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Hailee Steinfeld is especially recognized for her performing chops, however her singing talents bolster her esteem as a performer and stretch her model to extra audiences and followers. And identical to her enterprise into music, corporations typically lengthen their model to develop new merchandise in industries the place they don’t have any market share.
These initiatives are referred to as model extensions, and so they permit corporations to leverage their brand awareness and fairness to create extra income streams.
On this article, you’ll study extra about what a model extension is and see examples of extension concepts that might encourage you.
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What’s a model extension?
Model extension is a marketing strategy that includes an organization utilizing its well-established model identify or picture to introduce a brand new product or product classes to its buyer base.
This technique works finest when the brand new product class is expounded to its mother or father class and is one thing customers and prospects need.
Many corporations use model extensions as a result of it permits them to leverage their mother or father model’s model consciousness and authority to succeed in new demographics and open up new gross sales channels.
One firm that does model extensions effectively is Apple.
Though Apple began as a know-how firm that makes solely computer systems (Macs), it quickly prolonged its product line to incorporate music gamers (iPods), cell gadgets (iPhones), and tech equipment (Apple Watch and Earpods). Though all these new merchandise are completely different, the extension works as a result of Apple did not drift too removed from its mother or father product class. As a substitute, it leveraged its model identify to make penetrating the market successful.
What are the forms of model extensions?
Relying on the kind of prospects you may have and what you wish to obtain as a brand, you must resolve which model extension technique is true to your firm.
Listed below are 5 completely different extension methods that might give you the results you want.
1. Line Extension
A line extension is when a mother or father model launches a brand new product line in a class already acquainted with its prospects. With a line extension, manufacturers do not need to create new classes.
A superb instance of a line extension is when comfortable drink corporations introduce new flavors to their present drink lineup. Different examples might embody introducing new scents, sizes, and colours to a product line.
2. Complementary Product Extension
One other means a longtime model can lengthen itself is by creating complementary merchandise for its most important merchandise.
For instance, Nike, a sports activities model, creates varied gear, wears, and different sport-related merchandise that complement one another. We have additionally seen toothpaste corporations use this kind of extension for his or her unique model by including toothbrushes and different oral care merchandise as new classes.
3. Buyer Base Extension
An organization can create a branding extension for itself by launching completely different product classes for a single demographic.
Procter & Gamble (P&G), for instance, does this effectively with the Pampers model. Though P&G makes a speciality of varied merchandise, the Pampers line focuses on making merchandise like diapers and wipes for infants.
4. Firm Authority Extension
Firms with excessive ranges of authority of their sector can leverage this authority to create new merchandise.
As an illustration, Samsung has an enormous model identify within the know-how area that permits them to launch completely different merchandise in associated classes with a measure of success. And due to its model picture, most customers would not thoughts utilizing a brand new product, whether or not it is an air conditioner or a cell phone.
5. Model Way of life Extension
Who would have thought a tequila line from an power firm would sell out within a few hours? Nicely, Tesla did it. And it was primarily as a result of persona and way of life of its CEO, Elon Musk.
Nevertheless, Elon and Tesla are usually not the one ones to make use of a celeb’s way of life to increase an present model. Different cases embody Adidas/Kanye West’s Yeezy lineup and Fenty (a model beneath LVMH) with Rihanna.
Model Extension and Model Well being Measures
Earlier than you possibly can take into consideration extending your model, it’s vital to ensure that your model’s present iteration is in good well being. What does that imply? Model well being refers to a model’s means to ship on its worth proposition and promise. Earlier than you begin launching a brand new services or products, ensure that prospects are delighted together with your present choices.
Subsequent, we’ll dig into what precisely you’ll must assess model well being.
Model Well being Monitoring
There isn’t only one metric obtainable to diagnose model well being. As a substitute, you’ll must view quite a lot of metrics to get an excellent image of the place your model stands. Listed below are a number of metrics you must already be monitoring that can assist you to assess model well being.
- Net Promoter Score (NPS): Discover your NPS by sending a survey asking prospects in the event that they’d suggest your service or product to a pal utilizing a scale of 0 (probably) to 10 (unlikely). Prospects who rated you at a 9 or 10 are thought-about “promoters.” Those that rated 0 to six are “detractors,” with these rated 7 to eight thought-about “passive.”
- Customer Satisfaction Score: Much like NPS, your buyer satisfaction rating can also be a survey query. This one asks prospects to fee their satisfaction together with your service on a scale of 1 (very unhappy) to five (very glad).
- Model Recall: Model recall is used to measure model consciousness. Your survey query would ask one thing much like “What firm/model involves thoughts if you consider [product]?”
- Share of Voice: Share of voice permits you to evaluate model consciousness throughout a number of advertising and marketing channels towards your opponents.
- Buy Intent: This survey query asks prospects how probably they’re to purchase your model on a scale from not prone to very probably. To search out the rating, whole the variety of prospects that answered “very probably” and divide that quantity by the full variety of respondents.
The metrics above are key to measuring model well being. With them, you possibly can observe your:
1. Model Consciousness
Surveys and focus teams will assist you to observe each brand awareness and model notion. Instruments like SurveyMonkey could make running surveys a cinch, and permit your crew to drag much-needed buyer insights.
2. Model Loyalty
Utilizing each your NPS and buyer satisfaction rating may help you gauge model loyalty. In case your prospects wouldn’t suggest your services or products to a pal, it’s an indication you may have extra work to do in constructing belief and delivering in your worth proposition.
3. Social Media Listening
It might sound creepy however on this occasion of social media listening, spying in your prospects is an effective factor. You’ll be monitoring your model’s social channels for direct suggestions and mentions of your model to see simply what prospects are saying about it on-line. Use listening instruments to gather buyer suggestions or reply on to individuals mentioning you on-line. The extra you study your prospects, the higher you’ll be capable to serve them.
4. Messaging Targets
Utilizing the metrics above will even be certain that your advertising and marketing technique corresponds to the right customer segment. Your prospects can have completely different ache factors and wishes and will likely be at completely different factors of their buyer journey. As such, your messaging shouldn’t be one measurement matches all. You’ll want to make sure your advertising and marketing efforts goal the proper prospects on the proper time for his or her particular scenario.
For instance, you would group prospects by product pages they’ve visited prior to now and ship them a advertising and marketing electronic mail mentioning that particular product. In case your messaging shouldn’t be aligned with the proper buyer section, you threat offering a poor buyer expertise — which might derail your model extension efforts.
Keep in mind that buyer expertise and model well being are linked. You gained’t efficiently pull off a model extension with out guaranteeing each are in an excellent place.
What separates the most effective model extensions from the worst?
Traditionally, essentially the most profitable model extensions are those that intently tie to the corporate’s core model or flagship product, like Gerber’s child garments and Dole’s frozen fruit bars. By getting into tangential markets that may protect their model’s distinctive associations and perceived high quality, corporations can launch new merchandise that customers intuitively perceive the advantages of, though they’ve by no means seen them on a shelf.
On the flip facet, an organization can even exploit its model and, in flip, smash it.
Creating a brand new product in a market that isn’t intently tied to your flagship product or core model, like what Zippo did with its girls’s fragrance, might trigger some issues.
It might lead to undesirable associations to your model and weaken its present associations and damage your established merchandise’ perceived high quality.
So whether or not you’re a SaaS firm or a client model fascinated by extending your product line, try our checklist of essentially the most and least profitable model extensions to assist encourage your personal.
Model Extension Examples
- Michelin
- Reese’s Puffs Cereal
- Meals Community’s Kitchen Objects
- Gillette’s Razors & Shaving Provides
- Colgate’s Toothbrush
- Star Wars Motion Figures
- Honda’s Garden Mowers
- Sunkist’s Vitamin C Tablets
- Cadbury’s Immediate Mashed Potatoes
- Levi’s Tailor-made Classics
- Pillsbury’s Frozen Microwave Popcorn
- Samsonite’s Outerwear
- Arm & Hammer’s Underarm Deodorant Spray
- Colgate’s Kitchen Entrees
Examples of Good Model Extensions
1. Michelin
Whenever you hear the identify Michelin, do you consider top-rated eating places or meals? Maybe each? Michelin constructed their empire manufacturing automotive tires. Within the late 1800s, the car business was nonetheless in its infancy — on the time there have been fewer than 3,000 vehicles in France — the Michelin firm’s house base.
In an effort to assist drivers plan their journeys and increase automotive gross sales, Michelin rolled out a information that includes fuel stations, maps, tips on how to change a tire, and different helpful info. Nevertheless, it wasn’t till the Twenties that the Michelin Information took off. Because the information’s recognition grew, thriller diners have been despatched to numerous eating places to supply evaluations and a star ranking system was carried out.
Now the Michelin Information is a must have reference for foodies and vacationers, protecting eating places in roughly 41 international locations.
What we like:
Michelin’s model extensions is without doubt one of the riskier ones on this checklist, but it surely’s fairly spectacular. They took two seemingly unrelated industries and made it work — changing into the gold customary of restaurant rankings.
2. Reese’s Puffs Cereal
Reese’s Puffs was my favourite cereal rising up, so I may be a little bit biased right here. However with all of the chocolate-flavored cereal round within the mid-90s, Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup’s entrance into the cereal market was sensible and pure.
In the present day, with some advert campaigns highlighting how youngsters can eat their favourite sweet for breakfast, over 6 million customers eat 1 to 4 servings of Reese’s Puffs per week according to Statista.
What we like:
Reese’s advertising and marketing efforts obtained dad and mom on board with permitting their kids to eat sweet for breakfast.
3. Meals Community’s Kitchen Objects
With an viewers of over 13 million people, Meals Community stays one of many world’s largest TV channels.
Contemplating that many individuals have been excited by what it does, Meals Community noticed a chance to increase its model by partnering with Kohl’s Company to launch its kitchen and cookware merchandise.
What we like:
The partnership was successful as a result of Meals Community served a selected viewers with what they wanted.
4. Gillette’s Razors & Shaving Provides
Gillette’s extension into making shaving merchandise alongside its security razor blades was a sensible transfer. Why? It’s laborious to think about somebody shaving with out utilizing shaving cream, foam, or gel?
What we like:
It was nearly a necessity for Gillette to provide this complementary good for its flagship product.
5. Star Wars Motion Figures
Though Star Wars was common amongst adults when the film was first launched in 1977, many kids did not prefer it as a lot.
So how did the franchise turn into common as we speak? The Star Wars model prolonged into the toy market. With motion figures from characters within the films, Star Wars was capable of appeal to a brand new viewers, construct model consciousness and make a ton of gross sales within the course of.
What we like:
Star Wars was capable of faucet into its devoted fan base and market toys to not simply die laborious followers, however appeal to new ones with the addition of merch.
6. Colgate’s Toothbrush
Identical to Gillette’s razors and shaving merchandise, Colgate’s toothpaste and toothbrush are complementary items. However in contrast to the previous instance, you actually want a toothbrush to make use of toothpaste. In any other case, you possibly can’t brush your tooth.
What we like:
In my view, Colgate’s determination to enter the toothbrush market was a necessity and considered one of its finest strikes, serving to it safe the third-largest slice of the oral care market.
7. Honda’s Garden Mowers
Honda’s line of lawnmowers won’t elicit essentially the most pleasant recollections of my childhood. Nonetheless, its entrance and success in a saturated market communicate volumes for a corporation primarily recognized for promoting vehicles.
What we like:
By leveraging its experience in small motors to enter the lawn mower market in 1978, it now boasts the seventh-largest slice of market share in the global lawn mower industry.
8. Sunkist’s Vitamin C Tablets
That includes orange juice as its flagship product, Sunkist’s model has associations with oranges, well being, and power. Sunkist produced vitamin C tablets that spawned a complete arm of enterprise devoted to nutritional vitamins and dietary supplements to each bolster and leverage this affiliation concurrently.
What we like:
Sunkist was capable of parlay their model notoriety for orange juice into vitamin C dietary supplements. It is an extension that’s on model since oranges are an incredible supply of vitamin C.
Examples of Unsuccessful Model Extensions
Not each model extension could be a hit. Listed below are a number of examples of manufacturers which have made model extension errors — and the teachings you possibly can study from them.
9. Cadbury’s Immediate Mashed Potatoes
Cadbury is thought for making high-end chocolate and sweet. When it began producing low-end meals merchandise, like instantaneous mashed potatoes, it’s not stunning to study that its affiliation with the best sweets weakened.
Smash, its instantaneous mashed potato model, truly reached mainstream success, but it surely was on the expense of decreasing its flagship product’s perceived high quality. Cadbury eventually sold Smash in 1986, over 20 years after introducing its instantaneous mashed potatoes to the world.
What went fallacious:
Cadbury’s meals merchandise have been lower than the identical high-quality requirements as its sweet and misplaced buyer belief within the model.
10. Levi’s Tailor-made Classics
When Levi’s launched Tailor-made Classics within the early Eighties, it already owned a big share of its goal market, so it needed to enter some new markets to maintain its excessive development fee.
Certainly one of these markets was males’s fits, however since its model was closely related to an off-the-cuff, rugged, and outdoorsy way of life, Levi’s new product line conflicted with its core identification and did not catch on.
What went fallacious:
Customers trusted Levis to provide sturdy clothes that might endure the wrath of mom nature, however, for that very motive, they did not belief them to ship high-end tailor-made fits.
11. Pillsbury’s Frozen Microwave Popcorn
Though Pillsbury is thought for producing foodstuffs, its frozen microwave popcorn couldn’t compete with Orville Redenbacher or Common Mills’ Pop Secret as a result of its product positioning of being “frozen for freshness” didn’t provide sufficient worth. Positive, sticking your popcorn within the freezer is handy (I suppose), however that profit pales compared to having fun with a better-tasting popcorn.
What went fallacious:
Frozen popcorn was a tough promote — particularly when customers had better-tasting popcorn choices from opponents.
12. Samsonite’s Outerwear
Whereas Samsonite’s outwear is extra modern than Levi’s Tailor-made Classics, it nonetheless suffers from the identical drawback as Levi’s failed product line — the model extension doesn’t align with Samsonite’s core identification.
Samsonite is thought for making high-end baggage, suitcases, and enterprise luggage. So until it thinks its flagship product’s elegant traits can switch to a totally unrelated product line, its enterprise into the clothes business might diminish its brand equity. That is probably the rationale Samsonite doesn’t checklist outerwear on its web site anymore.
What went fallacious:
Samsonite was unable to switch its repute for creating smooth baggage to clothes.
13. Arm & Hammer’s Underarm Deodorant Spray
Arm & Hammer has efficiently prolonged its model from an odor-neutralizing baking soda to laundry detergent, carpet deodorizer, and even cat litter. However one product line that isn’t the most effective match for its model is an underarm deodorant spray. Making use of a product that shares an ingredient with heavy-duty cleansing provides to such a delicate a part of the physique doesn’t jive effectively with customers.
What went fallacious:
Whereas Arm & Hammer is thought for making wonderful cleansing merchandise, prospects simply could not image themselves utilizing its merchandise on their our bodies.
14. Colgate Kitchen Entrees
Though Colgate did effectively by extending its model and creating completely different oral care merchandise, it did not enter the meals area.
This model extension was a failure primarily as a result of promoting frozen meals was in sharp distinction with Colgate’s model identification. Since its viewers already related the model identify with dental care, it was laborious for them to see the corporate in a different way.
What went fallacious:
Pivoting from oral care to meals was not a swap that obtained buy-in from prospects.
Develop Your Model
Whereas a model extension has its advantages, you additionally must know that extending your model into unchartered waters would additionally include challenges.
So earlier than you implement any extension technique for your online business, guarantee it is according to what your very best client needs.
Does it make any logical sense to start out advertising and marketing a brand new product to my prospects? What profit would a client derive from this new model or product? Have I completed sufficient analysis to know the way a model extension would have an effect on my unique model?
When you reply these questions, then you can begin fascinated by efficient methods to develop your model.
Editor’s observe: This text was initially revealed in June 2021 and has been up to date for comprehensiveness.
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