Brand intelligence for a competitive advantage

How does your brand shape up against your competitors? That's what every brand wants to know. That, and how to grow what's working and how to fix what's not.

This most likely explains why, after more than five years, Brand Gauge - BMi Research's brand health measurement and tracking tool - remains the company's single, most-rapidly growing research solution.

"Brand Gauge measures the performance of a brand in a competitive context. It provides intel on a brand's relative strengths and weaknesses, and the levers to push or pull to accelerate or underpin growth. Together, these insights provide strategic direction for brand owners," explains Michelle Daines, Research Manager: Consumer Behaviour and Business Insights at BMi Research.

Relevant for all brand stages

That direction can apply to any phase of a brand's lifecycle, including at brand inception or launch to understand the brand category and landscape to harness unexplored opportunities and ensure a successful launch.

Brand Gauge can play a critical role in underpinning the success of a dominant brand. It is often harder to maintain dominance in a market than to grow a new or existing brand.

This solution is also relevant in instances where brand sales are tapering off, to help brand owners understand the causality of the decline and how to reverse this.

Maximising marketing ROI

Another key focus area in growing a brand within a competitive context is ascertaining how to secure the greatest return on investment in marketing spend.

This is particularly relevant in the current tough economic climate where competition is fierce, and it is harder to extract spend from consumer wallets.

Where maximising marketing ROI is a key objective, Brand Gauge isolates levers to drive equity growth, and identifies gaps at point of sale and in market activations to optimise brand performance.

Proprietary process

"This ability to track performance at every stage of a brand lifecycle, on an ongoing basis, is undeniably the true strength of this solution. It ensures that a brand continues to grow optimally, delivers the required returns, and proactively implements strategies to achieve positive growth," adds Daines.

To do this, Brand Gauge covers key category drivers and brand funnel tracking metrics such as awareness (salience and recognition), brand trial, future consideration, current or regular usage, and loyalty.

As part of BMi Research's proprietary process, Brand Gauge distils these metrics into a single number score per brand. This Brand Impact Score makes it easier to track the performance of the brand and competing brands over time, to gauge relative performance.

Customised to your brand challenges

Brand Gauge is a versatile, client-centric solution. It is highly customisable, and all metrics can be adapted to brand owners' current needs.

The research team provides insights on the customer profiles for each brand, affording brand owners intelligence into where opportunities exist within particular demographics and how 'future fit' brands are, given age skews.

Brand Gauge also provides insights into the perceived positionings of brands in the mind of the consumer, and where brands are competing on key attributes or perceptions. 

Indicators can be run continuously, with data collection taking place weekly, monthly, quarterly, bi-annually or annually, depending on the brand need.

Clients return to reassess performance

Brand Gauge continues to experience significant growth, with the majority of clients returning after the first wave of tracking to reassess brand performance over time.

"We have journeyed with many clients and have seen first-hand the successes of the brands where we have provided insights via this powerful research solution. We have also assisted clients in designing KPIs around brand performances, and strategies to help them achieve these goals," says Daines.

Brand Gauge is so much more than a research solution. It is a strategic compass that helps brand owners, marketers, media agencies and ad agencies easily navigate competitive brand landscapes for optimal outcomes.