Measure of a Brand

Photo nicked from here, many thanks.

Full disclosure: I am a complete Mac Fanboy. It seems to me that in recent years Apple and Steve Jobs have rarely come up with a miss when it comes to introducing new products. This is why I spent most of my day yesterday following live coverage of Apple’s World Wide Developers Conference on sites like Engadget and Mac Rumors and subsequently watching video of the keynote later in the day when it was posted.

While I was watching the keynote I started to think about how Apple seems to pull it all together, and I mean all: product design and performance, store design, distribution plus interesting advertising and communication. The question that entered my mind was “how can you tell?”

Brand Metrics

There are brand metrics that offer a really good status indicator, but don’t always indicate future performance or how others feel about a brand. For instance, one standard measure is brand awareness. I, like many others know the Hummer brand, but don’t count on me buying one in the future or even having positive emotions for the brand.

Stock Price

Stock price could prove to be a good indicator. Apple’s stock price has skyrocketed in recent years. Unfortunately there are many financial maneuvers that typically wouldn’t affect the brand, but could affect the stock price. This also seems to be a much more long term indicator, but not necessarily a short term indicator (yesterday during the keynote from Steve Jobs where he introduced the new iPhone, Apple’s stock price was down at least $6.

Fetishized Products

While certainly not scientific, I have noticed that Apple gets some seriously amorous talk online. There are several blogs devoted to rumors and news about the company. Think Secret (which has been shut down), Apple Insider, Mac Rumors, and even Engadget just to name a few. I understand that online conversations happen about many companies and products, but there seem to be a few products that stand out above the rest and generate much more affectionate conversations. Take for example the “unboxing” that has happened online for virtually every new Apple product, here is one for the MacBook Air.

Photo nicked from here, many thanks.

Apple isn’t the only company getting this kind of treatment. Activate Drinks was a product that I saw getting some “buzz” and popping up on a few blogs here and there. Then NOTCOT did an exhaustive post on the vitamin drink and it’s packaging. This seems quite similar to the posts unboxing Apple products. The GM Volt, plug-in hybrid concept, gets its own blog from a customer advocate just like the Apple blogs. These are just a few examples, that represent a more in-depth level than just casual online conversations about brands, or “buzz”.

Photo nicked from here, many thanks.

While, I wouldn’t base my agency compensation on producing these kinds of results it does seem that whether customers are fetishizing your products could be a good anecdotal indicator of how you are doing from a holistic perspective. Customers take everything into account rather than just looking at one element of a brand at a time.