The Hindu Business Line : Of brands, buildings and sounds

Jayendra, real estate play in the Indian market has heated up over the last four years. Players of both the desi variety and those with fancy tags of every MNC kind are in the Indian market today.

There are essentially three types of players. One is the kind that is focusing on infrastructure and real estate projects that talk of deep investments. The second is the type that focuses on the B2B segment with office infrastructure and operations in the space of building factories and manufacturing facilities. The third kind is the one that has a presence in the domestic housing market. This is more of a B2C play.

Each of these spaces is active today and witnesses separate sets of players who specialise in various segments of real estate.

In terms of advertising interest, print is the primary one for most. Television follows, depending on whether the firm is actually tapping into financial markets or not. Pre-IPO work is substantial in this space as well on television. Outdoor is a preferred medium as well.

There is a distinct and substantial increase in branding initiatives by most of these companies. Branding is focused upon as insulation from commoditisation in the future. Distinction is what is being sought. Brands crave this in particular as big names from other realms of business are also stepping in and unlocking their brand equity. One example is Godrej Properties. There is a special focus by these real estate players wherever you see economic prosperity in terms of new money from new industries such as IT, ITES, biotech and retail.

The buzz is all about a resurgent India with spending power that is bigger than what it used to be in the decades gone by.

Can sounds be branded? What is this science all about?

- Yasmin Shah, Mumbai

Yasmin, my definition of a brand is a simple one: The brand is a thought. A simple thought. Nothing more and nothing less.

This thought is essentially boosted by every sense. The sense of sight. The sense of touch. The sense of smell. The sense of taste. And most certainly, the sense of sound and hearing. This science is dubbed sonic branding.

Can a brand remind you of its aura just by its jingle? Can you recall a brand just by the way its container sounds when you keep it on your kitchen rack? Can just the crackle and rustle of a carton of cornflakes remind you of the brand?

Sonic branding is about all this and more. It comes with all the attendant bells and whistles that a physical branding programme comes with. A sonic logo can be a simple tune. It could just be a tone. A tenor, even. It could be the sound of a note on a musical instrument. Even an oblique instrument that is not all that common.

While a full-fledged brand jingle is really about the entire brand message being dinned into the consumer’s psyche, a sonic logo is just a hint of a reminder. A subliminal hint.

Examples abound in our modern-day, commercial lives.

Colgate uses a device called the “ring of confidence” in its advertising. This ring of confidence has a sound to it when articulated in its advertising. It is a sonic logo that closes the piece of advertising. This has worked well. So well that it is part of the spoken psyche of many consumers who have lived with it for a decade and more.

Vicks uses a Gale mein khich khich kind of a device. This is a sonic device as well. It has worked well and has worked its way into the jingle of the brand, as into other executions of advertising, be it print, outdoor or television.

The subject of sonic branding is deep and involved. Much of it works at the level of the subliminal.

Should not companies promote categories rather than specific brands, the logic being that categories last longer than brands?

- Rani Kuckreja, New Delhi

Rani, there are four possibilities that the marketing person can explore within this terrain.

One is the building of the narrow brand. If you own the Lexus, build the Lexus brand. This is what I call narrow-spectrum branding.

Second is building the mother brand for the company that owns it. If you are a Bru, you build the mother brand that can hold out as an umbrella for a number of Bru offerings.

Third is building the company brand. If you are in the automotive category and you are a Ford, build the Ford brand name. All brand outfits will figure under the House of Ford name. Build equity into the name that is literally forever. The Fiesta may come and go as a consumer flavour of the years, but the Ford name is forever. Therefore, whatever you invest in the Ford name in building the corporate name is a forever-investment.

The fourth is building of the category as a whole. This is best done when there is either no competition in the category at all, or you are the market leader. Also best done when you have a concept that is totally new, or when the penetration of the category you wish to dominate is next to nothing in a market. This can also be used when there is a crisis in the market or when there is negative sentiment in the market due to a crisis that has destroyed equity.

The fourth route has been experimented with many a time. Here are some examples.

Milkmaid used it in India in building the category of condensed milk. The company was the clear market leader with literally no competition to boot. This continued for decades till the first Mithai Mate came by.

Woodward’s Gripe water did this to build the anti-colic solution market in India. A whole generation respected the anti-colic campaign. Particularly troubled mothers, who still swear by Woodward’s even today, when their children are all of 50 years old!

The cola category in the country could have used it, if only the cola majors could get together legally and otherwise. The sugar industry, the coconut oil industry, the cashewnut trade and many others are examples that can actually use this to advantage.

E-mail your queries to askharishbijoor@thehindu.co.in

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