Doppelganger Brand Image that gave us some closure
A quick walkthrough to Doppelgänger Brand Image
A doppelgänger brand image is a company logo that has been modified in a pejorative manner. Such images are most likely, spread via social media, or through websites of anti-brand activists such as Adbusters. And these are often intended to highlight ethical issues regarding the product advertised. In the pursuit, it has drastic effects on the brand value.
Brand equity refers to a value premium that a company generates from a product with a recognizable name when compared to a generic equivalent. Companies can create brand equity for their products by making them memorable, easily recognizable, and superior in quality and reliability.
source: Investopedia
A 2012 study concluded that doppelgänger brand images were able to negatively affect sales.
Among others, the main reason behind DBI is that of inauthenticity and misleading people into buying something under false pretenses. And a Doppelgänger Brand Image can have a strong influence on consumer’s buying decision.
❝ Mainly three stages are involved in any purchase, i.e Awareness, Consideration and Decision. If the consumer is exposed to DBI in either of these stages, it could make the consumer switch to alternatives, which in turn would be a potential loss to the firm at the receiving end of it ❞.
A doppelganger brand image can influence and stimulate brand perception in the consumer’s mind.
Brand perception is how the consumer sees the brand. The aggregate perception of the brand by consumers is what defines brand equity.
For instance, Apple as a brand enjoys a great brand equity because consumers perceive Apple as a valuable brand. In fact, Apple stands as a benchmark of quality, standard and status quo.
One can find examples of Apple in numerous entrepreneurship and business books like Start With Why? and many more.
Here are some extraordinary creative DBI’s created by graphic designers that break the ice.
Everyone recognizes this brand, but that’s not it’s actual description. It is Starbucks, known for its speciality in coffee. But it doesn’t end there. Lately, we all are aware of the fact that how detrimental sugar is for our body, and I am not just talking about diabetes.
Of course, over-consumption of sugar will make you diabetic. But do you know why people always have been hooked on sugar? It’s an addictive substance. And turns out, it’s more addictive and strong that cocaine. There is sugar in everything, you name it. On the top of that, we have products heavily endowed with sugar, products like Nutella. On the premise of this data, the DBI seems legitimate.
Another popular fast food brand, or as I call it a Junk food brand, is McD. It received consistent criticism over the years but there’s very little that they can do about it. After all, junk food is indeed their core competency. They cannot serve broccoli and carrots unless they wanna relinquish their brand.
McDonald’s food have high amount of preservatives and toxicity which is detrimental to our health. According to a research conducted in the United States, it has made teenagers fat. Plus everybody knows Pepsi and Coke’s affiliation with McDonald’s, which again come filled with sugar and caffeine.
This looks familiar, isn’t it? It is Samsung. I mean who could not relate to this DBI. Their UI, their design, as well as the structure is pretty much always the same. Even a loyal consumer at one point would switch to another brand. Everybody expects something different and innovative at one point to get over the tedium.
The creativity of the designer in this DBI is worth some applause. Here, Pepsi did half the job itself and the DBI portrays emotional branding, which cautions restraint. Pepsi is a soft drink and goes with pizza and burger and sandwich. Now for the people who have these foods in their diet would probably consume more Pepsi.
And Pepsi, as said earlier, is high on sugar and caffeine. Both sugar and caffeine being the addictive component that they are, will induce frequent purchases.
This is a DBI of a Cigarette manufacturing company which had to close it’s operation in the year 1997. The name of the brand was Joe Camel, but it seems that the designer did a thorough research and named it as Joe Chemo.
The word Chemo suggests chemotherapy that one has to undergo as a consequence of cancer. In the original brand, the camel character is portrayed smoking a cigarette with a rather inappropriate smirk expression on its face. In the DBI, however, it appears to be sad and depressed, holding the saline bottle to keep itself alive.
What this artist has done is really commendable. I mean, cigarette companies are responsible not only for hefty medical bills, but also the loss of lives that they corrupt.
Doppelgänger Brand Image will keep occurring as long as human life is put in danger by these very brands and as long as they entertain inauthenticity. Brand creation process takes years to build up, but DBIs will destroy it in no time. We live in the consumerist culture, and a brand should always try to deliver its value proposition, thus, safeguarding its interests.
For dominant brands like Pepsi and Coke, which serve global consumers across countries, things like these get viral in no time with the help of social media.
To prevent it from happening, brands needs to define consumer culture and its constituents, and how the factors behave. Brands who cannot change their course needs to reflect corporate social responsibility, that’s how they can define their cause.
In this digital age, we will keep stumbling upon Doppelgänger Brand Images. They try to keep us safe from any product that might deprive us of our health or wealth.
Originally published at investinganswer.blogspot.com.
