The 7 Pillars of Branding

Although the question of branding has always been essential part of marketing and has been approached with multi-dimension models, sometimes these studies have been made without systematic approach or with full of redundancy or ad-hoc views. Unlike marketing which has the widely-known and usable, practical 7P-model, branding still misses such a sort of basic structure which makes the skeleton of all branding story.

Here I am making an outline of such a simplified model to help people in successfully designing brands and also to better understanding the already existing ones. I collected 7 layers of the branding with 7 different tasks to be completed in everyday actions. I hope this can be useful for the readers, too.

Right before entering this syllabus, we need to define what brand and branding is: in our view brand is a vision that is related to a specific company, product or any specific entity which lives in people and materializes to them. Branding is the art of deliberate control over the whole process.

First pillar: Publicly known

A brand always defines a smaller or bigger group of people who are somehow aware of the product or the service in question. This is the prerequisite or trivial condition of all brands: if you are the only one who knows a specific service or uses a specific product and no information is publicized, the service or product is unable to evolve into a brand. This is the primary task of all marketing efforts, making our specific product or service (along with its whole branding costume) widely known on the addressed market: the majority of the marketing budget is used for this purpose. At this point we normally pay attention to the details of the publicity of all brands: target segment(s), its content, geographic, demography, media, communication methods, timing etc.

Task 1: design and make your publicity

However, the fame of a product or service is not exclusively based on the publicity gained (mostly depending on the money available for promoting the brand) via frontal, push-type of promotion. Money spent on communications is a very important factor to reach the second stage of publicity: the people involved in the communications flow will probably share the information with each other and start a – sometimes very simple and few words – discussion about the product or service heard. The act of sharing the information with each other happens or has happened with all known brands. Suggestions, opinions made in public are very important in articulating brand and thus creating or strengthening/weakening brands. This is why the importance of Facebook in contemporary marketing cannot be overestimated enough, or, with similar effect, the customer service/problem handling has always been focal point of customer satisfaction and branding, too.

The publicity of branding therefore incorporates all means of sharing the information related to a specific brand or service. There are two basic type of publicities: there is of course the strictly controlled information sharing method (typically: marketing communications) and we also have to face a second publicity, the huge uncontrolled means of communication. When we are thinking on designing a new brand or just examining an existing one, we have to enlist all the ways how the specific brand gains publicity and sort them by relevance with regards to the public coverage and effect, making special attention to the uncontrolled ways of publicity.

The success of controlling publicity is a key to profit from branding, however, public control will never mean information monopoly over the media and over the outcome: even situations when a company has theoretically 100% control over the situation (e.g. customer care desk at the office or shop), it is always a challenge to control what is exactly happening there, what is going to be told or heard. Thus, from micro to macro level the publicity always carries a huge uncertainty factor with regards to reach, direct effect and future implications.

Second pillar: Associative and narrative – stories around

The discussions initiated and information shared publicly about a brand (or a branded product or service) would show up the next major characteristic of brands, that is, the power of the coupling or association related to the branded products or services. In other words, branding means that we create stories around a brand. Brand identity or personality, brand vision, brand promise are the official stories reflecting the narrative of a generic brand on different levels. Marketing creative planning is exactly doing the same around a specific product of a brand (e.g. ‘The environment friendly Toyota Prius’ as a story), while general brand stories (I mean the Toyota brand in the example) or associations are on higher level only. We therefore have to consider several layers of brand stories or narratives when examining them. It is very useful when these stories are consistent and formed professionally and are not contradicting to each other.

Brands are incorporating many stories and ideas not just from individual products and services determined by the company but stories and ideas also coming from the public. Unfortunately – as we mentioned above – we cannot control the majority of the perceptions of our brand. Individual opinions, perceived qualities, good or bad experiences are building the narrative universe, or more simply, the stories of a brand.

Task 2: define and drive brand stories

Notwithstanding the above, we can drive these brand stories and narrow them to the desired ones on at least two-three different areas. The mission statement of a company/organization is the very source of official brand stories and determines the branding direction via its written values and operational reasons. Secondly, the slogan or the tagline of a brand (like LG’s Life’s Good) is meant to embody the driving narrative story and works like a magnet: collects all the associations around a brand. The third layer of story comes along with specific products or services: repeating the slogans, taglines while inserting the logo of the brand on individual products/services makes the specific product or service painted with the general brand’s associations and qualities. The individual story of a product or service is like a topping on the branding cake. Pure brand campaigns on the other hand are always aiming outlining and fixing the desired main stories and narratives of qualities in the customers.

Controlling publicity cannot be done without controlling the stories attached to a specific brand and seems the major task of all branding and communications managers. Here, we have to highlight a related issue which behaves like the blind spot of the branding: rebranding. Rebranding campaigns are to change the very basic story of a brand. This is the reason why these campaigns fail many times and real rebranding is a very seldom event.

Third pillar: Concrete and multiplicative form

In real life we always give tangible forms to brands because we want to make profit from our money spent. Brand without concrete product/service to buy (or without a related person when we talk about personal brands) is useless or just a promise (like the newly planned Jolla mobile OS with only a demo video). The embodiment of a Brand is an essential part of its very nature.

Normally we use the power of a general Brand Name for many individual products. An already existing brand hands over its potentials (its stories of qualities, usage, value etc.) to specific, individual products and even when we see a new product of an already known brand we are already having a presupposition or sense of certain expectations towards the brand new product. A VW car is perceived for many as a reliable one; however, it may happen that a much lower quality is introduced in a new model than what the brand had fulfilled at its predecessors.

Task 3: make several appearances to utilize brand power

Most times we may say that a brand is transferred into several products and therefore it is multiplicative. It is very seldom that an earned reputation of a brand represented in only one product or service. For example the perfume 4711 seems to be transferred only into one product for a long time, but the brand’s product portfolio today consists of more than one item: after shave or even shower gel is also produced. Start-ups typically own only one product and normally the first product is the one that determines and forms the brand later on. Initially, the brand is typically built upon on only one product or service and this is why it is very sensitive when entering a market with a new company and a new product: it also determines the future brand and products the company assessed with.

Personal brands, seen superficially, are not multiplicative: a person who has double face (see politicians) and therefore not able to form a consistent and concrete personal brand, are subject to lose their reputation and their face rapidly. This is because brands can have only one concrete (credible) story, without major contradictions. The multiplicative nature of personal brands should be investigated from another perspective. In case we regard a person’s appearances in public as concretizations and multiplications of his/her brand, we are closer to the truth and we understand better why celebrities and politicians are so keen on public appearances.

Fourth pillar: Unique proposition

The history of branding is stemming from the wish of making a producer’s goods identifiable. This is not just to ensure the identity of goods but also to prevent from copying and forgery. The brands around us are still carrying these old attributes: the logo of the company/brand is expressing the uniqueness of a brand (supported by law as trade marks) and helps us to identify a specific brand in the universe of brands and signs.

Sometimes it is very hard to make distinction based on the products/services alone: Pepsi and its rivals put in a neutral glass next to each other are unidentifiable, so the use of branding techniques is crucial for gaining profit for both companies. Just like in the cola case, the technological industry also heavily relies on the branding when selling its products or services: PCs, laptops, smart phones or internet accesses are very similar to each other. Or, a tax advisory service consultant firm is facing real challenges to provide specific brand vision.

Task 4: find and use the means of brand differentiations

The unique proposition of the brands has to be built up and shown for the public: the individual logos of brands on devices for example help the company to make distinction from their competitors and help the customers to identify different market players in order to make a personal choice of preference. Most times companies heavily rely on the unique brand distinguishers, like stories about their unique market segment, tailor-made products, additional services they provide etc. Sometimes, when stories among a group of competitors are very similar or compatible (like the Big Four Auditors) and even their service is similar, a common story may evolve around them focusing on more the similarity and indirectly expressing the exclusivity of the group members.

Fifth pillar: Value

When we identify a brand on its telltale signs (e.g. design) or logo we do not think on what we see first (the product itself) but rather we focus on the brand value represented by the specific product or service. We may say (even without seeing the product) that if you are having Martin Logan stereo speakers that is very cool, but if you are having Philips that is not so awesome. Different brands represent different values: there are low-end and high-end brands with many in between. Start-up companies have to position their brand value on the axis predetermined by the existing market players. Making decision on positioning the companies’ services or products on the lower or higher end of this axis has nothing to do with ethical values: a low-end, cheap car helps many disabled or poor people without doubt. Rather, making the choice of brand values determine the market we are about to target. And this target market decision affects our business outlooks directly. When Toyota launched it Lexus series and decided to focus on the higher end cars they probably considered the higher profit option.

The value of a brand is also expressed in a more measurable way. In general ledgers brands are valued as a part of the company’s goodwill and are very sensitive for new product introductions and for amortization, too. From financial point of view brands regarded as assets that have been created due to investment and are also subject to lose or increase their values.

Task 5: define and carry brand values

The value of a brand emanates into individual products of a company and the value of the sold products affects the value of the brands. More surprisingly, the value of a brand may transfer over the buyer persona influencing the perceived value of a person in a certain group of people (see Apple fan-effect) while the network-effect of the public also modifies the brand value (exclusivity, limited models are also able to increase brand value).

The relative price of a product or the whole branded portfolio both has very special connection with the brand value: the higher the price positioned the harder to imagine low brand value. This is because the narrative of the price (see Second pillar) influences the brand value. Other narratives of a brand (how durable it is, for instance, or which celebrities are using this brand) heavily effect the brand value, too. Similarly, the extent of public spread (see First pillar – how much the brand is known, how much spent on advertising) also effects the brand value.

Brand value is determined by several other factors even not listed here. It is partly the result of deliberate actions of the company (market positioning of the brand and its products) but also exposed to external factors (like time) and public opinion.( LG’s rebranding from the low-end Goldstar brand to the higher positioned LG showed that value propositions of a brand require efforts in both areas. Grundig made the opposite U-turn when sold to Chinese company.)

Sixth pillar: personal relation

All the pillars encountered previously are summoning on personal level because the nature and the definition of branding 100% relates to human feelings and perceptions. Most cases we can translate this personal effect and feelings to perceived brand values and the position of a brand in the customers’ head. People know or do not know, like or dislike brands, become haters or fans of brands, recommend or just accept certain brands.

Task 6: turn personal relation to action

As a result, this personal disposition of a brand clearly ends up in the relation to the act of buying. We, marketing professionals should not deny the aboriginal intention of our branding efforts to influence buying decisions on personal level. We are not just simply influencing people in business for the sake of general human aims: we do not want world peace; we do want to have our specific products and services sold. We want to convince John or Clair Smith as individual customers to select our service or product. This is the action we – or more generally: the investors – expect from any investments (including brand campaigns) made.

Fortunately we not all live in the business sector, not all follow business aims (i.e. sales) in our lives. Surprisingly, non-profit organizations are not so much different from business ventures from this point of view. Non-profits also want to have a specific action to be reached: an action that is maybe appearing directly (like giving donation for starving people) but can be mental action or change to be targeted (for instance diversity campaigns).

The personal relation to a branded entity can be outlined in a matrix where on the first axis we can define the readiness or probability of buying action (or in a non-profit: readiness for action) and on the second axis we may highlight the level of brand’s emotional acceptance.

The personal relation to a specific brand with regards to the ultimate sales reason can be mapped as shown, but we should not forget that personal emotions and relations to brands are much wider than presented above: some people feel that their beloved brand is expressing also their way of life, involving several other actions well beyond a simple shopping; or just feeling neutral about a brand while the person is not going to be represented in any commercial situation (like myself with any hunting brands, although I know some of them).

We should therefore identify very precisely the personal relations to our brand of our existing and potential customers and we should make focused actions to harvest the branding efforts we have previously made.

Seventh pillar: Exposure to time

We have already mentioned before the amortization as an important factor in brand values. The simple reason of amortization is that the brands (via materialized products/services) and the customers live in time.

The general life exposure to time factor represented in concrete shapes with regards to brand itself and to its specific products/services. (Amortization is only the result of that process.) Brand perception very much effected by the products/services in timeline (e.g. how much up-to-date the product is reflects the brand’s state-of-the-art nature) and on the other hand the brand itself (without looking at individual products) also has an individual character which has its own life-cycle (how old a brand is, what type of products they represent).

Task 7: Consider time: plan and replan over time

Brands do not last for ever and are changing over time, even without deliberate actions. Amortization expresses the time-factor in economic terms but all the pillars mentioned before has a time layer. The

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Branding a Winery and Its Wine Is Expensive, Necessary and Benefits the Consumer No Matter the Size

A discussion about branding is generally not a conversation anticipated with excitement. If you’re a marketing type it can be characterized as maybe interesting. But, promising most people an indepth discussion on the subject of wine branding; heck, we might have no one accepting an invitation to our dinner party. In reality, creating a brand image for wineries and wines can help the consumer to be smart buyers.

Because margins can be small for producers and a perponderance of producers are small, small margins impact the small producer profoundly. Branding can be expensive. So what can be done to entice consumers to try a brand they have never heard of before? Now we are talking about branding and it can be risky, even with great planning. Further, it is a lot of compromising.

What impact did branding have on the last bottle of wine you bought? Did you buy that wine because you knew some enticing fact about the winery, winemaker or their wine making processes? Did you buy a wine based upon a friend’s recommendation because they knew your preference for a certain varietal? Have your preferences for a wine changed over the past few years? Do you buy your wine based upon a random trial and found you liked that particular wine? Whatever the process you went through in buying a wine you have been impacted, to some degree, by branding. If you simply selected a wine based upon its price or label design, branding was involved.

Recently, I have had discussions concerning the process of business branding from a corporate perspective and a product perspective. Most of the emphases of these discussions have been specific to the value of branding a winery and their wines; predominately with small producers. Like most everything in business, decisions are generally based upon compromises in budgets, approach, etc. Obviously, the product of a winery is bottles of various varietal wines which are a disposable product that is consumed based upon ever changing sensory perceptions–mostly taste. I submit that the juxtaposition in branding a winery and their products makes this discussion difficult. For example, many wines I like and buy frequently, I don’t even know who produces them. Further, winery brands I recognize, some of their wines I don’t like for various subjective reasons.

Point being, in most branding discussions relating to the wine industry become convoluted. Wineries produce multiple labels and these labels are subjected to consumer reviews that are based on innumerable personal influences. With so many variables, the task of presenting a positive image about a corporate winery brand is difficult.

We all are influenced by branding to some degree, even minimally. For example, a few years ago Tide was going to stop sponsoring NASCAR races. Surprisingly, they found that Tide had a rabid and loyal following with female NASCAR fans and Tide is still a sponsor. The brand had made a commitment and now wanted to change it.

Another example of branding impact is Schlitz beer. In the late 1960’s Schlitz decided to change their formula for brewing their beer. Immediately they went from a premier label, ahead of Budweiser, to being virtually extinct. In 2008, they went back to their original formula of the 1960’s, but the damage to a great brand was permanent.

These examples of powerful brands are obvious. In the case of Schlitz it shows how fragile a brand can be if the consumer is betrayed. However, wine is not a mass market product (like beer) that is as ubiquitous as beer or a laundry detergent. Compared to wine, consumers do not build beer cellars in their home and collect beer. So, wine is a very unique product that is expensive to brand on a per customer basis (this is especially true when consumers understand the discounting needed for distributors to sell and promote a label (discounting is part of the branding strategy).

The demographics for the wine market are broken down into 5 segments with some under 21 years old in the millennial category. This is according to a Wines and Vines Newsletter. The largest segment of wine drinkers are the millennia’s and Generation xers making up 70% of the 5 market segments (Baby Boomers included). Wine Business Monthly estimates 1 of 4 drinking consumers do not drink wine but prefer beer or spirits. Of the 130 million adult populations it is estimated 35% drink some wine, according to Live Science. This illustrates the finite size of the market and the precision required in branding to be effective in developing a consumer’s perception of a corporate winery brand.

For this discussion on winery branding, Wines and Vines tells us that the average price of a bottle of wine keeps inching up and is now approximately $12. The real sweet spot is in the $10-15 per bottle range. When a winery looks at the cost of raw materials, marketing, packaging, sales/discounting and facilities and G/A the margins are restrictive when planning a new or improved branding program. Wineries in this position need volume and a 5,000 case run makes branding challenging, but not impossible.

Using the best information available for this discussion, we assume there are about 44% of the populations who do not drink any alcoholic beverages. Based upon population distribution within the 5 demographic segments there are approximately 65 million people who drink some wine at least monthly. We will assume here that they will buy approximately 3-4 bottles of wine per month (probably a generous assumption). This information could account for the purchase of approximately 220 million bottles of wine in the US. These purchaseswould be for home consumption with an additional amount for restaurant sales and meeting/convention sales.

Here is where the branding issues become real. There are 8,500 wineries in the U.S. 80% of these wineries produce 5,000 cases or less of wine. To add perspective, Gallo produces in excess of 80 million cases of wine in a year for worldwide sales. Keeping with the small producer for the moment, this wine is sold via the winery tasting room, winery wine clubs, on-line (Direct to Consumer), retailers (which includes grocery stores) via Three Tier Distribution that requires discounting to the distributors for retailer discounts, sale commissions, promotions and their advertising.

Remember, there has been no discussion of the wines that are imported from Italy, France, Chile, Argentina, Spain, Portugal, South Africa, New Zealand and Australia. This is important because these producers/importers are worried about branding their products also; this causes a lot of clutter in the market.

It is probably apparent there are large producers, from all over the world, selling wine in America. Some wines do enjoy strong brand recognition such as Yellow Tail from Australia or Gallo from Lodi, CA. Beringer, Mondavi, and Coppola in Napa Valley are also high in brand recognition. In Sonoma we have Kendall Jackson and Rodney Strong. Interestingly, it takes strong revenue and profits to build a brand and if you are a small producer the money it takes for consumer branding activities is prohibitive. We need to always remember every brand (corporate or product) must be positioned differently as an image.

We see that sales of 4 or 5 bottles of wine per month to U.S. consumers is a daunting task just to get trials of the product. This is one of several reasons why wineries are spending more on improving direct sales through their tasting rooms, wine clubs, on-line (Direct to Consumer) sales and social media.

Let’s talk about corporate winery branding. The industry needs an honest relationship with consumers. Otherwise the customer belongs to the 3 Tier Distributor or wine store and the sale becomes exponentially expensive going forward. A winery must define their image, product niches, consumer profile and be targeted to the consumer with a message specific to their targeted consumer. Wine Business.com reports that the vast majority of wine consumers buy wine based upon taste. But, taste is only one of the differentiators. Obviously, wineries have to get the taster.

Branding

Effective branding is about bringing a corporate name, the company’s products, or the services to be top of mind awareness for the customer. A product may even have more recognition/branding than the company name. For example, Kleenex is more recognized than Kimberly Clark which manufacturers Kleenex. That is fine.

Wine is mostly sold, not by a winery name or a label but first through price. Of the 10,000 plus varietals in the world, California has mostly focused on maybe 25 varietals for wine and wine blending. This fact makes it even harder to brand a winery when people look for price first and varietal in third place according to Dr. Thach and Dr. Chang. Number two is branding.

Now consider the changes impacting the wine business. The industry is now impacted with labels and brands announcing: organic wines, sustainable wines, and bio-dynamic farming wines.These add a new twist to branding considerations. Over the past few years there are some trying to brand lower alcohol levels, and medals. Talk about branding overload.

Branding Impact

Wineries must recognize, after the decision is made to add focus to the company and/or its products, the company branding effort must be impacted throughout the organization. It will require constant development, refinement, monitoring, and administration. Finally, a corporate identity must become the culture at the winery. In Dr. Thach and Dr. Chang 2015 survey of: American Wine Consumer Preferences, 61% of their respondents had visited multiple wineries in California alone. This means, if a branding message being put out into the marketplace is not part of the winery culture the brand will be diminished. Consumers will see that culture in action at the winery.

Marketing is not all there is to branding, but it is significantly ahead of number two. Marketing is part of branding because it touches and introduces the brand to consumers, retailers, vendors and the community. There are many large companies that spend vast sums of money on building corporate brand without selling specific products. Boeing is such a company; consumer does not buy $300 million airplanes however they do respond to image.

Finally, companies/brands must protect their image at all costs. Once the Branding Plan (akin to a business plan) is developed, with a good foundation of research and winery metrics, that plan will dictate many things. For example: product launches and new product launches, dictate the messages coming from the company, employee hiring, PR, packaging, and the list encompasses every department is a winery.

Elements to Illustrate Branding Tasks

· Bottle labels and winery logo-Label creativity is still at the mercy of the TTB (Alcohol & TobaccoTax and Trade Bureau) relative to label content. Still it is part of the image that appears to the consumer on the shelf; it’s an identifier.

· Marketing/advertising/sales/collateral materials/PR/Sponsorships are front and center. The consumer facing image is throughout–club, on-line and tasting room sales and mailing list. Give consumers value beyond just the product.

· Training plan-Training must be centric to developing and reinforcing a new branding strategy. Employees at all levels must buy into the corporate and product positioning, not just public contact employees.

· Packaging is an element that ties the label and logo message together. In wine branding even the bottle shape and weight, closures (screw caps/cork/synthetic cork), capsules/foils, all go into the branding perceptions.

· Product consistency-Consumers who eventually accept a brand expect consistency. As the saying implies-If it isn’t broke, don’t fix it.

· Website, blog and social media are major elements to create, reinforce and maintain branding for products and corporate. Customer feedbacks will give almost immediate indications if the brand strategy is generating desired results and achieving benchmarks.

With wineries producing many varietal and blended wines under their corporate brand it is probably more important that the winery brand be face forward. This is a personal opinion and probably will vary based upon ownerships’ strategies for the business. For example, if a winery wanted to position the property for a sale then branding would have a different approach than a launch of a new label.

If you are a wine consumer the branding activity can be entertaining and enlightening. For example, as a consumer we enjoy winery tastings, but the chances of visiting more than a handful of wineries may be out of the question. But with so many wines and so little time, part of the fun is exploring new wines. For a winery, branding really becomes important and especially if your small but want to create a brand that meets your business expectations for a 5, 10 or 20 year time frame.

There are many occasions when I go into a Total Wines or BevMo or our grocery store, just to do fun research. With a note pad and a magnifying glass (required because of age and fine print) I will read labels for information-winery, blending, and a little of the hype. Coming home I will look up the winery website, read about their wines and form an opinion about the brand simply based on the feel of the site, label designs, the winemaker, and past awards (although that is not all that important). If I am interested I sometimes even call a winery to ask questions about the winery, owners and style of winemaking.

Amazingly, the majority of the time the people answering my questions are ill prepared.

Importance of research is not appreciated by consumers and producers. Research focuses on industry matters, winery/winery products and competition concerning the following: image, price, products, promotions, lace, historical data and competition (brands). This data will eventually direct the Branding Plan efforts.

Knowing the consumer, defining the future plans of the winery and product directions, now is the time to get to work on the business of branding. Half of the effort is about where the winery wants to go and how the winery gets there. Research gives a path. A branding without a written plan bought into by employee implementers is called gambling.

For the purpose of discussion we will assume a winery has not really focused on branding and this would be an early effort at branding. Or, maybe the current branding is not generating the desired results; then a change is in order. Sometimes branding is only to build awareness or it is image branding. If a customer can’t tell a winery’s researcher their perceptions/attributes of a wines brand then branding efforts have weaknesses.

Moving forward with the data points from industry research and the research initiated by the winery, a branding plan must be developed that focuses on the corporate brand image as well as the wines (products).

Mission Statement versus Objectives is always confusing. Some companies want a Mission Statement as a starting point of a branding plan. I am the exception to this rule; most Mission Statements I have been involved with are actually too esoteric and enigmatic to be useful throughout the organization. However, most everyone can relate to an “objective” statement as opposed to a “mission”. Here is the Mission Statement from Constellation Brands who owns Robert Mondavi-“Building brands that people love. “Their Vision statement reads-“To elevate life with every glass raised.” Do these statements resonate with you as a wine drinker? (By the way, this is not meant as a slight to Constellation Brands which is a highly successful company that has an impressive portfolio of brands) Answer this question relative to the Vision and Mission statement of any of their brands or the corporate brand image: What is your top of mind awareness of Constellation Brands after reading these statements?

In developing a branding plan objective and strategy, be focused on what the all encompassing goals are so that along the way most employees and consumers understand the message.

If this is the first time to work on a branding plan it might be best to focus on a Corporate/Winery branding strategy and let that strategy support branding objectives for the wine products. Branding is ultimately building the public’s (wine consumers) impression of the winery and the products.

For example, in the 1980’s whenever someone mentioned Robert Mondavi Wines I thought instantly of a winery with community involvement, arts, food, innovation and quality control. I drank a lot of their wines because of that image. After some turmoil, of which I know little about, I started buying other brands because my perception of the image became tarnished (to me). After Mr. Mondavi became distant for the brand it just lost some appeal. Point is a corporate brand built my perception of the wines.

After a Brand Plan objective is determined, based upon research results and the vision of the owners/managers, the specific strategies and plan-of-action items are developed by all winery departments. Think of the Objective as a military operation. Taking a hill is the objective, no more specific than that. Strategies are the options to achieve that objective.

There is always a cost associated with any launch of a branding program or even maintaining a brand. The impetus of the effort is marketing driven as that is the face of the company. Based upon revenues, cost of distribution (wine club, direct to consumer, distributors, on-line, tasting room), and product associated costs, the branding effort will dictated by a series of complex decisions; not all of which will be revenue or profit motivated.

The branding campaign can simply start off by maximizing existing marketing programs to incorporate new branding ideas. For example, add an updated logo to collateral materials or posters or point-of-sale cards. Improve e-mail communications to mail list, club members, retailers and even editors/bloggers at trade publications.

Not that the importance of branding needs further reinforcement, I digress. There was a research study conducted by Dr. Liz Thach and Dr. Kathryn Chang and published in WineBusiness.com. A question in that study ask respondents: When making a decision on which wine to purchase what were the two most important factors? 72% said price was the most important consideration, followed by brand as the second most important consideration at 67%. Interestingly, varietals were about half as important (36%) as price. The most common price range for wine bought for home consumption (32%) was $10-15 with 19% purchasing wine averaging $15 to 20 a bottle. For branding purposes 51% of the wine consuming market is buying wine in the <$20 per bottle. Point is, price is a driver in any branding. "Wine is regarded as an "experience good (sic)" in that wine purchase of a specific brand is a personal choice and usually made after tasting. However, many consumers do not have the choice and often rely on experts and friends to help decide which wine to purchase, Nowadays, they are more likely to use social media," as reported by K. Newman in "How Wine Lovers Use Social Media and K. Breslin in Presentation of Constellation Digital Marketing. Just remember the old axiom-The best laid plans of mice and men often go awry. Here is an example of plans that don't work out. Reported in Wines and Vines on November 11, 2015, Truett-Hurst Winery posted $800,000 in charges related to its Paper Boy brand, which had sought to use a unique bottle composed of cardboard with a plastic liner. This is the primary reason why making sure progress toward benchmarks are monitored and tested with good research. Dr.'s Thach and Chang summarize branding precisely, relative to wine: · Focus branding message on relaxation and social benefits of a brand. · Adopt social media platforms to interact with consumers and get their feedback. There are conflicting views on the value of social media in marketing wines, but it is probably wise to pay attention to trends and how to use the phenomenon. · Work with distributors to make sure wines are available in outlets. Distributors need care and attention so they understand the branding direction a winery and enforce a branding strategy with retailers. · Whatever the price point a winery wants their products to be in, the brand must support that message. The sweet spot is $10-15 but if the cost structure in the product does not allow that pricing then there are obvious choices a winery must make. · Wine tourism is a great way to brand which spills over into the social media, peer reviews and recommendations and word of mouth promotion. · Through research, keep abreast of competitive tactics. Here are some thoughts that pertain to social media branding. "A lot of mediocre wine is being sold on the basis of a 'story'." (Transpose "story" with "branding".) "That's a quote from a New York somm, Jason Jacobeit, cited in Lettie Teague's latest column in the Wall Street Journal," says Heimoff a wine writer. The following is another perspective on the value of social media in branding from Steve Heimoff. "I don't think these top 30 wineries consider social media as the most important of their "how to sell" strategies, rather, they focus on such traditional things as a trained sales force, pricing strategies, paying attention to consumer trends, forging good relationships with distributors and key accounts (on-premise and off-premise), courting wine writers (including bloggers) and a host of other proven best practices that social media has barely any impact on." The 30 top wineries referred to in Mr. Heimoff's blog come from Wine Business Monthly. The 30 companies represent nearly 90 percent of the domestic wine sold annually in the U.S. by volume." In fact, "The top companies themselv

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