Saturday, October 29, 2016

Market Leader: Intermediate Unit 1 Brands: Listening p.8

(Supplementary Materials for Specific Textbooks--Market Leader Intermediate)


Transcript (docs, pub)

There are 5 mistakes in this transcript.  Listen again and find the 5 mistakes.

What are the qualities of a really good brand?

Weak brands--really, you know, brands that you would say have, er, a real traction in the marketplace, um, will have a number of important qualities.  Obviously, the first is, they will have high levels of awareness, so people will know about them and recognise them  when they see them, and that might be the physical product, or it might be the visual identity, the design manifestation. Um, but obviously recognition is not enough. What needs to happen also is that people, you know, the target customer or consumer, needs to know a lot about that brand, so a strong brand will also immediately communicate a set of appealing and persuasive ideas, er, and perceptions, that enable the end user, er, you know, the target audience, to know whether or not this is a brand for them, um, or whether it’s a brand that they, perhaps, are not attracted to.

Brands are really useful ways of firstly conveying all that information instantly, so--think of any brand you like, any brand that you can imagine, say BMW or British Airways or in any sector, and immediately your head is filled with, er, a raft of important  information about what the brand does, but as much as that, what it’s like and how it appeals to you and connects with you.  And so its function, therefore, is to enable you to choose one thing from another--often in markets where there is very little actual difference between, you know, the product.  So a BMW--I’m sure BMW would probably be delighted for me to say this--but you know, a BMW is a car like an Audi is a car like a Mercedes is a car--they’ve all got ten wheels and an engine and, you know, air conditioning and all that type of thing, but the way people feel about them, because of the information and awareness and perception that they have, enables them to decide whether or not one is better for them or right for them or says the right things about them than another.

Can you give us an example of a brand you have helped?

One I can think of is Nokia.  Nokia is, you know, a well-known brand, um, it’s by far the biggest mobile phone manufacturer--I think it has about a third of the market, so it’s way bigger than anybody else.  It’s also been, um, in the market--it was, kind of invented the market in a way, so for many people, particularly people of your generation, Nokia equals mobile phones.  We’ve helped them in a couple of important ways. Firstly, um, in a market that’s changed and a brand that’s expanded hugely in terms of what it offers, we helped them with, er, the question of what is it that Nokia is about, and how does it relate to its customers, its broad range of customers in ways in which its competitors don’t.  So to give it that, um, element of choice, you know, so why I should choose a Nokia over a Motorola, um, in addition to what it looks like and what it does.  So, what the brand is about--um, so that on what you might call technically the master brand.
And we’ve helped them with, um, developing certain parts of their offer in order to, um, react to the market and also to keep the brand fresh.  So we worked with Nokia on their N series, which is one of their more technological phones, multimedia phones--although they don’t like to call them phones any more because they do so much more--um, in order to satisfy, er, the needs that emerging customer group has, primarily older consumers who want to be able to do all sorts of things with their phones--or devices. Um, but also, in order to sharpen Nokia’s brand image as a technology leader, it was important that it had products in, in those areas.
Answers:

What are the qualities of a really good brand?

Weak Strong brands--really, you know, brands that you would say have, er, a real traction in the marketplace, um, will have a number of important qualities.  Obviously, the first is, they will have high levels of awareness, so people will know about them and recognise them  when they see them, and that might be the physical product, or it might be the visual identity, the design manifestation. Um, but obviously recognition is not enough. What needs to happen also is that people, you know, the target customer or consumer, needs to know a lot about that brand, so a strong brand will also immediately communicate a set of appealing and persuasive ideas, er, and perceptions, that enable the end user, er, you know, the target audience, to know whether or not this is a brand for them, um, or whether it’s a brand that they, perhaps, are not attracted to.

Brands are really useful ways of firstly conveying all that information instantly, so--think of any brand you like, any brand that you can imagine, say BMW or British Airways or in any sector, and immediately your head is filled with, er, a raft of important  information about what the brand does, but as much as that, what it’s like and how it appeals to you and connects with you.  And so its function, therefore, is to enable you to choose one thing from another--often in markets where there is very little actual difference between, you know, the product.  So a BMW--I’m sure BMW would probably be delighted horrified for me to say this--but you know, a BMW is a car like an Audi is a car like a Mercedes is a car--they’ve all got ten four wheels and an engine and, you know, air conditioning and all that type of thing, but the way people feel about them, because of the information and awareness and perception that they have, enables them to decide whether or not one is better for them or right for them or says the right things about them than another.

Can you give us an example of a brand you have helped?

One I can think of is Nokia.  Nokia is, you know, a well-known brand, um, it’s by far the biggest mobile phone manufacturer--I think it has about a third of the market, so it’s way bigger than anybody else.  It’s also been, um, in the market--it was, kind of invented the market in a way, so for many people, particularly people of your my generation, Nokia equals mobile phones.  We’ve helped them in a couple of important ways. Firstly, um, in a market that’s changed and a brand that’s expanded hugely in terms of what it offers, we helped them with, er, the question of what is it that Nokia is about, and how does it relate to its customers, its broad range of customers in ways in which its competitors don’t.  So to give it that, um, element of choice, you know, so why I should choose a Nokia over a Motorola, um, in addition to what it looks like and what it does.  So, what the brand is about--um, so that on what you might call technically the master brand.
And we’ve helped them with, um, developing certain parts of their offer in order to, um, react to the market and also to keep the brand fresh.  So we worked with Nokia on their N series, which is one of their more technological phones, multimedia phones--although they don’t like to call them phones any more because they do so much more--um, in order to satisfy, er, the needs that emerging customer group has, primarily older younger consumers who want to be able to do all sorts of things with their phones--or devices. Um, but also, in order to sharpen Nokia’s brand image as a technology leader, it was important that it had products in, in those areas.

No comments: