Introduction
Male Coffee Shop is one of the many coffee shops in the city of Male that has been in the market for the last eight years. This firm, just like many other coffee shops in this city, has been largely depending on the booming tourism industry in this city to support its operations.
With a total of twenty permanent employees, Male Coffee Shop is one of the leading coffee outlets that have successfully attracted a pool of customers who visit this city regularly. It is worrying that this firm, just like its market rivals, is operating without any a clear brand that can make it stand out as a unique firm.
Other than the name, this firm has made no effort to build a strong brand equity that may help it increase its competitiveness in the market. Brand equity is important for any firm that is operating in a competitive market environment (Keller 2003, p. 28).
Fisher and Vallaster (2008, p. 57) defines brand equity as “A brand’s power derived from the goodwill and name recognition that it has earned over time, which translates into higher sales volume and higher profit margins against competing brands.”
According to this definition, it is clear that brand equity is earned over a period of time, and it gives a firm power to earn higher profit margins over its competitors in case the brand is stronger in the market. In this report, the researcher seeks to develop an appropriate way through which Male Coffee Shop can develop strong brand equity.
Analysis
According to Kotler and Keller (2012), it is important to understand the relevance of a brand in the market in order to realize the importance of building one within a particular industry. Male is one of the tourists’ destination cities in this region. Coffee is very popular among the tourists, and for this reason, several coffee shops have sprung up.
The problem that most of these shops face when it comes to attracting and retaining customers is lack of strong brands that can distinguish their products from one another. At the coffee shop where the researcher works, this problem has been persistent, and has limited the ability of the firm to outsmart its competitors despite its superior products.
The only solution for this problem will be the development of a superior brand that will make the products of this firm distinguishable from those of other market rivals. The following are some of the general steps that can be followed when developing brand equity.
Choosing brand elements
Brand elements refer to trademark devises which are used for the purpose of identification and differentiation of a brand in the market. These elements serve vital role in identifying a given brand in the market in a way that would enable customers to differentiate the existing brands in the market. Brand name is the first element of a brand (Parameswaran, 2006).
It is one of the most important elements of a brand because customers will rely on it when talking about superior brands in the market. The current name used by this firm can appropriately support its branding efforts. This name would help the marketing team of this firm to emphasize to the customers their unique capacity to prepare high quality coffee.
The brand symbol is another important element of brand that should be used to differentiate a firm’s brand from those of competing firms (Bergh & Behrer, 2013). An appropriate symbol for this coffee shop would be a steaming cup of coffee. This would help in emphasizing on the particular product that is offered at the firm. The marketing team would also need to develop a logo that would be used to identify the name.
The appropriate logo should have the full names of the firm, and colors that would further emphasize on the products that is offered at the shop. It will also be appropriate to identify spokespeople that can be used to help boost the image of the firm.
The best spokespeople that can is chosen would be local or international celebrities who are not controversial (Narula, 2006). For instance, top athletes like Usain Bolt of Jamaica, David Rudisha of Kenya and Justin Gatlin of the United States would be appropriate spokespersons. Other important elements such as characters, slogans, jingles, and signage should also be treated seriously in order to win the appeal in the market.
Designing holistic marketing activities
Selling a brand to the market involves a series of activities that are focused on reaching the right population with the right message that will convince them that the firm offers a better deal. Designing holistic marketing activities involves developing programs that would enable a firm to reach out to the market with the information about its brand, and specific products that it offers in the market.
One of the most important activities at this stage is always advertising using the best channels available (Pike, 2011). Advertising helps a firm to create awareness of the brand in the market, factors that make it superior, and how different it is from other existing brands.
Given the fact that this coffee shop will be targeting tourists who visit Male, one of the best channels that can be used for advertising would be through website of tour companies. Most of the tourists would visit these websites before they travel in order to know what to expect. It is at that moment that the firm should make the brand for its products be known by this group so that they can be familiar with name.
The firm may also consider using the social media to reach out to the clients. Facebook and Tweeter may be appropriate in reaching out to the local and international clients (Sen, 2005). In order to ensure that the local market segment is not ignored, mass media marketing through radio and television commercials or national newspapers should also be used.
Viral marketing will also be needed in order to promote endorsement of the brand by customers who have experienced the service delivery at the shop or those who have been informed of the brand by friends or relatives. Direct communication through the customer care center should be developed as the firm grows to take care of the interests of the clients when they need to make direct contact with the firm.
Leveraging secondary associations
In order to build brand equity, it is important for this coffee shop to leverage secondary associations in the market. According to Kotler (2009), leveraging secondary association involves developing superior product attributes, creation of competitively convincing prices, and finding ways of making the product available to the consumers.
It is important for this coffee shop to make use of its strong brand to leverage its new products in the market. In order to achieve this, it is necessary to ensure that the current products have desired attributes in the market. The existing products should meet or even exceed the expectations of the customers in the market. The pricing strategy taken by the firm should reflect the superiority of the products.
This means that the prices should not be abnormally high because the customers may feel that the firm is being exploitative. Similarly, they should not be below the market average because customers may become suspicious of the products offered by the firm. They may feel that the firm is offering substandard products. The pricing strategy chosen by this firm may be pivotal in the future when introducing new products (Holt, 2004).
The approach taken to make the products available to the customers is another important factor that would determine the strength of the products in the market. The products should always be readily available to the customers through convenient channels. That will be a way of strengthening the brand in the market. The brand will be associated with efficiency in the delivery of products in the market.
Internal branding
Internal branding has become very popular for companies that seek to promote their brand in a competitive business environment. Internal branding involves developing a culture within an organization where employees become more focused in meeting or exceeding customers’ expectation in the market.
According to Kotler (2011), internal branding focuses on making employees understand the need to offer quality services to the customers. Customers always expect firms to deliver on their promise. If this coffee shop promises to deliver the best coffee to its customers who visit the city of Male, then they should be given the best when they visit the facility. It is the role of the employees to ensure that these customers get the best.
Brand communities
Developing a brand community is perhaps one of the biggest challenges that firms have in the current market in their quest to develop a pool of loyal customers. Keller (2001) defines brand community as “A specialized, non-geographically bound community, based on a structured set of social relations among admirers of a brand.”
As shown in this definition, it is a group of admirers to a given brand who feel that they are bound together by the brand because of the superior quality it offers. Because of the brand, they find themselves sharing the same views or even culture when it comes to the consumption of that particular product irrespective of their geographic origin.
This means that this coffee shop will need to find a way of creating a community out of the visitors to this city who will be bound to visit its facility because they have developed a culture of regularly visiting it. The marketing team will need to develop a unique character among consumers that would help in creating a strong bond between the firm and its consumers.
This bond can be created in superior products, superior product delivery, superior product positioning, and appropriate marketing approaches (Vaid, 2003). Customers should always have the desire to visit the facility as a way of being part of the community whenever they visit the city of Male.
Factors influencing organizational structure and types of authority
According to Hartwell and Chen (2012), the organizational structure defines the type of authority that a leader uses to run a specific firm. At Male Coffee Shop, the top manager is the owner of the facility. This gives him the absolute authority over the decisions made at this firm. The authority from the top manager is passed to the two deputies responsible for production and marketing.
These top managers understand that delivering the best quality starts by preparation of high quality coffee. The employees responsible for serving coffee should be cautious and very attentive to the customers, ready to respond to any of their request. Their service should be superb to make the customers feel that they are getting the best of the services.
All the employees within the firm must realize that it is their responsibility to strengthen the brand of this firm in the market. They must remain motivated in order to ensure that their final products are of high quality, and with capacity to meet or exceed what the industry offers. To achieve this, the managers must make them feel that they are important members of the organization other than just employees.
Evaluation
Span of Control and Centralization
When defining the evaluation that should be used, it is important to determine the best span of control for the process in order to know whether centralization or decentralization would be the best strategy. The marketing team should develop a superior evaluation process that would help in maintaining a superior quality delivery of products to the customers.
According to Glynn and Woodside (2009), evaluation should be a continuous process. Some processes should have a centralized system of evaluation while others may have decentralized approach. Developing an appropriate evaluation strategy will be important at this stage in order to ensure that all the consumers who visit the coffee shop leave when they are satisfied. The model below may be very important at this stage.
Keller’s Brand Equity Model
It would be important for this coffee shop to settle on an appropriate brand equity model that it is intending to use when building the brand equity. Choosing an appropriate model that is already tested will help the firm to know some of the important steps that it should follow in order to achieve the best results.
Keller’s Brand Equity Model is one of the best models that can be used by this coffee shop to develop a strong brand in this competitive market. As Borja (2003, p. 67) says, “You have to build the right type of experiences around your brand, so that customers have specific, positive thoughts, feelings, beliefs, opinions, and perceptions about it.” This will make them develop some commitments towards the brand.
They will always feel attached to the products offered by the firm because of the past memorable events. It will also promote viral marketing where customers will invite their friends to come and visit the facility in order to share the superior experience they had with the brand when they were served. The figure below shows the steps that should be observed when using the model.
Keller’s Brand Equity Model
Source (Han, 2005, p. 48)
The first step in this model has been identified as the brand identity process. At this stage, the coffee shop will focus on identifying itself to the customers. Currently, there are numerous coffee shops within Mali city operating without a clear identity using a strong brand. When this firm decides to build brand equity, the first step would be to identify itself among the customers.
The second stage in this model is creation of meaning to the brand. After identification of what the brand is and the specific products it offers in the market, the next crucial step will be the definition of brand meaning. Definition of the brand meaning is done from two perspectives which include imagery and performance (Davis & Baldwin, 2005).
In terms of imagery, this firm will need to explain to its customers how well its products meet their needs both socially and psychologically. This can be done through promotions. In terms of performance, the firm should ensure that whenever customers visit the facility, they should get the best quality that the firm can deliver best in order to make them know the superiority of the firm’s products.
The third stage is the brand response that customers give after an interaction with the brand either through the promotions or through the actually consumption of its products. The customers will use the quality of the products, and the credibility of the firm in delivering on its promises to determine its superiority and finally make consideration about the brand (Hansen & Christensen, 2004).
When they are satisfied, they will give positive response that should be used by the firm to improve their services even further. Dissatisfaction will lead to poor response which should be a warning to the firm that they have to overhaul the current strategy.
The last stage would be the brand resonance which is a complex process that seeks to define customers’ behavioral loyalty, a sense of community, and active engagement in the market (Tungate, 2012). It seeks to make the customers feel part of a given brand, other than being mere customers.
It is a concerted effort that seeks to hand over ownership of the brand to customers. It is through this that Male Coffee Shop can outsmart some of its top competitors such as Top Coffee Brewers in this market.
Conclusion and Recommendations
Male Coffee Shop is operating in a competitive environment where it must find the best ways of outsmarting its competitors such as Top Coffee Brewers. Building brand equity is one of the ways through which it can gain this superiority over this competitor. This firm offers products that are almost identical to that of Top Coffee Brewers.
Male Coffee Shop can outsmart other market rivals by building a brand equity that would help it differentiate its products in the market from those of other market competitors. Branding will help this firm to acquire a unique position in the market.
The marketing team will need to develop a brand that can help its customers identify Customers will know of the existence of its products, and the superiority over other existing brands. The following recommendations should be observed.
- The marketing management of Male Coffee Shop should develop a team of experts that will be engaged in the creation and management of the firm’s brand to enable it to compete successfully with firms like Top Coffee Brewers.
- When developing brand equity, it is important to conduct a market research in order to understand the needs of the customers.
- The firm should consider using both the mass and social media in marketing its brand to the customers.
- All the employees within Male Coffee Shop must realize that it is their responsibility to strengthen the brand of this firm in the market to make it more successful than Top Coffee Brewers.
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