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Industry Trends
  • Posted by Jason Hensel at
    12:00AM 06/12/2012 • 1 Comments

    Brands as Connectors

    I’m currently in Baltimore, Maryland, attending the Association Media & Publishing Annual Meeting. In addition to accepting One+’s gold award for magazine general excellence from the organizers, I’m attending many of the event’s professional development sessions.

    One of the most interesting sessions was the opening keynote “Why We Buy, Why We Brand” presented by Debbie Millman. It was a fascinating anthropological investigation about, well, branding.

    Millman started by taking the audience down the branding history road. A couple of interesting trivia bits included that the word brand comes from “brond,” which is in the epic poem Beowulf from 1010 A.D. Also, the world’s first trademark was for Bass Pale Ale, a beer. Humanity, of course, has its priorities straight.

    We were then presented by the various waves of branding. The first wave (1875-1920) of brands guaranteed quality and consistency, with package goods equalling signified premiums and expectations of safety.

    Morton SaltBranding’s second wave (1920-1965) brought on anthropomorphization. Metaphor was injected into a brand. This wave was popular, and still is, because people love puzzles, they love figuring out what a logo or image means for a brand. For example, the Morton Salt girl is walking in the rain trailing salt behind her. The slogan is “When It Rains It Pours.” Trying to figure out why Morton says that is part of the fun (Morton figured out a way to cause salt to pour from a container even in humid weather is the answer). Another reason this wave is popular is because people can relate to and project onto characters. The next time you’re in a grocery store check out children’s cereal boxes. All of the characters eyes will be looking down toward the children who are looking up to them.

    The third wave (1965-1985) was all about self-expressive statements, that a brand could provide status. If you’re a Mad Men fan, you’ll see this wave in the pitches that Don and Peggy present to clients for Jaguar and Heinz.

    Wave four (1985-2000) was the experience era, with experiential marketing a popular tactic.

    Now we’re in the fifth wave of branding. Humans are at their happiest when they feel attachment to other people. However, one-in-three current households are comprised of one person (compared to one-in-10 in 1950). Because of this, our brains have found new ways to connect to others. In the current wave we’re in, brands act as connectors.

    Your event, your meeting, is a brand. Its sole purpose is connections. This could mean connections to content to new business to new friends. If you’re not thinking of your event in this way, if you’re not even thinking of yourself this way as a meeting professional, then you’re behind the times.

    Sure, it’s fine to have a status symbol attached to your event’s brand. Or maybe your brand’s event creates an experience. But without that final piece, the connection, your event will come up sorely lacking. Who wants to attend an event where they don’t bring back any new ideas, business, or friends? No one that I know.



  • Posted by Jason Hensel at
    12:00AM 08/29/2011 • 0 Comments

    Facebook Enhances Customer Perception

    It appears that a Facebook page breeds confidence in a company's brand. According to a Polaris Marketing Research Inc. study of U.S. consumer usage of company Facebook pages, 25 percent of Internet users agree “strongly” with the statement, “If a company has a Facebook page, it means they are interested in what customers have to say.” Another 51 percent agreed “somewhat” with this statement.

    When asked how much they agreed with the statement “If a company has a Facebook page, I tend to think more highly of their products or services,” 9 percent of online Americans agreed “strongly” and another 33 percent agree “somewhat.”

    “Not only is Facebook a valuable tool for gaining feedback, it appears that simply having a Facebook page can enhance consumers’ perceptions of a company’s brand.” said Polaris President Jan Carlson.

    This finding, though, did not vary strongly across demographics. Only males and older respondents (50 years plus) were less likely to agree with the statement “If a company has a Facebook page, it means they are more interested in what customers have to say.” The statement “If a company has a Facebook page, I tend to think more highly of their products and services” showed no variation by respondent demographics.

    Fully 53 percent of online Americans claim to have “liked” a company’s Facebook page in the past 60 days. Conversely, only 15 percent of online Americans indicate that they have “unliked” a company’s Facebook page in the past 60 days.

    “Facebook is an important marketing tool for businesses," Carlson said. "In our survey, in addition to liking companies’ Facebook pages, 25 percent of online Americans had posted a comment to a company’s Facebook page, indicating that Facebook is a valuable source of consumer feedback as well."

    Company Facebook page activity also varied by demographics: 

    • Female respondents were significantly more likely to “like,” “unlike” and comment on a company Facebook page than their male respondent counterparts.
    • Respondents under the age of 35 were significantly more likely to give feedback to companies via their Facebook pages.
    • Income and ethnicity are not related to a respondents likelihood to “like,” “unlike” or comment on a company’s Facebook page.
    • Respondents in the Western U.S. were least likely to “like,” “unlike” or comment on a company’s Facebook page.


    Polaris conducted online surveys with a representative sample of 1,000 U.S. consumers during the week of July 18, 2011.



  • Posted by Jason Hensel at
    12:00AM 04/20/2011 • 0 Comments

    Measuring Brand Personalities

    Companies spend millions to develop their brand’s personality in hopes that it can help sell products. But they’ve had no way of measuring whether that personality actually appeals to consumers. Now, research from North Carolina State University lays out a system for measuring the appeal of a brand’s personality.

    “We developed this means of measuring brand personality appeal (BPA) so companies can figure out how favorably their brand personality is viewed by consumers—and what they can do to enhance that personality’s appeal to their market,” said Dr. David Henard, an associate professor of business management at NC State and co-author of a paper describing the study.

    The concept of brand personality helps consumers form attachments to specific brands. For example, Apple has its “I’m a Mac…And I’m a PC” campaign, which brands its products as young and hip. But does that brand personality actually get people to buy anything?

    “Until now, researchers have only been able to determine whether a company has a brand personality,” Henard said. “The only existing scale was Aaker’s Brand Personality Scale, which could determine whether a brand personality is rugged, sophisticated, competent, exciting or sincere. What we've done here is develop a system that digs deeper to help companies link brand personality to concrete outcomes. For example, does the brand personality actually make people want to buy their product?”

    The researchers first broke BPA down into three components: favorability, originality and clarity. Favorability is how positively a brand personality is viewed by consumers. Originality is how distinct the brand personality is from other brands. Clarity is how clearly the brand personality is perceived by consumers. For example, Ford trucks are clearly recognized as having a “rugged” brand personality. A brand personality’s appeal is determined according to the interaction of these three variables.

    The researchers then used these three variables to establish a measurement system for BPA. The system consists of 16 questions that provide information on each of the three BPA variables. The questions can be applied to any brand personality, from Mercedes Benz to Mary Kay. By assessing consumer responses to these 16 questions, a brand personality is graded on its overall favorability, originality and clarity.

    For example, a company may find that its brand personality has a moderate rating on favorability, but is viewed as highly original and clearly defined. High marks for originality and clarity make the brand personality more appealing than the moderate favorability rating might indicate. It also tells a company that it needs to focus its efforts on improving its favorability rating, rather than distinguishing itself from competitors, in order to boost the brand personality’s overall appeal.

    “This work gives us a much more thorough understanding of how the mechanics of brand personality work on consumers,” Henard said.

    The paper, “Brand personality appeal: conceptualization and empirical validation,” was co-authored by Henard; Dr. Traci Freling, of the University of Texas-Arlington; and Dr. Jody Crosno, of West Virginia University. The paper is forthcoming from the Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science.

    (Story materials provided by North Carolina State University.)