This document discusses key concepts in product and brand management including defining a product, stages of new product development, challenges with new products, levels of customer value, branding, managing brand equity, packaging, and labeling. It provides an overview of these important marketing topics and considerations for product managers.

1. Product and Brand Management

2. What is a product?
• A product is any offering by a company to a
market that serves to satisfy customer needs
and wants.
• It can be an object, service, idea,etc.

3. New Product Development
• Most new product development is an
improvement on existing products
• Less than 10% of new products are totally
new concepts.

4. Success rate of new products
• The success rate of new products is very
low – less than 5%. ‘You have to kiss a lot
of frogs to find a prince.”
• Product obsolescence is rapid with
improvements in technology
• Shorter PLCs

5. Product Development Stages
• Idea generation
• Idea screening
• Concept development and testing
• Concept testing
• Conjoint analysis – to find out the best
valued attributes by consumers

6. Business analysis
• The most customer appealing offer is not
always the most profitable to make
• Estimate on costs, sales volumes,pricing
and profit levels are made to find out the
optimal price – volume mix.
• Breakeven and paybacks
• Discounted cash flow projections

7. Market testing
• Test markets
• Test periods
• What information to gather?
• What action to take?

8. Commercialization
• When? (Timing)
• Where? (Which geographical markets)
• To whom? (Target markets)
• How? (Introductory Marketing strategy)

9. Product Levels
Customer value hierarchy
• Core benefit
• Basic product
• Expected product
• Augmented product
• Potential product

10. Customer Delight
• When you exceed customer expectations

11. Product Hierarchy
• Need
• Product family
• Product class
• Product Line
• Product type
• Brand
• Item

12. Product classification
• Durable
• Non – durable
• Services

13. Consumer goods classification
• Convenience goods
• Shopping goods
• Specialty goods
• Unsought goods

14. Industrial goods classification
• Materials and Parts
- raw materials
- manufactured materials and parts
• Capital items
• Supplies and business services

15. Product Mix
• The assortment of products that a company offers
to a market
• Width – how many different product lines?
• Length – the number of items in the product mix
• Depth – The no. of variants offered in a product
line
• Consistency – how closely the product lines are
related in usage

16. Product Line decisions
• Product rationalization
• Market rationalization
• Product line length
too long – when profits increase by dropping a
product in the line
too short – when profits increase by adding
products to the product line
• Line pruning – capacity restrictions to decide

17. Brand
• A name becomes a brand when consumers
associate it with a set of tangible and
intangible benefits that they obtain from the
product or service
• It is the seller’s promise to deliver the same
bundle of benefits/services consistently to
buyers

18. Brand Equity
• When a commodity becomes a brand, it is
said to have equity.
• The premium a brand can command in the
market
• The difference between the perceived value
and the intrinsic value

19. Levels of meaning
• Attributes
• Benefits
• Values
• Culture
• Personality
• Users

20. Brand Power
• Customer will change brands for price
reasons
• Customer is satisfied. No reason to change.
• Customer is satisfied and would take pains
to get the brand
• Customer values the brand and sees it as a
friend
• Customer is devoted to the brand

21. Brand Equity – Competitive
Advantages
• Reduced marketing costs
• Trade leverage
• Can charge a higher price
• Can easily launch brand extensions
• Can take some price competition

22. Managing Brand Equity
• Brand Equity needs to be nourished and
replenished. We must not flog the brand for
equity to be diluted or dissipated
• Store brands

23. Advantages of branding
• Easy for the seller to track down problems and
process orders
• Provide legal protection of unique product
features
• Branding gives an opportunity to attract loyal and
profitable set of customers
• It helps to give a product category at different
segments, having separate bundle of benefits
• It helps build corporate image
• It minimises harm to company reputation if the
brand fails

24. Brand parity
• Consumers buy from a set of acceptable/
preferred brands

25. Umbrella Brand
• Products from different categories under
one brand
• Dangerous to the brand if the principal
brand fails
• Sometimes the company name is prefixed to
the brand. In such cases the company name
gives it legitimacy. The product name
individualises it.

26. Naming the Brand
• Product benefits
• Product qualities
• Easy to pronounce
• Should be distinctive
• Should not have poor meanings in other
languages and countries

27. Brand strategy
• Line extension – existing brand name extended to
new sizes in the existing product category
• Brand extension – brand name extended to new
product categories
• Multibrands – new brands in the same product
category
• New brands – new product in a different product
category
• Cobrands –brands bearing two or more well
known brand names

28. Brand Repositioning
• This may be required after a few years to
face new competition and changing
customer preferences

29. Packaging
• Includes the activities of designing and
producing the container for a product
• Packaging is done at three levels
- primary
- secondary
- shipping

30. Packaging as a marketing tool
• Self service
• Consumer affluence
• Company and brand image
• innovation

31. Designing packaging
• Packaging concepts
• Technical specifications
• Engineering tests
• Visual tests
• Dealer tests
• Consumer tests
• Packaging innovations
• Environmental considerations

32. Labels
• Identification
• Grade classification
• Description of product
• Manufacturer identity
• Date of mfg., batch no.
• Instructions for use
• Promotion

33. Labels as a marketing tool
• Labels need to change with time or
packaging changes to give it a
contemporary and fresh look