This Girl has drunk 2 Coca Cola Bottles daily for last 4011 days - What can Brands learn?
Brands give us shortcuts for making buying decisions quickly by being the top of mind/obvious choice. Want to buy Mobile Phone - Buy Apple, Wanna buy Floor Tiles - Buy Kajaria, Wanna buy a Scooty - Buy Activa and so on. But, the speed of decision making is determined by the power of brand over the individual in question.
For example: I still remember buying Asus laptop for my college because it was endorsed by my favorite “Hrithik Roshan”. I did not look at the laptop company’s reviews even when I have a technical background - Just think about what branding can do to influence a non-technical person buying a technical product.
In the case of this girl, lets call her D, she has been choosing Coca Cola (not sure if she has any free will in this matter, though) for her soft drinks requirements EVERY SINGLE DAY for last 4011 (Four Thousand and Eleven) days without flinching an eyelid. Do you know how long is this period - It is equivalent to over 133 months and over 11 years. CAN YOU BEAT THAT!!
This girl might be an extreme example - but all of us save a lot of time by just choosing a brand while purchasing a product in a certain category. In essence, we don’t need to answer any of these questions:
How good is the product?
How many other people are buying this company’s products?
What are the key benefits of the product?
What is the mission and vision of the company which is selling this product?
Should I buy this product?
And if the brand is a true blue market leader then the brand becomes synonymous with the category - like we get Xerox done (and not photocopy) and I still remember asking for Pepsodent wala Colgate.
But how powerful are Brands exactly - Can we quantify that?
Brand power can be subjectively measured by their relevance in the cultural zeitgeist and objectively by various studies done every year by a number of agencies such as Forbes and Kantar. These annual studies value each brand in dollars and publish the list of top brands every year.
Check out the list of top 10 global brands for 2022 as per Kantar’s study. Not surprisingly - this list is dominated by Big Tech. The total valuation of these 10 Brands is over 4 Trillion USD.
Closer home - the list of top 10 Indian brands as per Kantar along with their brand valuation is given below.
The total valuation of the top 10 Brands is 200 Billion USD.
How does a brand drive value for a company?
Now, we know that brands command a lot of value but how are they useful and how do they drive value for the company.
They drive value in three ways for a company -
Helping a potential customer cross the chasm and become a customer - A potential customer is looking at multiple products and a popular brand name would take care of the customer’s doubt.
Helping the brand in charging premium for good quality - It is next to impossible for a company (without brand) to charge a premium even if the product is of best quality in the world.
Get loyal customers - Brand means that the customer would not even look at the other options available in the market irrespective of their quality/price and always go for their Dear Brand.
Keep new companies from entering the market - With the current customers so loyal to a particular brand - it is an uphill task for a new company to make inroads - requiring much higher investment and risk.
The holy grail for any business is to have customers come back to buy again because in those transactions - there is ZERO marketing cost and these repeat transaction account for bulk of profit for any business.
Now - lets look at D’s journey with Coca Cola
D has been drinking 2 bottles of Coca Cola (500 ml each) for over 4000 days straight. You won’t believe but drinking Coca Cola is the first thing that she does every single day.
What is her exact routine?
She drinks Coca Cola first thing in the morning - even before she drinks water. She does not take breakfast so Coca Cola is, in a sense, breakfast for her. Through the day, she sips through two 500 ml bottles of the drink (without fail).
But this Coca Cola does not replace her water intake. She ensures a 4 litres of daily water intake alongside the 1 litre intake of Coca Cola.
She starts her day with Coca Cola and ends it with Coca Cola.
How did she end up in love with Coca Cola?
She has, of course, tried other soft drinks available in the market at some or the other time. However, what has worked for her at a broad level is “Black color”. Non black carbonated drinks don’t taste great to her.
However, within the black also - she has three major options in the Indian market - Thumsup, Pepsi and Coca Cola. Pepsi is too sweet for her (tastes like Saunf to her) while Thumsup is too strong. Coca Cola hits the jackpot in terms of just being the right taste for her taste palette.
Learning: Getting the perfect product (for a particular segment of customers) is the first step to customer loyalty
How loyal is she to Coca Cola?
In her own words, If she can't find coca cola.. then she goes for Mojito.. then Pepsi and then water in that order But the preference for Coca Cola remains really really strong.
In fact, her loyalty is so strong that when Dominos replaced Coca Cola with Pepsi at their outlets - she stopped visiting the fast food chain.
Is she still enticed to pick other brands?
Generally speaking, Coca Cola is available everywhere so there is no need to look at an alternative. In fact, she has never faced the situation that Coca Cola is not available somewhere. This speaks so strongly about the brand’s distribution - wherein the product is available everywhere and the customer does not need to move to competition just because the product is not available.
Learning: Even a strong brand needs to ensure that its products are EASILY available to the customers (across channels) else even the most loyal customers would be tempted to shift.
Do other family members also drink the same brand?
The other family members are not that much into soft drinks - however since Coca Cola is available at home at all times - there is a tendency for others to also drink Coca Cola on a daily basis even though in smaller quantities as compared to D.
Learning: A loyal customer inevitably gives a brand many more customers.
What is the competition to Coca Cola in her daily life?
The competition is NONE but she replaces Coca Cola with Mojito and Pepsi in that order in case Coca Cola is not available - even though this seldom happens.
Learning: Brand loyalty means that the competition ceases to exist for the customer - how so ever good their product might have become over the period.
Whats is her overall view on Coca Cola as a brand?
D is so enamored with everything Coca Cola that the brand holds a very special space in her life.
You wont believe but when Coca Cola launched their Water brand - “Kinley” in India - it was the obvious choice for her. Essentially, she has become so enamored with Coca Cola that she loves watching Coca Cola ads as well.
She, in fact, always wanted to work at coca cola due to her love with the product even though, she has never applied at the company. But if any Coca Cola executives are reading this - then pls drop me a line and I would get you in touch with D.
Summary
Brand Loyalty is one of the biggest moats that you can create and might be the best bet for any company from the “7 Powers as per Hamilton Helmer”. Always think about why your customers would come back and how would your brand help your marketing/sales in the same.