Description
Report
Give consideration to a brand that you feel has underperformed in recent years. This need not be a major brand, but it does need to have a commercial presence in the Business to Consumer market and, for your own sake, you should be able to find a reasonable amount of information to make your case.
This information might include a history of the brand, corporate financial statements reflecting current performance, etc. You need not conduct primary research for your summative assessment, although any primary data (e.g. findings from interviewing a relevant brand manager) may obviously be used to add value to your report.
You are not restricted to the UK market, but please do heed the guidance above with respect to the accessibility of information. It is strongly recommended that you do some background research prior to deciding on a particular brand. If in doubt, please liaise with your tutor.
As a rough guide, you will be expected to address the following in your report:
• Discuss the profile of the brand, including relevant market statistics to indicate its current standing in the market. Be sure to include mention on key sources of brand equity (LO a).
• Now discuss the individual brand elements that collectively form the constituent components of the brand (LO a).
• Explore the brand positioning in its current form, noting points-of-parity and points-of-difference (LO b).
• Apply the various layers of Keller’s “CBBE (Brand Resonance) Pyramid” and/or the dimensions of Kapferer’s “Brand Identity Prism” (LO b).
• How does the brand manage relationships with consumers? Does the brand have alliances with other brands (e.g. co-branding, ingredient branding) or people (i.e. celebrity endorsement)? Is there a specific brand architecture in evidence? (LO b).
• How does the brand track and measure performance over time? Be sure to discuss suitable metrics which are used, or may be used, by brand managers (LO b).
• With a view to making strategic recommendations for the way forward, why do you surmise the brand has not performed at its best? You may refer to issues such as intensity of competition, scandals involving the brand, lack of resources, etc (LO c).
• Lastly, critically and systematically discuss how best your brand should address the deficiencies unearthed in your analysis, stating what you believe to be pertinent strategic recommendations. Be sure to consider new products and brand extensions in your response. You should also aim to recognise and incorporate any insights from SDG’s 8, 9 and 12 that might moderate purely commercial objectives in growing and developing your brand (LO c & d).
Extremely important: You will need to use relevant concepts and theories from the module to support the above analysis.
You need not address these objectives in any set order. Some issues might be more prevalent than others. In fact, you may encounter difficulties in finding all of the information above. The structure of your report needs to be logical and cover the majority of the ground detailed above. However, there is no prescribed structure per se.
