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Notes on Branding, Strategy, and Marketing Planning

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  • SESSION 1: What customer base you wanna target – Putting ourselves into the consumer’s shoes
  • WHAT IS A BRAND?
    • Intangible
    • Values
    • Personality
    • Storytelling
    • Perception
    • Lifestyle
    • Unique
    • Consistent
    • Satisfaction
    • Experience
    • Emotion
    • Status
    • Influential
    • Image
    • Reputation
    • Evolution
    • Focus
    • Mission and Vision
    • Flexibility
    • Connection
  • A BRAND IS: A set of differentiating promises which work together to bond a product to its consumers.
  • A brand ensures a consistent quality and a “superior” value for which consumers are ready to pay a price which is ultimately beneficial for the brand itself.
  • Origin: Did you know? “Brand” comes from the Old Norse brandr (“to burn”), as livestock owners marked their animals to identify them.
  • Why are brands important in life?
    • FOR CONSUMERS
    • Confidence, information & time efficiency (imagine a supermarket without brands, they make the purchase) – more convenient
    • Minimization of purchasing risk → trust
    • Satisfaction (delivery of expectations)
    • Identification & values
    • FOR COMPANIES
    • Loyalty & margin
    • Brand extensions & geo-expansions
    • Competitive advantage (protection, trademarks)
    • Benefits for trade
  • KEY TAKEAWAYS
    • Brand = differentiating promises that bond product to consumers
    • Brand quality and value justify a price that benefits the brand
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  • CREATING A BRAND: 3 key words to build a brand
    • Differentiation
    • Sweet Spot
    • Connection (feeling connected to other customers, identify and learn needs, shared principles)
  • Selling approach: When we try to sell something, we usually tend to talk more before we listen.
    • I need to get to know you and understand my target
  • BEST WAY OF SELLING: asking questions and observing the consumer
    • If you have two minutes, ask first questions and then adapt the observations to your pitch
  • COMPANY CENTRIC VS USER CENTRIC
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  • MARKETING IN THE CENTER OF STRATEGIC DECISIONS IN MANY COMPANIES
    • Marketing is not just about advertising – it influences and coordinates across internal departments (finance, sales, R&D, etc.) and external partners (suppliers, agencies, resellers).
    • It sits at the intersection, ensuring that strategy, execution, and customer focus are aligned throughout the business.
  • INTEGRATED MARKETING COMMUNICATION (IMC)
    • A planning process designed to assure that all brand contacts received by a customer or prospect for a product, service, or organization are relevant to that person and consistent over time.
    • In IMC, all actions should be delivering the same message to the same target.
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  • WHY BRANDING FUELS LONG-TERM GROWTH
    • Trust & loyalty – strong brands reduce risk for customers.
    • People buy familiar brands even when cheaper alternatives exist.
    • Example: Colgate dominates toothpaste shelves despite generics.
    • PRICING POWER (brand premium) – customers pay more for brands they love.
    • Example: Apple’s iPhones are 2–3x more expensive than competitors, yet sales grow.
    • CATEGORY EXPANSION – trusted brands can enter new markets.
    • Example: Virgin → music, airlines, finance, even space travel.
    • Uber Eats, Dove etc.
    • CULTURAL RELEVANCE – brands that connect with cultural movements grow faster.
    • Example: Dove’s Real Beauty campaign shifted beauty standards, making it a values-driven brand.
    • Brands and cultures are interrelated.
    • CONSISTENCY ACROSS TOUCHPOINTS – every interaction reinforces the brand promise.
    • Example: Starbucks – the same “third place” vibe globally, from Madrid to Mumbai.
  • WHAT IS STRATEGY IN MARKETING?
    • Beyond ads & promotions: creating long-term business value
    • This long-term plan: where do I compete, who is my target and how am I going to win
    • Marketing strategy = long-term plan to achieve competitive advantage by understanding customers, creating value, and building relationships.
    • FOCUS: Where to compete and How to win.
    • Not just campaigns → defines the direction of the business.
  • WHY IS STRATEGY IMPORTANT?
    • Provides focus → guides decisions across markets & segments.
    • Creates differentiation → makes the brand stand out.
    • Builds sustainable advantage → competitors can’t easily copy.
    • Drives long-term value → loyalty, pricing power, equity.
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  • SOME EXAMPLES OF STRATEGY IN MARKETING
    • Nike: “Just Do It” → sells empowerment, not sneakers. Sponsorships + inspirational storytelling → consistent growth for decades.
    • Coca-Cola: sells happiness and shared moments, not just soda. Global campaigns like “Open Happiness” and local activations keep it culturally relevant.
    • Tesla: no paid ads, but a powerful brand built on innovation + Elon Musk’s storytelling. Premium positioning fuels rapid growth.
    • Airbnb: went beyond lodging → “Belong Anywhere.” Build trust in strangers through brand narrative and reviews.
    • Apple: ecosystem + lifestyle brand. Customers stay loyal because they buy into an identity, not just gadgets.
  • 3 STAGES OF A MARKETING PLAN

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  • STP: segmentation, targeting and positioning
  • THE FIVE C’S – The logic: First we analyse the customer, company, competitors, context and collaborators. Then we create value and deliver it to finally capture it with the KPI’s
  • RWE: Five Guys - Stages of a Marketing Plan
    • In communication: How can we translate the value into a message
  • 1. CONTEXT
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  • What is context -> analysis of trends in the world (fast food), what is emerging.
    • Macroenvironment: General consumer trends; Marketing trends (activities/strategies brands use to stay relevant). Trends are inspired by technology or changing needs, help brands stay up to date while trying new things.
  • 2. COMPETITORS
    • How big is the market?
    • What is my market share and my competitors’?
    • What do they communicate and where?
    • How much do they grow or decrease?
    • What are the prices, promotions…?
  • How to analyse competitors (e.g., in case of Five Guys)
    • Where are the competitors offering
    • Placement and location
    • Prices
    • Market share
  • Perceptual Map
    • A perceptual map (positioning map) graph to show how consumers perceive brands in a sector.
    • Build with two attributes relevant for the industry (not always price and quality, but image-based ones like freshness, innovation, speed, luxury, sustainability, etc.).
    • The two attributes become the X and Y axes; plot brands accordingly. This helps identify clusters, gaps, and brand position.
  • Example: In the burger sector, map “freshness of ingredients” vs. “speed of service.” McDonald’s would be fast but less fresh; Five Guys would be fresh but slower.
  • 3. CUSTOMERS (the most important C)
  • In a highly competitive market, organizations are prioritizing customers and consumers at the center of their corporate strategies. True customer centricity goes beyond care services.
  • A customer-centric strategy means ensuring that product/service development and marketing are fully aligned with customers’ real needs.
  • CONSUMER INSIGHT (e.g., Nike “You can Do it”)
    • Consumer truth discovered through research, analysis, and observation.
    • Types of insights:
    • Inspirational, simple, real and relevant
    • Emotional or functional
    • Should be the foundation for action, but not the strategy itself.
  • The insight should be memorable: touch you, move you, or at least trigger an AHA!!
  • Should be written in consumer language and first person: “I feel that…"
  • Human insights: focus on humans, not the product (e.g., human empowerment)
  • UNIQUE VALUE PROPOSITION (UVP)
    • Empowering you to do more
    • Intangible
  • 4. COMPANY (internal analysis)
  • 5. COLLABORATOR
    • Analyze all groups of collaborators:
    • Suppliers
    • Resellers
    • Distribution firms
    • Marketing Agencies
    • Financial intermediaries
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  • SWOT ANALYSIS
    • Should include what is relevant, what direction is your strategy going; it’s like a summary. Mark in bold what is differentiating
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  • SMART OBJECTIVES
    • Needs to be SMART:
    • Specific: Clearly Defined
    • Measurable: Target to measure success/failure
    • Achievable: Challenging but not impossible
    • Realistic: Not too easy, not too difficult
    • Time-bound: Specify when
  • E.g.: Grow +2% in Revenue in 2013; Increase Penetration +0.5 pp in 2013 and 1 pp in 2014
  • TWO TYPES OF INTERRELATED OBJECTIVES:
    • BUSINESS OBJECTIVE
    • Volume/Value
    • Market Share
    • Profitability
    • Penetration: % Households
    • MARKETING OBJECTIVE
    • Average Purchase
    • Loyalty
  • These objectives are connected to the business objective.
  • MARKET SHARE
    • Percentage of the market held by a brand.
    • Example: Market = 1000 tons, €5,000,000
    • Share = 10% (example) or 12%
  • PENETRATION
    • Percentage of homes which consume a category or a brand.
    • Example: 14,000,000 homes in Spain
    • 5% Penetration: 700,000 Homes
    • Purchase: 140 g/year
    • Spend: €6/year
    • Example numbers: 100 tons and €600,000
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  • 4 STRATEGIC LEVELS
  • This comes before defining the positioning of the brands
  • LEVEL 1: CORPORATE STRATEGIC DECISIONS: Company Vision and Mission
  • LEVEL 2: PORTFOLIO MANAGEMENT: Overall vision of all the brands, setting priorities
  • LEVEL 3: BRANDS SEGMENTATION AND POSITIONING: Set the right target and positioning for your brand
  • LEVEL 4: BRAND MARKETING MIX: 4+3 P’s. Define all the marketing mix for your brand: Product, Price, Promotion, Placement + People, Processes & Physical evidence.
  • MARKETING PLAN – STRATEGY (STP)
    • In concept, marketing boils down to two questions:
    • (1) Which customers will we serve? and (2) How will we serve them?
    • The tough part is coming up with good answers to these simple-sounding questions.
    • Goal: create more value for the customers we serve than competitors do.
    • Steps:
    • Select customers to serve
    • Segmentation
    • Targeting
    • Create value for targeted customers
    • Decide on a value proposition
    • Differentiation
    • Positioning

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  • GEOGRAPHIC SEGMENTATION CRITERIA
    • Geographic segmentation divides the market into units: nations, regions, states, counties, cities, or neighborhoods.
  • DEMOGRAPHIC SEGMENTATION CRITERIA
    • Based on variables: age, life-cycle stage, gender, income, occupation, education, religion, ethnicity, generation
  • Age and life-cycle segmentation divides a market into different age and life-cycle groups.
  • Gender segmentation divides by gender.
  • Income segmentation divides by income level.
  • Demographic segmentation has limitations: sociodemographic groups are heterogeneous and fragmented and we may lack enough information to connect with them.
  • Example: American friends aged 20–30
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  • PSYCHOGRAPHIC BEHAVIOURIAL MOTIVATIONAL
  • Demographic segmentation can be stereotypical and wrong
  • PSYCHOGRAPHIC: divides market by social class, lifestyle, values, or personality
    • 1. Lifestyles: e.g., culture-oriented, health and wellness-oriented, “Calorie counters…”, gourmets, …
    • 2. Personality: e.g., aggressive, independent, friendly, tough, serious, …
    • 3. Values
  • BEHAVIORAL segmentation: divides by consumer knowledge, attitudes, uses of a product, or responses to a product
    • Based on:
    • Occasions
    • Benefits sought
    • User status: user, non-users, potential users, …
    • Usage rate: light, medium, heavy users of category
    • Loyalty status: loyalty to the brand
  • MOTIVATIONAL segmentation: segments by motivation (not individual), as humans have many and changing motivations in daily life. Not targeting a single individual but any individual with a specific motivation
  • EXAMPLE OF MOTIVATIONAL TARGETS:
    • People looking for feeling supported and fit into one group
    • People who challenge themselves continuously to go beyond their limits
  • POSITIONING AND DIFFERENTIATION
  • First, identify where we are playing and the main competitors
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  • POSITIONING
    • Positioning is the act of designing what a company offers in such a way it will occupy a distinct and valuable place in the consumers’ mind.
    • It defines the differential value of a company’s brand (product/service) that will be perceived by certain consumers relative to competitors.
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  • BRAND POSITIONING & STATEMENT
    • Brand positioning refers to the specific, intended meaning for a brand in consumers’ minds.
    • More precisely, a brand’s positioning articulates the goal that a consumer will achieve by using the brand and explains why it is superior to other means of accomplishing this goal
  • BRAND POSITIONING & STATEMENT – Strategic place we want to occupy in our customers’ minds, in order to create value for them and be different in the market.
  • The positioning is inside our consumers’ mind; we communicate it but it’s finally the consumer who builds it in their mind
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  • 4 Elements to include in the statement:
    1. Target: Selection of your strategic customer segment or segments.
    2. Frame of Reference: The target’s goal when buying my brand. It includes the other competitors that my customers may consider.
    3. Point of Difference (POD): The strategic competitive advantage vs. Frame of Reference.
    4. Reason to Believe: Why and how we are supporting this point of difference
  • We summarize it in a statement! (We will see in depth session 5)
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  • 4 Elements to include in the statement (continuation):
    • Target
    • Frame of Reference
    • Point of Difference (POD)
    • Reason to Believe (RTB)
  • SOME KPI’S & METRICS FOR MARKETING PLANS
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