Unveiling the power of brand health studies

By Riko Rahman, Client Solutions Director – Data & Insights, APAC – Indonesia

What is a brand health study?

A brand health study is a comprehensive analysis that assesses the overall well-being and perception of a brand within its target market. It typically involves measuring various key performance indicators, such as brand awareness, customer loyalty, and market share, to provide insights into the brand’s current standing and areas for improvement.

Why is a brand health study important for your business?

In a fast-paced era with widespread information, it is increasingly difficult for brands to create long term and impactful marketing strategies. The obstacles: money and time. Marketers frequently question the necessity of regular brand health studies and the importance of implementing data-driven strategies.

Here are three compelling reasons for conducting regular brand health studies:

1. Ensure your brand stays relevant

Change is a constant challenge for brands. Shifts in consumer perceptions and needs are inevitable. Even when the demographics of your target consumers remain constant, their perceptions and thought processes continually adapt to the evolving environment and incoming information. 

One of the primary benefits of conducting a brand health study is to help the brand understand these changes, ensuring its relevance and proximity to its consumers.

A frequently asked question is how often should brand studies be conducted? My advice is to align the frequency with the brand’s capacity to act on the findings. While ‘slow-moving’ sectors may find semi-annual or annually studies sufficient, ‘fast-moving’ brands benefit significantly from at least quarterly studies.

 2. Gain insights into consumer perceptions

Brands often contend with limited means of communication, such as 15-second TV advertisements or website banners viewed for less than 5 seconds. These constraints can make it challenging for brands to effectively convey messages and shape consumer perceptions in alignment with the brand’s Unique Selling Proposition (USP).

A brand study becomes a valuable tool in obtaining accurate information about consumer perceptions. In the case of a brand study tracker, it enables the monitoring of progress in how consumers perceive the brand, a crucial metric in understanding the brand’s impact.

3. Stay ahead of the competition

You can easily observe your competitors’ external actions in the market, such as their advertising strategies and ongoing promotions. However, we cannot know how competitors’ brands are developing from a consumer perspective.

Are there notable advancements, shifts in consumer preferences towards rival brands, or instances where competitors seek to emulate or capture the same target audience as us? These questions can only be addressed through a comprehensive consumer survey conducted as part of a brand health study.

The path to growth unfolds from two key directions. The first is from your existing consumer base, where we need to maintain and manage your consumers by understanding the reasons behind their loyalty. 

The second involves gaining new consumers, whether from competitors or those unfamiliar with your product category. Identifying strategies through a brand study within your target demographic is key. True business success lies in acquiring more users from competitors, the ‘real’ growth number.

Building internal success in brand studies and decision-making

Drawing from my 15 years of experience working with various brands and marketing teams, the challenges faced internally also influence the team’s ability to act on insights gained from brand studies. 

Here are key considerations to address internally:

1. Embrace a data-driven approach: Foster a culture of understanding, interpreting, and acting on data, enhancing the impact of business decisions.
2. Communicate it well! Extend lessons learned from brand studies beyond the insight and brand marketing teams. Ensure everyone comprehends the rationale for short and long-term brand development plans through presentations or workshops.
3. Avoid interpretation bias. Internal teams conducting consumer research may introduce bias – from study design to data collection and insight interpretation. Partnering with a trusted market research agency counters this risk, combining independent perspectives with internal insights for impactful business decisions.

Reach out to let us know the topics you’re interested in learning more about, or contact me to plan your consumer research now! 

Find out more about our Brand Health Studies here.

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