Okay first things first. The title is only to attract visitors to this post (if it can really do that!) and the post itself is not intended to liken either products to men or brands to women. What it does intend to do is clearly differentiate products from brands and make a point that brands sell in their own rights.
There’s an awful lot of debate going on about the (inter)relationship between products and brands. One theory suggests that products evolve into brands at some stage, another argues that products themselves are brands; the better the products, the stronger the brands. According to some others, brands exist to sell products and their primary job, if not the only job, is to promote and create awareness for the products they are meant to sell.
The basic problem with all these theories is that a lot of people still don’t understand what brands really mean. As I’ve already made clear in my earlier post, I am not a big fan of “defining” brands but I would still go with the “set of emotions and feelings” definition, which a lot of people seem to agree with. But what I’ve seen is that people don’t understand that these emotions and feelings are not for the products that companies try to sell under their respective brand names. Contrary to what engineers, product managers and (unfortunately) some brand managers would like to believe, people don’t have any feelings for the sound of a car’s engine, the feel of snickers or the taste of a cigarette.
In my opinion, the fundamental difference between products and brands is that products, by and large, satisfy functional needs whereas brands cater to emotional needs. Products are meant to clean our teeth, take us from place A to place B, quench our thirsts, and help us communicate and so on. But wearing a pair of comfortable snickers does not give us a killer instinct and drinking a fuzzy drink does not give us joy and happiness.
Brands do that. Brands give us a meaning, an identity. In that sense, brands attain an almost philosophical level of existence in our lives. Brands, and not products, make us feel happy, confident, sexy, smart, in control, secure and so on. I could never tell a difference between shaving gels but I always prefer to buy Gillette because I just feel more like a man! No girl has ever felt attracted to me because the way I smell but I still rely on Lynx every time I go clubbing! I have never missed a date or an appointment because of my ‘Titan’ watches but give me enough money and I would junk decades of association with them to buy a Patek Philippe!
What this really means is that products, on their own, have very little, if any at all, role to play in making us feel the way we feel about the brands under which they are sold. And great brands outperform, outlive and overshadow the products. Less than 50% of Apple’s revenues today come from its computer business. Nike’s Footwear division contributes just over 50% to the company’s overall revenues and whilst Harley Davidson’s motorcycle division is showing consistent decline in revenues, its general merchandise division is recording a steady growth.
People buy brands; not products. Customers pay a premium for the way certain brands make them feel. I would never buy a tangy drink if it doesn’t make me feel ‘cool’ and ‘non-conformist’, I would never buy a motorcycle if it doesn’t make me feel part of an exclusive ‘riders’ club’ and I would never wear a deodorant if it doesn’t make me feel like a Casanova. How better the product is or how well it satisfies my functional need (or not) is almost insignificant.
So the point is very simple. Products don’t evolve into brands but a strong brand idea could translate into great products. Strong products do not lead to strong brands but a strong brand idea could lead to great products. And great products led by a strong brand idea could lend credibility to, and play an intrinsic part, in the overall brand experience.
Moreover, the concept of brand has considerably evolved over the last decade or so to include not only product brands but also service brands, place brands, people brands and so on and in my opinion, the above argument applies to these brands as much as it does to product brands.
Clearly differentiating brands from products is extremely important from a strategic perspective and could have significant implications to the business as a whole. Exactly what those implications are and how a strong brand idea is central to the overall business follows in the next blog.
