Establishing a new brand is hard work. In categories where people already have a repertoire of brands they happily and easily buy from, these new brands start from zero for the fight for attention in category buyers’ minds, let alone for precious shelf space in retailers.

But what if a brand isn’t exactly new? What does this mean for likely success? Dr. Kirsten Victory and Dr. Will Caruso, senior marketing scientists at the Ehrenberg-Bass Institute for Marketing Science, explain.

Why do some new products fail and other succeed? Some people might argue failure is common for many new products because they were not innovative or different enough. However, long-run success is still not guaranteed even for the most innovative and consumer-approved new launches. The Institute investigated how many new launches who have achieved Product of the Year status continue to survive in the long run.

No one looks forward to a recession, but economic downturns can provide opportunities. Some of these opportunities will come from changes in consumer behaviour, others will come from reduced marketing activity from rivals (e.g. reduced costs for advertising media). Drawing on existing empirical knowledge the Ehrenberg-Bass Institute offers this little guide to marketing in recessionary times.

Discusses the factors to consider when creating the identity of a new brand launch.
• To design a good sub-brand or variant brand identity you first need a clear strategy for the parent brand.
• Always remember to protect the parent first, and make sure any sub-brand or variant brand identity decisions ‘cause no harm’.
• Use brand identity as a bridge that links the parent and the sub-brand, don’t create more difference than similarity.
• When creating a new asset for a new variant, avoid the obvious (e.g. green = natural) as this will be easy for competitors to copy.

This article was also published on WARC as part of a series of articles on brand architecture in the digital age.

Successfully launching a new brand is one of the toughest challenges in marketing. New insights from the Ehrenberg-Bass Institute for Marketing Science draw on one of the chapters in the book How Brands Grow Part 2, Emerging Markets, Services, Durables, New and Luxury Brands. In this blog, I will address some of the common questions and misinterpretations that emerged.

The mantra within marketing and R&D departments is that innovation is for delivering differentiation. But the reality is that much of the purpose of innovation is to avoid differentiation. It’s largely about keeping the brand competitive and where it is.

You’ve heard this line ? Or maybe something more conservative, say 7 out of ten ?
It sounds awful, but gives solace to marketers who have an under-performing new brand. It’s used by consultants to stress the importance of marketing (and the advice or services they are selling).