Reference no: EM133100923

Meeting on importance of brand equity

Carlos Chance, the head of branding at Slate, Inc., soon hosts a kick-off Zoom meeting asking for the case team's insights into the company's logic on brand equity.

Carlos noted that "brand equity is basically the added value that a brand gives to a product beyond the functional benefits that it provides. Brand equity provides competitive advantages; for example, Mercedes Benz implies quality. A second advantage is that consumers are willing to pay more for a product with a brand equity. Here, brand equity is represented by the premium that a consumer is willing to pay for a certain brand over another when both brands provide similar functional benefits. Acura, Infinity, and Lexus cars enjoy a price premium that arises from their brand equity" (Kerin & Hartley, 2017).

Carlos also noted that "Keller (1998) defined brand equity as the added value of a brand that represents the part of a product created in consumer minds as a result of previous investments in brand marketing. In addition, Keller (1993) argued that brand equity is assessed through a customer-based lens by examining how consumers would react favorably to a brand versus a generic version of the product."

Carlos added that "a company like P&G has 22 global brands bringing in more than a billion dollars each in annual sales (Brownfield, 2020). P&G spends millions of dollars each year to defend its brands; they are its most precious assets."

Carlos said. "I want you to research the role that brand equity plays in our competitors' branding strategies, and how we can learn from them to enhance and defend our brand equity?

What roles does brand equity play in Samsung and Apples' branding strategies, and how we can learn from them to enhance and defend our brand equity?