Kotler and Armstrong in the year 2002 defined Brand Extension as a marketing strategy in which new products are introduced in relation to a successful brand.
Interesting things have come out of this extension business ranging from Dettol baby wipes to Park Avenue soap. Some of them more hilarious than the other. Some of them work well and some fail miserably like we have seen umpteen times over.
But this is FMCG, and products are placed and taken off shelves at the speed of missiles; just another day in the consumer business…
Unfortunately this isn’t the case when it comes to media, media companies and brand extensions and this is strangely ignored very often by media owners and leaders. The essential premise with which a brand’s value and goodwill is extended to the other rests on the fact that the extension will eventually give back to the mother brand.
Planets in the umbra of a solar system must give back in plenty to the Sun and this is the success of a brand extension.
Either the extension must add to the volume or value of the trunk brand. Extensions in media are often stupas built at breakneck speed without enough thinking and often do nothing but dd to the overheads of the company in question.
I have seen several examples of this kind of drain and wasteful expenditure in my years of consulting.
Often germinated around an idea or concept that the media owner wishes to see come alive, these extensions do nothing to boost the sales or the revenue of the mother brand be it a newspaper or TV channel.
Fancy names, serious noise levels, spanking new offices, conferences and seminars and eventually just a bigger dent in the coffers. This time and resource utilised well could actually bolster performance for the trunk brand but that is totally a different matter!
Brand extensions must be planned keeping in mind a symbiotic relationship with the trunk brand and careful evaluation plays the key here.
Feel the pulse and extend when you know the new fledgling will benefit from the name and perceived brand value. And yes, a Nirma ice cream will not work, despite them significant players in the detergent market !
Every brand that has stood the test of time has a loyal audience that values it for ‘x’ reasons and associates a certain persona with the name and brand imagery. To expect them to get enticed by the same imagery with a new product category is fool hardy unless there is a seamless blend onto a suitable category or genre of product.
For God’s sake, do not create stupas to pamper your ego or conceptualisation skills, both of which already occupy positions of pre-eminence.
Focus on your core and do not tamper with the nucleus of your business. A Cash-cow today could be a ‘dead-cow’ tomorrow and this is an eventuality that may need consideration!
Brand extensions are not meant to make the world a better place to live in and change the way the society behaves. They are meant for a specific purpose and that is to bring additional revenue and value through a symbiotic relationship with the mother brand. It would be prudent to understand this, lest company coffers are emptied for extensions and extended extensions that do nothing more than gather dust on excel sheets in board rooms.
Do not tamper with your core brand’s wiring and overload it’s capacity to
perform effectively. Let it just do it’s job of propelling customer value and growth.
# The views expressed in this column are the author’s and Pune365 does not necessarily subscribe to them.
Jd also consults in Consumer Neuroscience and Neuromarketing, both of which are integral to his brand interventions.
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