BRAND HEALTH
Brand Health Tracking And
Competitive Edge
By Enock Wandera
C
utting out a competitive edge
in
the
current
marketing
environment is becoming more
and more challenging as consumer needs
and attitudes shift rapidly. Increased
choice is only part of the drivers for this
– we all know that in the past, consumers
would stay loyal to the few available
brands but with the emergence of variety
of competing brands, these loyalties have
slowly faded away as consumers begin to
view what is on offer as parity brands/
products. This means that every marketer
must now search for sources of competitive
edge or Points of Difference (PODs) that
cannot be duplicated and matched by
competition.
I always use the example of ATMs as
the simplest – around 20 years ago, some
banks did not have ATMs as an additional
channel and back then, as research
partners, we would confidently advise
clients to invest in ATMs because it was
a growing trend and would act as an edge
especially when supported with a wide
network. Back then, ‘visit to the banking
hall’ was the top channel.
Fast forward to now – ATMs are a basic
channel and the conversation has shifted
to digital with many banks focusing on
expanding digital whilst reducing banking
hall visits/transactions. I noted for
instance, in KCB’s 2017 integrated report,
A well thought out brand health tracking system
should answer fundamental questions that keep
a marketer awake such as: What are the funda-
mental drivers of brand equity within a specific
category? How healthy is my brand against the
competition? Why is the brand not responding
to my initiatives? How is my pricing initiative
affecting my brand’s perception? Why is the
brand doing well in some countries and not
others? What drives loyalty in this category?
32 MAL27/18 ISSUE
that 87% of transactions were non-branch
leaving only a small fraction as banking
hall related. Most, if not all banks, are
looking at this as well – going digital.
Gaining
competitive
edge
partly
depends on how any business makes
best use of its intangible assets that the
business can identify as unique and not
vulnerable to duplication by competition.
Such assets would include brands,
reputation, relationships, knowledge,
skill, competences, processes and systems.
How a business stays aware of these
key assets and leverages them to create
value – both in the short and long term,
would determine its performance in this
increasingly challenging environment.
In general, we learn that it is the unique
mix of brands that determines and
drives every single aspect of business –
from mainstream marketing to trade/
distribution or in other words, the balance
between the promise and the delivery. It
is therefore critical to track and measure
brands in such a way that it provides
insights and ideas needed to drive the
whole business into the future and
eventually grow the shareholder value.
A well thought out brand health tracking
system should therefore be able to answer
fundamental questions that keep a
marketer awake – such questions would