Summary of Brand relevance making competitors irrelevant- David A. Aaker

Summary of Brand relevance making competitors irrelevant- David A. Aaker

This book clearly defines the concept of brand relevance and shows what it takes to channel innovation and manage the competitive arena so that competition is reduced or eliminated. David Aaker explains how brand relevance drives market dynamics using dozens of illustrative case studies. He reveals how brand teams have turned away from destructive brand preference competition by making other brands irrelevant. Adopting Aaker’s brand relevance model-in which innovative offerings form categories and subcategories-provides dramatic opportunities for brand teams with insight and the ability to lead the market. Successful brand relevance competition involves four vital tasks: concept generation, concept evaluation, creating barriers to the competition and, critically, actively defining and managing the new category or subcategory. It also involves being on top of the market, the competition, and the technology so that they get the timing right, a crucial element of a successful brand relevance strategy.

The goal of this book is to show the way toward winning the brand relevance battle by creating categories or subcategories for which competitors are less relevant or not relevant at all. If a brand can become the exemplar brand that is used to define the category or subcategory, other brands would be at a disadvantage.

The key to finding a niche is to avoid the trap of focussing only on the heavy user, the large sweet spot in the market. Look instead at underserved segments, those for which the current offerings represent a compromise or that avoid the offering altogether because it is deficient or even repellent.

All firms place an emphasis on customers. A few, however, creates an intimacy that connects the offering to the customer on a more involving and passionate level and serves to define a subcategory. Intimacy can be created by shared interests.

Corporate social programs and efforts toward sustainable operations can serve as definers of a category or subcategory. Aaker says that a social program can add energy to a boring brand. The bottom line is that a firm’s involvement in a social program affects the company’s sales and loyalty.

The key to enduring success is to create barriers to competitor. The creation of a new category or subcategory can generate a marketplace in which the competitors are irrelevant and not considered or they are weakened. Brands that can create and manage new categories or subcategories making competitors irrelevant will prosper while others will be stuck in exhausting marketplace battles or will be losing relevance and market position.