5 Most Valuable Brands and What They Sell Beside Their Products
Have you ever played RPG video games when you go over the world and collect items, buy clothes, weapons, shoes and get points for them? For example, the sword can give +10 points to your strength and +10 points to your fighting skills. You continue wondering over the world, meet people, do quests and kill monsters then you use all your collected money to upgrade your clothes, weapons and so on till your character level increases. As ridiculous as it sounds but this kind of games always remind me of our lives. What we actually do is working, collecting money and buying items which give us strength, +20 points to our ego or +10 points to our health. Here is where you as a product or service seller have to figure out what we need, what skills you are going to upgrade for us, how many points are we going to get for our ego and what problem, in general, your product or service is going to solve for us.
Actually, this is how brands are built. Have you ever noticed all famous brands have their specific color, slogan, idea or quality they that they assure us they have? These highlights their competitive advantages. When I was thinking about this RPG thing I came up with the idea that those competitive advantages are the points we get for our character development. As a product seller you have to fulfill not the rational customer needs but also the irrational ones. Have you seen almost every girl on Instagram mentions in hashtags the brand of their clothes when they describe their look? Why? Because brands are more than clothes, watches and accessories. They make people happy and proud of wearing them, or give points to their role-play character development. It’s like showing what your character has collected beside the actual items. Let’s see what the world’s 5 most valuable brands are giving to us beside their products.
Apple
Apple has sold 78 million units in the fourth quarter of 2016 and its average pricing is $695. It is one of the most famous brands and tops Forbes’ annual study of the most valuable brands 7 years in a raw. Apple now worth $170 billion.
What it gives to its consumers apart from being a fancy and high-end product? Apple has so much differentiation points that it is hard to compare with any other similar brand. It is just different and this is the biggest competitive advantage of this brand. You know that by buying Apple products you make yourself different, special, the one who belongs to Apple community and people can hate you or love you for this.
Nike
Nike, Inc worth $91.2 billion. Nike sportswear and sports equipment with the short but compelling slogan ‘Just Do it’ are the most recognizable products in the sports industry. The main reason why Nike is always associated with sports is that they sponsor lots of sports athletes. They have signed a sponsorship contract with the basketball star Michael Jordan back in 1984.
Nike has a number of famous athletes as brand ambassadors such as Ronaldo, Renaldo, Roberto Carlos, Lebron James, Jermane O’Neal, Lance Armstrong and Tiger Woods. This is one of its biggest competitive advantages. All these athlete fans are more likely to choose Nike over all other similar sportswear brands. What you get by owning this product besides the product itself? Belonging to something huge, being part of the sports world along with the most innovative brand.
BMW
BMW is a German company that manufacture and sale of automobiles and motorcycles and its value is $57.7 billion. BMW is at the top of its league in the car industry and counts to be one of the leading producers of luxury & state of the art vehicles. BMW’s success lies in its strong sense of identity which is tied to the experience of driving the machine.
The consumer knows that if they are buying a BMW vehicle they are expecting a certain quality and are willing to pay a bit more for it. As you can see, it’s not only car manufacturing that made this company world wide famous. As a result, if you are buying BMW car you know that it is going to give self-confidence and points to your ego.
Louis Vuitton
Louis Vuitton was founded in 1854 in France and now it’s world’s most valuable luxury brand that costs $28.8 billion. The company always concentrate their marketing strategy on their product quality. It is hard to hide if you’re wearing a Louis Vuitton bag because of their specific design.
Of course, celebrity endorsements played a major role and Jennifer Lopez, Kate Moss, Scarlett Johansson and Uma Thurman are brand ambassadors. Louis Vuitton products are mostly for elite society and their ads always highlight the exclusivity of the brand. This makes consumers believe that they are unique too. Women with Louis Vuitton clothing and accessories always feel more self-confident, elite and beautiful. Brand speaks for itself and shows the uniqueness of its owner too.
Rolex
Rolex is the leading name in luxury wristwatches and its brand value is $8.7 billion. Rolex has created world’s first waterproof watch back in 1926. Rolex has always introduced its products as luxurious and owning it is a status symbol. Rolex promotes its product as a specialized watches for every individual consumer. The company assures the consumer that there is only one watch was made for him and it is Rolex and owning it is a sign of standard. Also, Rolex has a bunch of brand ambassadors among celebrities like Roger Federer, Michael Schumacher, Daniel Craig, Cristiano Ronaldo and other famous people all over the world.
You buy Rolex when you have a special status and owning these watches already talks about you like you are someone who is not an “ordinary” person. Besides being a luxury brand it is also an idea of being someone special.
Some people never understand why would someone collect money or “waste” their money to buy branded products, but most of the people do because these brands are selling not only a product but an idea. Ideas can be different from wearing the same snickers with your favorite athlete to driving the best quality German car and it works perfectly well. The consumer always chooses in the research stage of the buyer’s journey and branded products are always an option even subconsciously because competitive advantages are highlighted perfectly well and they know what for they are going to pay more. Subconsciously we know that if we collect more money from our “life quests” we can get more with our new products more to our ego, pride, health, style and so on. Branded products always give more points to the character because they are not only products and this logic of selling products always works regardless of how big or small your company is you just have to make it special.
