They act as early warning radars to warn of impending attitudinal change that could cause tectonic shifts in categories. One only has to think of the recent past and many examples come to mind. The way motorcycles have supplanted scooters in India, iPod and downloadable music have supplanted the Walkman, digital imaging has made film-based cameras and camera film obsolete, pagers were obliterated by the mobile phone, the examples are endless. In each case, the longstanding leader has been left stranded as the river of consumers began to flow in a different direction. Most are still trying to catch up with their rapidly disappearing customer base.
This does not apply to categories with technology shifts alone. In the world of brands too, iconic brands have fallen by the wayside. Does anyone remember Weston TVs, Campa Cola, Forhans (toothpaste), Dalda, Stencil shirts, FUs jeans, Pertech Computers, etc? These were all successful brands at one time but have since disappeared or have a vastly reduced presence. Somewhere down the road the people who bought these brands and even expressed loyalty to them did not feel a sense of mutual interest any more. The companies that owned them did not listen and understand where their consumers were headed and in ignoring mutual interest lost them entirely.
The case of motorcycles and scooters is a classic one. Bajaj was the leader and people were happy to pay huge premiums for a Bajaj scooter. When the tectonic shift took place in the two-wheeler industry, Bajaj lost out. However, Honda has shown that there is still a healthy interest in scooters. Not only is it the leader in scooters but it has single-handedly rejuvenated what was seen to be a moribund category. Honda even launched its first side-engined scooter – the Eterno, for Indian customers. It listened to the people who did not want a motorcycle, who continued to prefer the practicalities of a scooter. It found mutual interest with an entirely new group of two-wheeler buyers – women. It introduced vehicles that were simple but modern looking. It understood that people wanted designs that were not exotic but didn’t not want the age-old scooter look and feel either. People rewarded this by preferring it to the hitherto leader. Honda did not just bring its range of vehicles and try to “sell” them to people, it understood what mattered to them, invested in it and has received their loyalty. Similarly, while Hero Honda has often been criticised for making so-called “ordinary” motorcycles and not making them sufficiently “sporty” (with some exceptions, of course) it has continued to grow and dominate the motorcycle market with its iconic Splendor and Passion range of 100 cc motorcycles. It has also listened to its audience and introduced a range of exciting “sporty” bikes, but in doing so, has not neglected its core customer. Also, with the Passport program, it has sought to recognise the value of its customers and in doing so, has created one of the largest customer relationship programs in the country. It, not surprisingly, continues to grow as other rivals struggle. Mutual interest wins every time.
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