Brand Resonance Model
Taylor Doege
Preston Dunlap
Rasika Reddy
Casey Sublett
Product and Brand Management
Professor Haworth
February 8, 2015
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Table of Contents
Executive Summary…………………………………………………................................. 3
Background……………………………………………………………………………………... 4
Analysis
Who are you: Salience……………………………………………………………
5
What are you: Performance & Imagery…………………………………..
6
Imagery………………………………………………………………………………………. 7
What do I think about you: Judgment……………………………………………. 8
Feelings……………………………………………………………………………………… 9
Resonance…………………………………………………………………………………... 10
Recommendations…………………………………………………………………………… 11
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Executive Summary
Subway and Jimmy John's -- two competitors in the same market, yet two very
different brands.
Subway is the largest and one of the most successful food-chains in the world. They
have established a healthy and fresh alternative to what we see as "fatty American
fast food". Consumers love having what they perceive as a better option and loyalty
to the brand has been established for decades. However, there is something Subway
does not do: delivery. This is where Jimmy John's has capitalized on the weakness of
its competition and specialized in convenience. Both companies are targeting a
specific consumer.
Of course the bigger a company is, most likely, the bigger the brand is and this
definitely rings true for Subway. The amount of brand equity Subway has is
unsurpassed (besides McDonald's perhaps) and thus their Brand has a lot of good
things going for it. For instance, it is easy to determine that Subway is all about
customization. However, it is not exactly fair to judge Jimmy John's under the same
standards since they are so small in comparison.
Even though they aren't nearly as large, Jimmy John's fast service and convenience
has helped build their brand equity and image. Jimmy John’s image is all about fresh
sandwiches, cold cuts, premium ingredients, and of course freaky fast delivery. A
brand’s image is possibly one of the most key things it possesses, and is one of the
largest shares of a brand’s equity.
Subway and Jimmy John's have defined who they are, what they are, how they want
to be thought about. The aspects that go into each brand's equity are salience,
imagery, performance, judgments, feelings, and resonance -- but the true test of a
brand is how effectively it puts together all 6 of those aspects. This is what we aim to
define in the following words for both Subway and Jimmy John's and see what they
excel at and where they fall short.
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Background
Imagine this: “Hey guys let’s get delivery for the game, what are the options?” Pizza
Hut, Dominoes, Jimmy Johns are probably the most accessible that come to mind in
terms of takeout. Sure there is Chinese delivery, but for the football game it just
doesn’t seem right. Besides, the game starts in 10 minutes and is pizza really going
to make it in time – or will they interrupt during the game causing you to miss the
biggest play of the year? Lets get Jimmy Johns. Here is a different scenario:
“Mommy, I’m hungry.” “What do you want to eat?” “A sandwich.” Now there are a
few choices, such as Potbellies, Jersey Mikes, and Jimmy Johns, but more than likely,
nothing comes to mind faster than subway. In this scenario we have a mother
daughter, and Subway just seems healthier and more personable right?
This is what companies strive for. They want to be at the forefront of the minds of
consumers whenever they are in a certain state of mind. Notice above how two
different scenarios led to the same food choice, sandwiches, even though they were
completely different sets of people. How do these brands obtain this level of
accessibility in our minds? They do it through brand resonance. Brand resonance is
the thoughts and feelings consumers associate with your product. If a sandwich
shop opened up and the sign said “SANDWICHES” then sandwiches are expected,
but what about them? Are they healthy, are they the best, are they unique, do they
deliver, what different options do they have, what should s consumer expect from a
shop that has a sign that simply says “SANDWICHES”? While it very well could be a
hole in the wall star as some eateries are, it could also be Joe in the back handing out
bologna and mayonnaise sandwiches all day and the only variety is whether you get
pickles on the side or not. There is nothing associated with “SANDWICHES”
therefore the consumer won’t feel anything about the shop and it wouldn’t come to
mind when they want a sandwich.
To achieve brand resonance such as Subway and Jimmy Johns has, there are
building blocks to follow, which are laid out before us by Kevin Keller, a marketing
professor at Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth, and his brand equity model.
While the model is simple, achieving brand resonance requires work. There are two
roads up the pyramid that must be followed simultaneously. To achieve brand
resonance the first step is brand salience – who are you? The second is performance
and imagery – what are you? After you establish what you are you must answer
what about you – what judgments and feelings will people get about the brand.
Finally brand resonance is achieved –what about you and the brand. To exemplify
Keller’s model, this study will examine two sandwich shops, Subway and Jimmy
John’s, and their brands to demonstrate the different routes taken by two products
that share the same product, but use their branding strategy to introduce points of
parity to make them differentiable.
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Who are you?
Brand Salience
Salience is about category identification and needs satisfaction. Both brands, Jimmy
John’s and Subway, offer sandwiches. What makes them fundamentally different
then? Why not toss a coin and decide where to go by that? This is the simple parity
between the two brands as to what they offer.
Subway satisfies the need for a sandwich. However it is not just a simple sandwich,
it’s something that can be customized. Subway offers sandwiches that can be made
with ingredients that might not be so readily available. Their menu is guidelines for
sandwiches that work, but you could very well go in and completely make
something of your own creation. From their website Subway describes its core
model as, “As we continue to grow, we are guided by his [Fred DeLuca – co-founder]
passion for delighting customers by serving fresh, delicious, made-to-order
sandwiches“ (Subway) and emphasizes who they are targeting as a consumer base:
“We’ve become the leading choice for people seeking quick, nutritious meals that
the whole family can enjoy” (Subway). This basic salience of the Subway brand
allows people to know that at Subway they will get a customized, hand made,
healthy, fast sandwich at a low cost.
Jimmy John’s also satisfies the needs for a sandwich. However, Jimmy John’s does
something subway doesn’t – they deliver. Jimmy Johns has built his brand on fast
delivery and fresh ingredients. The sign says “Jimmy John’s gourmet sandwiches”.
Ingredients are a point of pride for the company as taken from their website:
“What makes Jimmy John's different from the rest is that it's honest, it's damn good,
it's damn fast, at a decent price! Jimmy John's definition of fresh is worlds apart
from everyone else's. Bread is baked in-house everyday and served fresh. Meat and
veggies are sliced fresh in-house everyday. The turkey is real turkey, the roast beef
is real roast beef – no additives, no vegetable-based fillers, no fake stuff. Nothing is
delivered pre-sliced. Real Hellmann's mayo, real Grey Poupon, real olive oil and red
wine vinegar – it's the best of the best.” –Jimmy Johns
Jimmy John’s salience relies on a consumer base that wants fresh sandwiches, cold
cuts, premium ingredients, and of course freaky fast delivery.
After brands have agreed upon who they are, and they get the word out to the
consumer, how do they differentiate? What does Subway stand for that Jimmy
John’s doesn’t and vise versa? This is how we get to the performance and imagery of
a brand.
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What are you?
To answer the question “what are you?” a brand must figure out two things: what
type of performance will people expect from the brand, and what type of image the
brand will present. Successful marketing of the brand will result in a clear and
recallable description of what the brand does and why it does it.
Performance
Performance describes how your brand meets your customers’ physical needs.
Subway has done amazing with sandwiches, but has also grown in terms of product
selections. They now offer: the classic hot and cold sandwiches as well as soups,
salads, pizzas, and flatbreads. With those product expansions carrying the Subway
name people expect a certain standard of quality with the products, but they also
inherently trust them since they already trust in the Subway brand name. Another
aspect Subway has focused on heavily is its price point. Many people would not
consider Subway unaffordable, even in financial hardships. Their five-dollar foot
long deal is instantly recognizable by many, mostly in part due to the commercial
blockbuster that was their five dollar foot long jingle which is still stuck in the head
of the masses. Another key factor to Subway’s success was its ability to franchise.
The Subway franchise is much easier to afford than most other fast food chain
franchises – leading to their domination of the global market: there are 43,540
restaurants in 110 countries worldwide, the most of any food store in the world
(Subway). Subway has made its store and brand more accessible than ever through
these franchises.
Jimmy John’s focuses on a different performance standard. Their performance
model offers less sandwich options, however they have the ever-important delivery.
In the modern age of instantaneous internet, texts, transactions, and
communications the value of fast is becoming ever more critical. Consumers can
expect a performance from Jimmy John’s that will deliver them a fresh, gourmet
sandwich with a minimal amount of waiting. The brand is centered to be cheap but
is still a bit pricier when compared to Subway. The Jimmy John’s brand is
widespread and franchised, though not nearly as much as Subway, with 2000 stores
nationwide (Jimmy John’s). However with the store coming second to delivery, the
service is not as personable compared to the Subway stores, where sandwiches are
built with you right there for every step of the process.
Besides performance, one other characteristic provides an answer to what are you –
and that is image. A brand’s image is possibly one of the most key things it
possesses, and is one of the largest shares of a brand’s equity.
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Imagery
Imagery refers to how well a brand meets consumers’ intangible needs – their social
and psychological needs. Imagery leads to what is associated with the brand, and
how consumers will eventually feel about the brand.
Subway has three main points of imagery associated with the brand. When people
think of Subway, the three most prominent images associated with the brand are:
Jared from Subway, their slogan Eat Fresh, and the five-dollar foot long commercial
that was mentioned in the previous section. Jared, their company “mascot”, was an
average Subway guest who vowed to get into shape on a subway diet. Eventually he
did, losing over 200 pounds through subway products. This imagery is important
because it promotes the companies strive for a healthy image. Their slogan, “Eat
Fresh”, is another health conscious image that also doubles for quality of the
product. By eating fresh, not only are consumers getting a superiorly fresh product
– the freshest bread, produce, and meats – but they are also making a health
conscious choice that might not be associated with store bought produce or deli
meats. And of course, the famous five-dollar foot long. Subways affordability has
taken off ever since the five-dollar foot long campaign was conjured up by a Miami
franchisee. Even with most of their “premium subs” costing a bit over six dollars,
the five-dollar foot long campaign, which had changed the entire pricing structure of
the company, continues strong years later. Subway will always be considered
affordable because of the breadth of people the five-dollar foot long campaign
reached.
Jimmy John’s is interesting for imagery. There are not many television commercials,
if any, and the slogan is not as readily available as Subways. “Freaky Fast” is the
slogan for Jimmy John’s which again only highlights the delivery aspect of the brand.
Only radio commercials have really given the brand any personable identity with its
fast narrator telling stories of fast delivery. The brand is not as recognizable
compared to Subway’s and really is centered on a younger market than Subway is.
After a brands performance expectations and imagery associations are set, they
must focus on what the consumers feel and think about the brand choices that were
made. The consumers’ reactions to how a brand presents itself is a key definer in
whether the brand will be successful as is or not.
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What do I think, or feel, about you?
To answer this question, a brand must understand two consumer responses: what
kind of judgments will potential consumers have about the brand, and what type of
feelings does the brand evoke? Successful marketing of the brand will more than
likely result in the preferred responses from consumers. This level is known as a
more transitional phase because it bridges the gap between the feature and
resonance levels. Judgments and feelings reflect the effectiveness of your
performance and imagery.
Judgments
Judgment refers to the responses from consumers about a particular brand and
what they perceive as its quality, credibility, relevance, and superiority. Consumers
constantly make judgments about a brand and therefore the company must keep
this in mind to be successful.
Our main judgments on Subway reflected a positive performance and delivery of an
exceptional quality service. The first judgment we came up with was great value. We
believe that this spoke to the consideration aspect of judgment and providing value
was relevant to the needs of customers. The $5 footlong specials they run on a
regular basis meet the needs of consumer value -- you get a ton of "bang for your
buck" -- 12 inches of sandwich for an incredibly reasonable price. Now, not only do
you get a great value with Subway's sandwiches, but you get healthy choices and
alternatives (our next judgment). Subway's multitude of products is both high
quality and superior to its competitors with a plethora of health conscious options -which is increasingly important in today's ever-growing "health nut" society. Along
with this, Subway is incredibly innovative which speaks to its credibility, likability,
and consideration of consumer needs. $2 specials on 6 inch subs for customer
appreciation month, reminds the consumer that we are valued and that Subway is
still relevant in our lives -- and we should keep going back. We also judged that
Subway is superior to its competitors. They have all kinds of options, from hot
sandwiches like there incredibly popular meatball sub, to cold cuts on flatbread. The
choices are endless, and to top it off, you can have this freedom of choice in almost
every country around the world. Subway's international reach is unmatched.
Now, Jimmy John's was a little bit different for us. We did not necessarily judge JJ's
as worse than subway, but that they had a little less of a desirable range of products
with less accessibility. For example, for pretty much the same product of what you
could get at Subway, you pay almost double the price at JJ's. Although it's
differentiated, we do not want to pay more for what we perceive as an equal
product. However, Jimmy John's has capitalized on a niche market -- delivery. This
consideration meets many consumers need of having sandwiches come to them and
they are unique because of this. Jimmy John's is convenient and a quick solution for
those times when you just can't go to Subway or are craving something different.
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Feelings
Feelings is the second part of the consumer response level and represents the
emotional response a consumer feels when they think of a brand. Feelings is a slight
bit different from judgments in that feelings are a pure emotional response to
stimuli (in this case a brand) while judgment is the ability to come to a sensible
conclusion. In other words, feelings are emotions and judgments are interpretations
of a brand. Examples of emotions are warmth, fun, excitement, security, social
Approval, and self-respect, but obviously this is not a completely exhaustive list.
Subway has paved its brand and established their priorities as a corporation. They
aim to be healthy, affordable, and consistent. The feelings we came up with first are
fresh and guilt-free. Subway makes you feel good inside and out. It is this way most
likely, because they push for healthy options and are transparent with their
ingredients -- and you get to choose these ingredients. The guilt-free feeling comes
with the entire experience, not just saving calories. The fact that their prices are so
cheap and you could feed an entire family for around $20 or less, make it easy on
your wallet as well. Guilt-free all around. Some of our other feelings associated with
Subway were freedom (mostly of choice) and consistent satisfaction. Most people
enjoy how much freedom they have with their ingredients and that they can add
fresh vegetables or whatever they please. Jimmy John's does not have nearly as
much freedom. You tell them the sandwich you want, and it's made for you with
only a couple of options like adding mayo, mustard or hot peppers. Plus, Subway has
done a great job of making every Subway consistently taste the same. With this
consistency, you always know what you are going to get.
The positive feelings we got from Jimmy John's was instant-gratification and a
"homemade" feeling. What Jimmy Johns excels at is fast service and delivery. If you
want something quick or don't want to go to Subway, Jimmy John's has the service
for you. Of course, not all people feel this way, but everyone we have talked to in and
outside our group came to this consensus. Subway is usually the first choice, but
regardless, Jimmy John's still has some things going for it. One feeling we had that
was interesting is that "Jimmy John's feels like something you would make at home,
just 10 times better". While it was not the first feeling that came to mind, there is
definitely a homemade feeling that is evoked by Jimmy Johns.
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"How much of a connection would I like to have with you?"
Brand Resonance is the very top of the branding pyramid because it is the most
desirable yet most difficult level to achieve. Resonance is the deep bond a consumer
has with a brand and this leads to loyalty, attachment, community, and engagement.
Brand resonance does not usually come easily, but more established companies
strive for excellence in this category by tackling the other branding requirements in
the pyramid and creating a sense of connection with their consumers on a
psychological level. Creating relationships and deep connections leads to more
satisfaction and loyalty to the brand, thus creating more sales.
Resonance
Subway has quite a bit of resonance in today's society. The very lowest level of
resonance is repeat purchases. Subway has so many storefronts and convenient
locations. Combine that with an exceptional product and you get behavioral loyalty.
Even one of our group members said that on road trips around the United States,
she would specifically wait for a Subway, because she knew one would come up
soon and she preferred the food to anything else. It's hard to imagine that we are so
loyal to a sub sandwich shop like Subway, but from almost everyone we have talked
to, it's hard for them to say that they are not loyal to the brand (when they think
about it). Also, the "Eat Fresh" campaign has created a lot of attitudinal attachment.
Customers love that they are getting a healthy option and it feels like a special
purchase to them because they can "save calories" while eating something they
thoroughly enjoy. Furthermore, NASCAR has also been a big sponsorship partner
that has established community and the Healthy Community with the Jared
Foundation has fostered active engagements between the consumers and the brand.
Jimmy John's has not quite reached the level of resonance yet. Consumers do not feel
a deep, psychological bond with the Jimmy John's brand and thus attachment,
community, and engagement are not as solid as they could be. This is where Jimmy
John's needs to act. We do believe that Jimmy John's has behavioral loyalty because
many customers have repeat purchases either in store or delivery. If Jimmy johns
can develop an attitudinal attachment by making the purchase feel special, creating
community by making the brand something that is relatable, and actively engage the
community through marketing rallies or goodwill events, they could boost their
brand resonance.
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Recommendations
Taking all of the previous branding aspects into consideration, our group has some
recommendations for both Subway and Jimmy John's.
Subway should start to improve its upper resonance levels, more specifically it's
engagement with the community. We would like to see more visible community
events or philanthropic sponsorships in order to give us a better idea what their
values are and to be a part of society with customers. When we think of a brand that
has great engagement, we think of Coke and all of their clever marketing campaigns.
Now, we know that Subway is capable of doing this (and are most likely attempting
something for engagement), but they need to figure out a way to really engage those
yearning for something more. We want to see Subway help our society and spread
goodwill so we can have even more of a reason to keep purchasing sandwiches.
For Jimmy John's, they need to focus on what they have been developing already.
They need to "own" the brand and start to branch out with their marketing efforts.
Their slogan right now is "Freaky Fast Delivery" and this has the potential to be
great for them. The only sponsorships they have are with auto-racing teams and
organizations, but we do not feel this is enough to establish their brand and to
convert more customers. Whenever we walk into a Jimmy john's we don't really
understand what it's trying to achieve for its image, and his needs to be fixed by
solidifying who they are and what they plan on being. Jimmy John's also needs to
widen their product offerings. It's great to have a simple concept and menu, but
some people don't like that they only have 9 or 10 options to choose from. This feels
like you do not have the freedom of choice -- and looking at Subway, they don't have
that many more sandwiches than Jimmy John's, but they let you choose what goes in
them, so it seems like they have an infinite amount of sandwich combinations which
keeps things fresh and exciting.