Secondary Brand Associations

Primary Association
Before I start on secondary associations, it makes sense that I talk about what the primary associations of a brand are. Primary associations are qualities/equity inherently possessed by the brand. These would include those of salience/utility (whether a washing powder cleans clothes or whether fairness cream makes you fair), performance (does the washing powder tackle tough stains well, whether the fairness cream makes you 5 shades or 2 shades fairer), imagery (how reputed the brand is, how successful has it been), judgment (how the brand fairs in comparison to competitors), etc.

Secondary Association
Secondary association on the other hand is more of a branding-marketing function. It transfers the qualities/equity of other entities to the brand in question. Consider a commodity like salt. One can argue that iodized salt is iodized salt and while one can double filter it and another triple filter it, the two salts cannot be too different. But when one of them is Tata Salt and the other Dandi Namak one would tend to think of the former as of better quality. This is a classic case of the secondary association: Tata’s reputation of quality being transferred to the salt.

Leveraging Secondary Associations
The above example was one of the many ways one can build secondary associations – through the parent company. However there are many other ways of doing the same. Some of these are illustrated below:

Other Brands
Co-Brands: is used extensively by credit cards. Consider a Standard Chartered card that is co-branded with Shopper’s Stop. It would indicate that the card is oriented towards the frequent shopper who could avail discounts at Shopper’s Stop outlets using the card. An ABN Amro – MakeMyTrip.com card on the other hand would be one for frequent fliers and enable one to stock points for each flight booked using this card. As for equity transfer, a StanC-Shopper’s Stop co-branded card would work differently when compared to a StanC-Big Bazaar one – the previous would transfer sophistication to the card while the later would transfer qualities related to cost effectiveness and value-for-money.

Company: Tata Salt is an example of this

Ingredients: Take Sona-Chandi Chyavanprash. Gold and silver, being expensive and noble metals, lend their ‘sheen’ to the chyavanprash making it seem better in quality than, say, a Dabur Chyavanprash.

Extensions: Again used extensively. Consider when Cadbury wanted to make a smaller and lighter version of its chocolate snack, Perk. Instead of giving the product a new name it called is Perk Slim. Not only has this logic resulted in Perk XL and Perk XXL, but when Cadbury came up with a new ‘reverse Perk’, i.e. a snack which is a wafer on the outside and chocolate inside they named it ‘Ulta Perk’! The idea obviously was that the brand equity created by Perk be leveraged in all these new products

People
Employees: Examples are few of this kind of secondary association because the consumer rarely comes into contact will the employees of the company behind the brand in question. But there are some where the interface with employees is significant. Consider airlines. Do friendlier ground handling staff and prettier air-hostesses affect your impression of an airline? I bet they do J. Similarly a bank where employees seem ill-dressed and ill-at-ease will seem much more inefficient than one where the employees are smartly dressed and prompt.

Endorsers: Belmonte, a little known clothing brand, gets endorsed by Shah Rukh Khan and immediately starts selling more. Why? Because Shah Rukh Khan had a relevant equity (his style statement) to lend to the brand. I am unsure if someone like, say, Govinda, would have worked as well.

Places
Country of Origin: Swiss Chocolates, French Wines, Indian Basmati… need I say more? What inspires greater confidence – a Japanese electronic good or one that is China-made? Besides being known for quality products countries often are known for more subtle qualities – like German engineering and Italian design.

Channel: Where you sell what you sell makes a difference too. Consider Louis Vuitton. They are available in Ambience Mall in NCR, UB City in Bangalore, Hotel Taj Mahal Palace & Tower in Mumbai – the exclusivity of each of these places adds to that of the brand.

Things
Events: Manickchand sponsored the Filmfare awards for a long time. This association with an event that served as the spectacle of India’s glamourous and high-fliers enabled Manickchand to later claim to be catering to a high class – ‘Unche Log, Unchi Pasand’

Causes: Sponsorship of events of serves as a strong secondary association too. Toyota sponsored NDTV’s Greenathon, with and aim of imbibing the qualities of being environment-conscious from the event.

Parting Note
When building a secondary association, one should be aware of the relevance of the equity sought for the brand. For example ‘German technology se bana Binani Cement’ makes sense because Germany is known for its superior engineering strength, ‘German main bana ABCD Chai’ makes no sense.
Further equity when lent to a brand should reinforce and augment the parent brand. For example if Tata Salt turns out to be non-refined and foul, it will not just damage the salt brand but also the name of Tata. A recent example is of how the Satyam scandal has hit the reputation of India Inc. as a whole by virtue of association.
Ultimately the aim would be that while initially a brand leverages on secondary associations, it should eventually be in a position where it is not just a good brand in its own right, but also lends positive associations back to the source of its secondary association.