Assignment 220
Delp10
B207BPowerpoint-Week5.pptxB207B
Shaping Business Opportunities II
Block 2- Reading 23
Innovating and
branding in a global context
Innovation
For brands, as for companies, innovation is crucial.
The marketing environment is continually evolving and thus, as Kapferer (2012, p. 427) observed:
‘Innovations are the lifeblood of a brand’.
For example, the chocolate brand Milka is readily recognisable (and easy to locate on supermarket shelf displays) because of its trademark lilac branding.
Reading 23: Innovating and branding in a global context
Learning Outcomes
At the end of this session you should be able to:
Recognise how the global context shapes branding and marketing ethics,
Recognise the importance of ethical considerations in branding.
Global and local branding
While many brand names have global recognition, a few sell standardised offerings were ‘selective globalisation’ is a more accurate description for today’s ‘post-global’ brands.
This means that brand offerings typically need to be adapted to suit consumers’ needs and legislative requirements in different regions or countries.
It is not just the products themselves that may need to be adapted to different local requirements, but also the marketing of brands. (to suit local advertising regulations, and cultural and social norms).
Global and local branding
Global, international and local brands have been defined as follows (Schuiling and Kapferer, 2004):
Global brands – use the same marketing strategy and marketing mix in all of the countries in which they are marketed
International brands – use some of the same elements of the marketing mix across the countries in which they are marketed
Local brands – are marketed in only a single country or limited geographical area.
Global and local branding
Kapferer (2012, p. 408) suggests the following key advantages and associated examples of global brands:
Economies of scale that enable a lower price (for example, Ikea)
A stream of innovations (for example, L’Oréal and Google)
An international image that is typically more appealing to younger and more mobile population segments (for example, Ralph Lauren and Armani).
Global and local branding
According to Schuiling and Kapferer (2004), advantages of local brands include:
The flexibility to be developed to meet local consumers’ needs
The flexibility to adapt pricing strategies and other elements of the marketing mix to local markets
Insulation from the risks of damage from problems with other differently branded products in a company’s portfolio
Close relationships with the brand and trust by consumers.
Global and local branding
Three recommendations for building a global brand (Krell, 2014, p. 12);
Engaging in cultural immersion – visiting and immersing oneself in each market’s local culture and refraining from imposing cultural expectations from the home country.
Finding and leveraging influencers – harnessing insights from local markets that can be incorporated to enhance global products.
Using global frameworks with local relevance – creating space for flexibility and adaptation to local markets in marketing programs and messages.
Global and local branding
While some global brands have become accepted to the extent that they are considered to be the local brands in many countries, other global brands explicitly highlight their country of origin.
Some companies use country references or inferences in their choice of brand names.
For example, this brand naming strategy is common among airlines such as British Airways, Singapore Airlines, Norwegian Airlines, etc..
Other companies emphasises their origin and associated reputation through its trademarked advertising slogan (e.g Audi) or like IKEA its Swedish identity through its product and Swedish-themed in-store restaurant and groceries.
Global and local branding
Research has demonstrated that consumers’ perceptions of a brand’s country of origin matter and affect brand attitudes, even if those attributions are inaccurate (Magnusson et al., 2011).
In today’s global marketplace, some brands with strong national associations are owned by organisations from other countries.
Example: the British chocolate maker Cadbury is owned by an American company (Mondelēz International).
Brand tribes and brand communities
The concept of tribes is mentioned as a rival to segmentation, in which shared experiences, passions and emotions that bond heterogeneous people together – providing a linking value – predominate over groupings based on homogeneous consumer profiles.
As defined by (Cova and Cova, 2001, p. 69) Tribes have thus
‘a network of heterogeneous persons – in terms of age, sex, income, etc. – who are interlinked by a shared passion or emotion’
They are short term, can involve multiple tribe memberships and are not based on enduring personality traits or shared values and are less easy to identify than traditional segmentation variables
Brand tribes and brand communities
A brand community ‘is a specialized, non-geographically bound community, based on a structured set of social relations among admirers of a brand’ (Muniz and O’Guinn, 2001, p. 412).
These features of a brand community provides a sense of group belonging; rituals and traditions; and a sense of moral responsibility.
Brand communities have been identified for a wide range of brands and product types, including motorcycles such as Harley-Davidson and Ducati, cars such as Mini and Mercedes, or films such as Star Wars.
Brand communities may also operate with or without the involvement of the company that owns the brand.
Critical reflections on branding
How can brands be managed responsibly?
Valuing consumers as people (not just as a means of revenue)
Considering their best interests, acting in line with key ethical principles (not just getting away with what the law may allow)
Taking responsibility for both the mechanisms and purpose of marketing activities and also the impact on the organisation’s stakeholders more widely.
Murphy and Laczniak’s seven perspectives for evaluating and improving marketing ethics
Ethical marketing puts people first.
Ethical marketers must achieve a behavioural standard above the law.
Marketers are responsible for whatever they intend as a means or end with a marketing action.
Marketing organisations should cultivate better (i.e. higher) moral imagination in their managers and employees (the ability to morally reason with creative ethical solutions).
Marketers should articulate and embrace a core set of ethical principles.
Adoption of a stakeholder orientation is essential to ethical marketing decisions.
Marketing organisations ought to delineate an ethical decision making protocol.
