Brand Awareness: Three Myths as a Performance KPI

Myth 1 Building Awareness Is a Clear SingleMinded AspirationIf we wanted to focus on building awareness of a brand we could buy large billboards across the nation and plaster our brand name upsidedown on them in garish colors Brand awareness would soar but we would have failed to move the brand39s personal relevance its quality of awareness In other words we would only be impacting and measuring one form of awareness the quantity not the qualityWhile building the quantity of awareness might seem useful by itself it is deceptively simple because we would not have shifted people39s perceptions of the brand The advertising would not have reinforced the brand39s equity that underpins its competitive standing enabling it to withstand competitive assault or help convince prospects believe it39s a brand worth paying more forQuality of awareness is critical to ensure a brand39s competitive importance and brand attributes are a strong measure of the quality of awareness Brand attributes represent the quintessence of the brand They distil the brand identity both in terms of its physical character and personality traits For instance these might cover the brand39s personal relevance integrity competitive distinctiveness and perceived marketplace valueIn short any brand awareness measure needs to track both the what of the brand but also the why This ensures the awareness metric reflects both the brand39s literal and implied meaning and makes it more purposeful in a competitive marketplaceQuality of awareness is a powerful metric amp8211 typically it can strongly link to brand preference the KPI that often is the most powerfully predictive attitudinal measure of market share In their book Accountable Marketing the Marketing Accountability Standards Board MASB show that together with distribution and price brand preference typically explains 87 of a category39s market share over the midtermIn any brand survey the discriminating power of brand preference sometimes referred to as first choice is because we ask the consumer to select one brand above all other brands and as such we can view the metric as a proxy reflecting most purchase or usage decisionsMyth 2 Advertising Only Works on People Who Are Aware of the AdIn 2006 copytesting agency IpsosASI undertook a largescale analysis of 97000 adults who tested 500 ads covering 65 categories from 47 different advertisers All test ads were for established US brands in CPG categories IpsosASI specifically examined respondents who had positively shifted their brand choice as a result of seeing the brand ad They found that correct ad recall only accounted for 65 of the brand choice uplift In other words 35 of those who responded positively to the ad could not remember seeing itWhile ad recall is definitely valuable we should not apply it as an absolute gatekeeper of advertising effectivenessThis counterintuitive phenomenon was also confirmed in the online world in 2018 by digital research company OnDevice who showed that quotThree quarters of people who we know have been exposed to test ads claim that they haven39t seen themquot For digital advertising prospects who didn39t actively remember seeing ads still saw a lift in unaided brand awareness of 10A key insight by OnDevice was that since advertising39s impact happens for many panelists at an unconscious level in the study they concluded quotwe have measured the System 1 unconscious impact of digital adsquotChampioned by Nobel Prize Winner Daniel Kahneman System 1 refers to the part of our human thinking that is automatic immediate and instinctual For example it is what makes us jump in fright if we suddenly see a large spider or snake Our brain automatically kicks in its intuitive and instinctive mode This is what makes the audience39s unconscious reactions to advertisements still valuableMyth 3 All Brand Awareness Metrics Can Fit All Campaign CircumstancesIn an age when we are all timehungry a wealth of information can often lead to a poverty of attention Precisely because consumers have a poverty of attention selecting the best awareness metric for campaign measurement can become criticalThis is where topofmind awareness TOMA as a key element of unaided awareness can be useful Topofmind awareness is the first response consumers give when asked to name brands that automatically come to mind without prompting Essentially when we select a metric such as topofmind awareness as a leading brand KPI we are implicitly aiming to track the brand39s ability to be top of mind at the moment of choice Yet TOMA has its limitsIn an excellent article on topofmind awareness Chuck Young CEO of Ameritest shows that the most appropriate brand awareness metric depends of the lifestage of the branda For new products aided brand awarenessb For established brands unaided brand awarenessc For category leading brands topofmind awarenessImportantly the threshold at which TOMA and unaided awareness become valuable is around 60 aided awareness TOMA is often the more volatile of the two measures because it directly reflects a brand39s most recent marketing achievements relative to its competitor39s activities on a weektoweek basis Conversely TOMA appears to correlate well with ad awareness a valuable measure of an advertiser39s media marketplace presence with consumersWhy Brands GrowAwareness comes in various forms and not all are suited to all brand circumstances We shouldn39t even assume that consumers need to be aware of an ad for it to have an effect For awareness to be truly valuable we have to customize the KPI to the individual brand lifestage and the campaign goalsIn his landmark book Why Brands Grow What Marketers Don39t Know Byron Sharp refers to one of marketers39 39commonplace marketing mistakes39 as 39creating advertising that doesn39t build or refresh relevant memory structures39 in the consumer39s mind While awareness is a useful measure of consumer visibility we also need to ensure the brand has the relevance and distinctiveness to ensure the campaign is achieving true standout in a competitive marketplaceClick the social buttons to share this story with colleagues and friendsThe opinions expressed here are the author39s views and do not necessarily represent the views of MediaVillagecomMyersBizNet

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Brand Awareness: Three Myths as a Performance KPI

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Graeme Hutton

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