How to measure and track brand accurately without a vendor-filtered lens

Brand Health Tracking: A Comprehensive Guide

Brand measurement is a crucial aspect of any marketing strategy. However, there are major challenges when it comes to effectively measuring and tracking a brand's performance. In order to overcome these challenges, it is important to have a clear understanding of what a brand is, the metrics used to measure it, and how to go about measuring it accurately.

The first step in brand measurement is determining whether you actually have a brand to begin with. While technically everyone has a brand, not all brands meet the minimum threshold for brand tracking to be useful. To assess this, you can conduct interviews with a random sample of the population or use tools like Google Trends to gauge brand awareness.

Once you have confirmed that you have a brand, the next step is defining your category. This involves understanding how your product or service is perceived by your customers and which box it falls into within their minds. This is important because it forms the basis for the most important question in brand tracking surveys. By defining your categories accurately, you can ensure that you are asking the right questions and gathering meaningful data.

In brand measurement, it is common for companies to assume they belong to one broad category. However, this approach does not reflect the heterogeneous nature of markets. It is important to use behavioral segmentation to divide the market into different subcategories based on purchase situations or category entry points (CEPs). By mapping out these CEPs, you can identify the specific contexts in which your brand is competing and tailor your measurement accordingly.

The next step is survey design. In order to effectively track a brand, it is important to focus on four key metrics: brand awareness, stated purchase intent, brand attributes and affinity, and usage experience. Brand awareness can be measured through both unaided recall (where respondents are asked to recall brands from memory) and aided recall (where prompts are provided to aid memory).

**Understanding Brand Health Tracking: A Guide for Beginners**

Brand health tracking is a pivotal aspect of strategic marketing, yet it's a concept often shrouded in complexities. Many find themselves asking, "What is a brand?" and "How can we measure its efficacy accurately?" The journey into brand measurement can be daunting, especially when considering the accuracy of third-party metrics and their alignment with broader business goals. This guide aims to illuminate the foundational steps of brand health tracking for those just embarking on this crucial marketing journey.

**Do You Have a Brand Worth Tracking?**

The starting point is an evaluation of your brand's significance in the marketplace. While technically every company possesses a brand, not all meet the minimum criteria necessary for beneficial brand tracking. Conduct simple population interviews or utilize Google Trends to gauge public awareness. If results are underwhelming, it may be prudent to reassess your position in the market or strategy before delving into detailed tracking.

**Defining Your Category and Market Position**

Before you start measuring, clearly defining your market category is crucial. Many businesses mistakenly categorize themselves too broadly. Accurate categorization ensures that brand measurement reflects true competitive positioning and informs the survey's most critical questions. Consider the example of Liquid Death, a water brand that consumers might not categorize as bottled water. Define your category with behavioral segmentation using Category Entry Points (CEPs), which align with consumer purchase situations. This segmentation helps map a genuine representation of the market landscape.

**Designing the Survey: Metrics That Matter**

A well-constructed brand survey should encompass key metrics: brand awareness, stated purchase intent, brand attributes and affinity, and usage experience. Brand awareness is assessed through unaided recall (unprompted memory tests) and aided recall (recognition tests). These reveal recognition depth and potential brand salience in consumers' minds.

Stated purchase intent involves gauging brand consideration and preference, moving beyond mere recognition to understanding consumer likelihood to choose your brand within a specific purchase scenario. Meanwhile, delving into attributes, attitudes, and associations can unveil deeper insights, though they correlate variably with purchase behavior.

An often-overlooked but pivotal metric is usage experience. Cross-referencing this with stated intent helps validate survey data, aligning declared preferences with actual consumer actions.

**Executing Brand Health Tracking**

When executing brand health tracking, companies face the decision to DIY or outsource. Outsourcing to panel providers or brand research firms offers expertise but often comes with significant cost considerations. Alternatively, Omnibus surveys provide a cost-effective solution by inserting questions into existing surveys. For those opting for DIY, comprehensive survey platforms like SurveyMonkey or Qualtrics support the process, though they require careful design and execution to ensure data integrity.

**Monitoring and Avoiding Pitfalls**

Brand tracking is not a one-off task. Ideally, it should be conducted periodically to track changes over time. Annual assessments are common, with some opting for more frequent checks to capture evolving consumer perceptions. Awareness of potential pitfalls, such as response bias or manipulated survey results, is crucial when interpreting data.

In conclusion, understanding and implementing brand health tracking requires both strategic foresight and tactical execution. By learning from established methodologies and adapting them to their unique marketplace contexts, businesses can gain valuable insights into their brand's standing and trajectory in the competitive landscape.

It is important to note that stated purchase intent may not always align with actual purchase behavior. Therefore, it is important to cross-reference stated intent with actual usage or purchase behavior to validate the results.

Once the survey data is collected, it can