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Brand Relevance, or Category Innovation
I am off to Japan to introduce the Japanese translation of my book Brand Relevance: Making Competitors Irrelevant. The Japanese version has a different title — Category Innovation. It’s actually a far better title, because it highlights the message of the book.
The only way to grow, with rare exceptions, is to engage in category innovation, to create a new category (or subcategory) and then manage the perceptions toward, the purchases of and loyalty toward that category. To that end, the brand should become the exemplar or representative of the category, but the focus should be on the category not on the brand. It should be “my category is better than your category” rather than “my brand is better than your brand.”
Winning is when the category is defined by “must haves” that the competitor lacks. As a result, competitors will not have the visibility and credibility to even be considered and will thus be irrelevant or weak at best. The goal is no longer to increase market share but rather to create a context in which the brand is dominant and there is no need for brand preference competition.
Category innovation will only be worthwhile if barriers can be created to keep competitors at bay or discourage them from entering at all. These barriers can include brand, scale, loyal customer base, technology, ongoing innovation or superior operations and execution. But they need to be resourced and managed over time.
Category innovation has such an upside. The Chrysler minivan had 16 years with no viable competition and sold over 12 million units. Enterprise Rent-A-Car went 35 years with little competition. Prius dominated its new category for over 10 years.
Virtually every category has a similar story.
Posted November 10, 2011 / Permalink
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Tags:
brand relevance
category innovation
chrysler
enterprise
japan
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Comments
This idea makes a lot of sense, intuitively. If a product cannot differentiate itself, how can it be noticed? Very frustrating for the legion of products which are very similar to competitors. I've seen large marketing dollars wasted in vain attempts to hook consumers emotionally (for lack of a differentiating benefit).
Which begs the question, what can a brand do if it honestly is not much different from the competition? What are those rare exceptions?
Mehdi, I have given two talks of Iran by video connection, I was impresed with the audience in each. DA
Frank, one way is expand the brand offering like with Avon Walk for Breast Cancer or Sophora’s Beauty Talk or Papers Baby Care and think of emotional and self-expressive benefits instead of functional ones.
Yes professor, and this is exactly why I think your books should be translated to those enthusiasts of brand knowledge in Iran.
Actually I had the same issue in my mind for a while: what other title could be considered for this book if it is to be translated to my language (Persian) someday??
I thought it could be something like "Find Your Island, Rule!".
Doesnt sound much academic, but is somehow mouthwatering
Anyway, its strange that your books have not been translated here in Iran - except of "Strategic Market Management" . It's a shame.
— Added by Mehdi on November 17, 2011