By Gautam Talwar
Chief strategy officer, Rediffusion Y&R
Management guru Peter Drucker has famously put his view on leadership — "Management is doing things right; leadership is doing the right things". However, understanding the right things is a challenge that baffles most managers. The matter becomes even more complex when you are trying to understand a diverse market like India.
Only a few have been able to figure out the right things required to become leaders in their respective categories. We look at certain brands in high involvement categories like automobiles, consumer electronics, mobile phones, telecom, banks and insurance from the lens of Brand Asset Valuator (BAV) to try and understand the "right things" that separate leader brands from followers.
The journey of becoming a brand from a commodity begins by owning the codes of trust, reliability, performance delivery and customer focus. We see these routes adopted by leaders across categories, including low involvement categories like cement and adhesives.
The execution might have varied — ACC (nostalgia), Binani (celebrity) or Fevicol (humour) — but all of them communicate the same set of attributes which would make the name stand out as a brand from a pack of commodities. Leader brands use these very same attributes to fence their territory by associating themselves so strongly that it becomes overwhelmingly difficult for the challenger brands to break the benchmarks.
Being stronger on these parameters is not enough for leaders to establish their dominance. There are three clear ways in which most leader brands score over their competitors — they are seen as more prestigious to own; their vision defines the future of their category and they have greater affinity of their customer base. Challenger brands need to focus on these three things to give the leaders a run for their money.
The first and foremost is to build the perception of being upper class, prestigious and worth more. Challenger brands need to move forward from the game of ‘good value’ of offering promotions and discounts to boost sales temporarily.
To become leaders, they need to be seen as worth more by consumers and portray cues of upper class and prestige. Consumers see pride in owning these brands and are willing to pay more and allowing brands to charge a premium. Leader brands such as Vodafone, LIC and many others have time and again proved this by maintaining a price premium when compared to competition.
The second aspect to become a leader is to have a long term vision for the category and continuously defining market trends with innovations to match the consumers' needs. Challenger brands are generally content with being ‘up-todate’, however, they need to up the game to be seen as visionary, innovative and trendy. Brands need to walk this talk by delivering the experience through their products and services.
For instance, Airtel has established the trend of video snacking with its one rupee video; high-speed data with 4G and mobile money transfers with Airtel Money. ICICI Bank has been ahead of the innovation curve in providing new features and services integrating social media and money management with offerings like Pocket and iWish. Finally, leaders have the ability to gain affinity of consumers.
Challenger brands need to create noise around their adoption by existing consumers. Being active on social media helps the brand to be seen as friendly and social, at the same time the brand gain popularity.
Maruti’s claim of a large number of satisfied buyers or SBI’s distribution with large number of branches boosts the consumers’ confidence in adopting the brand and recommending to others. We have often seen in the past that a new brand can take the throne away from existing leaders.
Challenger brands like Micromax, Yes Bank, Honda and SBI Mutual Fund are taking on the category leaders with new conversations, but in spite of these new conversations they are beginning to own the same codes of pride of ownership, ingenuity with vision and affinity among consumers, to become the leading challenger brands in their categories.
Stronger you own these codes, quicker is the path to leadership.
Chief strategy officer, Rediffusion Y&R
Management guru Peter Drucker has famously put his view on leadership — "Management is doing things right; leadership is doing the right things". However, understanding the right things is a challenge that baffles most managers. The matter becomes even more complex when you are trying to understand a diverse market like India.
Only a few have been able to figure out the right things required to become leaders in their respective categories. We look at certain brands in high involvement categories like automobiles, consumer electronics, mobile phones, telecom, banks and insurance from the lens of Brand Asset Valuator (BAV) to try and understand the "right things" that separate leader brands from followers.
The journey of becoming a brand from a commodity begins by owning the codes of trust, reliability, performance delivery and customer focus. We see these routes adopted by leaders across categories, including low involvement categories like cement and adhesives.
The execution might have varied — ACC (nostalgia), Binani (celebrity) or Fevicol (humour) — but all of them communicate the same set of attributes which would make the name stand out as a brand from a pack of commodities. Leader brands use these very same attributes to fence their territory by associating themselves so strongly that it becomes overwhelmingly difficult for the challenger brands to break the benchmarks.
Being stronger on these parameters is not enough for leaders to establish their dominance. There are three clear ways in which most leader brands score over their competitors — they are seen as more prestigious to own; their vision defines the future of their category and they have greater affinity of their customer base. Challenger brands need to focus on these three things to give the leaders a run for their money.
The first and foremost is to build the perception of being upper class, prestigious and worth more. Challenger brands need to move forward from the game of ‘good value’ of offering promotions and discounts to boost sales temporarily.
To become leaders, they need to be seen as worth more by consumers and portray cues of upper class and prestige. Consumers see pride in owning these brands and are willing to pay more and allowing brands to charge a premium. Leader brands such as Vodafone, LIC and many others have time and again proved this by maintaining a price premium when compared to competition.
The second aspect to become a leader is to have a long term vision for the category and continuously defining market trends with innovations to match the consumers' needs. Challenger brands are generally content with being ‘up-todate’, however, they need to up the game to be seen as visionary, innovative and trendy. Brands need to walk this talk by delivering the experience through their products and services.
For instance, Airtel has established the trend of video snacking with its one rupee video; high-speed data with 4G and mobile money transfers with Airtel Money. ICICI Bank has been ahead of the innovation curve in providing new features and services integrating social media and money management with offerings like Pocket and iWish. Finally, leaders have the ability to gain affinity of consumers.
Challenger brands need to create noise around their adoption by existing consumers. Being active on social media helps the brand to be seen as friendly and social, at the same time the brand gain popularity.
Maruti’s claim of a large number of satisfied buyers or SBI’s distribution with large number of branches boosts the consumers’ confidence in adopting the brand and recommending to others. We have often seen in the past that a new brand can take the throne away from existing leaders.
Challenger brands like Micromax, Yes Bank, Honda and SBI Mutual Fund are taking on the category leaders with new conversations, but in spite of these new conversations they are beginning to own the same codes of pride of ownership, ingenuity with vision and affinity among consumers, to become the leading challenger brands in their categories.
Stronger you own these codes, quicker is the path to leadership.
