ADIDAS AND NIKE- LESSONS IN BUILDING BRANDS QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION

1. Band-building approaches that Nike and Adidas used are: Brand building is not just advertising: Though advertising most of the time worked very well for both Nike and Adidas but their brands building approach was not restricted to advertisements only, there were many other factors too that played an important role in making their brands strong. Brand building involves innovation: For any brand to be successful, it is important for that brand to be innovative and continuously bring more uniqueness in their products. Both Nike and Adidas are always in struggle to create new, distinctive and ground-breaking products. Their successful brands are the result of their innovation. Excellence in execution creates huge pay offs: According to several studies the quality of advertisement is four to five times more important than the amount invested in making that advertisement. A good and well defined advertisement can play a very important role in strengthening the power of brand. Both Adidas and Nike have executed their advertisements with great superiority. Products are key to the brands: Behind every powerful and strong brand the quality, innovative, unique, and difficult to imitate products are the real source that make it distinctive and differentiate it from other brands. From the Waffle shoe to Air Jordans to Feet You Wear and beyond, products and advances were delivered by both brands. The brand is more than products: it is necessary for a brand to create its own personality, a sense of emotional attachment with its customers and connect with them on the basis of emotions. Nike developed a strong personality-provocative, aggressive, even in-your-face. On the contrary, Adidas stresses more on functional benefits which worked well for it initially and later on added personality and emotions. Know the brand identity: it is necessary for a brand to create its strong identity which helps their customers to distinguish it from its competitors or other similar brands. To create a strong identity, it is required from a brand to execute different programs over time to know in which direction they are heading. The brand team should run the brand: At both Adidas and Nike, the category or business unit teams ran the brand strategy and were closely involved in the development of innovative brand building programs. The leadership of the brands was not delegated to outside partners. In fact, the Nike brand team got so involved in the creative and media decisions that agency got frustrated. At one point, it ran a full page ad with a letter to Nike saying, Peace. Connect with customers on an emotional level: Customers always find those brands close to us who remain in connect with them on emotional level. This feeling realize them that they are an important part of their brand and they are there for them. The Nike advertising, NikeTown, and the Adidas Streetball Challenge connected with customers by touching their emotions.

Use sub brands to tell a story and manage perceptions: Nike and Adidas showed how powerful subbbrands can be in brand building. The use of high-end brand ( such as Adidas Equipment and Nike Alpha) isolated this line from mass market products where most of the volume resides. In addition, a host of silver-bullet subbrands (such as Air Jordan) or branded technologies ( such as Air and Feet You Wear) helped Nike and Adidas tell the story of their brands. The approach which is most admirable is Brand building involves innovation as no brand can survive without bringing innovation in their products. Innovation is what customers are always looking for, if its missing brand might lose its customers and it would be difficult for them to keep customers retention. Both Nike and Adidas were continuously working and still working to innovate that would attract their customers. They did not only bring innovation in their products like NikeTown and Adidas Streetball Challenge which enable to excel but their ads were also commendable and highly appreciable among viewers.

2. From 1982 to 1985 Reebok grew from $35 million to more than $300 million by utilizing the fitness and aerobics craze among women, especially in United States. Both Nike and Adidas were failed to respond to this running craze. For Nike, they were doing well in their athletes and they were not interested in trends involving women aerobics and new business models in which endorsements and college advisory board programs would not work. Both Nike and Adidas made excel in athletes and they were satisfied with it. They did not bother to respond this craze as they are still very successful in other sports categories.

COLGATE TOOTHPASTE

Colgate Palmolive is a well-reputed company with a large series of its well-known products having different varieties in terms of flavor. Colgate is one of the most prominent products of Colgate Palmolive. Colgate Palmolive is an exceptionally renowned brand when we talk about oral hygiene. It has been striving to be the market leader and with the highest share in whole oral care market. Majority and most of the dentists recommend Colgate tooth paste as it protects cavity and good for oral care. Under the umbrella of oral care, there are number of Colgate toothpastes which are as follows: Colgate CDC Colgate total fresh stripe Colgate herbal Colgate herbal white Colgate whitening Colgate misvak Colgate Max Fresh Colgate sensitive Their competing firms include Close up, English, Forhans, Shield, Sparkle, Sensodyne, Medicam which are in this field and pursuing same the same purpose. According to many researches Colgate is most consuming toothpaste and the reason could be it is the best toothpaste for oral cavity protection. If we talk about consumers perception regarding different flavors of Colgate tooth paste, consumers do prefer other toothpaste instead of Colgate flavors and at this point Colgate loses its customer share. If we talk about Colgate Sensitive, customers always prefer to choose Sensodyne, because it specializes for sensitive teeth and dentists also prefer this for those who have sensitivity problem. Same case is with Colgate Max fresh, close up is the strongest competitor and customers looking for Max fresh toothpaste chose close up instead of Colgate. For all those who brushes their teeth with Misvak would prefer original Misvak instead of any alternative which contains Misvak ingredients because it itself is very beneficial for teeth. Due to other tooth pastes Colgate is losing its profitability and sales in its other flavors except Max cavity protection in which it is the market leader.

NAME: ANUM FATIMA REG NO: 17961 BRAND AND ADVERTISING FARAH ALI NAWAZ 04-03-2012 SUNDAY (13:00-16:00)