Spa: building your brand as an industry leader

Moreover, there was another desire. Because while for mineral water Spa is a household name, for soft drinks it is now even less so. A different market, with different competitors. How does Spa manage to build their brand and achieve growth within this product category as well?

Monitoring brand growth in a new way

At the 2016 Marketing Insights Event, Blauw gave a presentation on Byron Sharp's thinking. 'How Brands Grow' has a vision: Brands grow by being present mentally (in the mind) and physically (in the environment) at the moment of consumption. In other words, that your brand is there at the moment it matters. The greater the mental and physical availability, the greater your market growth.

Daniel Kahneman, the Nobel laureate and author of the bestseller Thinking fast and slow, has been saying it for decades: people don't act rationally, they act intuitively. But how do you get insight into these kinds of intuitive consumer choices? The research tools that go along with this assume, unlike the classic version: actual behavior, implicit thinking and changing buying and need situations.

Inside the brain of the consumer

In this study, we focus specifically on the mental availability of Spa. Mental availability refers to the mental links to a brand. In this regard, distinctive brand assets (DBAs) are essential. These are the "meaningless" elements of a brand that are sensory perceptible, such as logo, color, pay off, font, jingle. Elements that a consumer associates in their mind with a brand. And these are especially important in relation to category entry points (CEPs). These are the relevant buying or need situations in which the brand should be thought of. They are not about the why but about the tangible when, what, with whom, and where(to). The more consumers associate relevant category entry points with the brand, the stronger the brand and the stronger the foundation for brand growth.

To clarify these CEPs and DBAs for Spa, we held group discussions with three target groups: heavy users, light users and non-users divided between the two categories of natural mineral water and soft drinks. As a result, Spa now has new insights into:

• The target audience. At what times and situations do they use natural mineral water and soft drinks.
• The brand. What is the recognition of Spa among the target audience?
• The triggers for use. What makes Spa stand out and relevant?

A tool that is practically applicable

One of the major advantages of this way of thinking and doing brand research appears to be its better practical applicability. As a company, you get concrete tools to get started. No abstract terms and end values like sustainability or freedom, but practical insights about actual usage.

Ricardo van der Valk went to work with Spa as Expertise Manager Brand & Communication: "This method is much more in line with how people act, think and store information. The classic communication model knowledge-attitude-behavior is out of date, but unfortunately difficult to eradicate. It is rather the other way around: behavior-attitude-knowledge. In nine out of 10 cases, you do something and then start thinking about it or trying to explain it when asked about it. Companies know this, but sometimes don't want to know it yet. The implications of the insights we uncover with this brand research can have quite an impact on existing KPIs and therefore the entire company. This is quite exciting and you have to dare to do this as an organization. We don't claim that this method is the new truth, but we see so much evidence supporting this approach."

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