What’s the most distinctive brand asset of all?

What thing are people most likely to link — correctly — to your brand? (Not just in ads.)

Ipsos and Jones Knowles Ritchie did a big ol’ global study to find out. 25 countries. 33 categories. 523 brands. 5,000 brand assets. And 26,000 people. 

The core question: did LOTS of people connect the thing to the RIGHT brand?

Then they sliced them into three tiers: gold, silver & bronze. 
Turns out the best distinctive asset is your actual product. Oreo cookie. Ray-Ban shades. Lego bricks. Dyson vacuums. A third of products got a gold rating. 23% got silvers. 

Logos were next, with 19% gold & 22% silver. Maybe Coca-Cola is on to something.

Then mascots with 16% gold (hi Bibendum!), then slogans with 6% gold (“It’s the Real Thing”). 

Only 4% of colors got gold & 16% got silver. Without context, it’s tough to guess what brand is forest green. This isn’t to say color blocking isn’t massively important, especially in retail. But I bet you didn’t instantly think “forest green = Starbucks!”

Caveats galore, natch.

F’rinstance, if your product is intangible like insurance, then of course it’s gonna be hard to have a strong branded product.

And did they tease apart product (brown fizzy sweet liquid) from packaging (curvy glass bottles)? Maybe not. 

And did they control for how long an asset had been in use (happy 125th birthday, Bibendum!), or how widely, or how big the brand is? I don’t think so. 

Nonetheless, it’s a lovely 10,000-foot view of distinctive brand assets.

Some key lessons:

1. If you can make your actual product (or package) distinctive, do it do it do it.

2. Keep your logo as distinctive as possible. Resist the blandification trend.

3. Don’t rely on ‘owning’ a color overall, but do try to have a distinctive color in your category (a la Starbucks vs Dunkin).

4. Remember this stuff takes years&years of disciplined use to become solidly linked to your brand.

5. Don’t let n00bs throw out any of your assets that actually have equity. (Paging J&J….)  

Read the whole thing too.

WANT MORE BRAND SCIENCE IN YOUR LIFE?

• Keynotes for conferences & offsites.

• 1-day intensives for your company, leadership team, or marketing team.

• Multi-day brand science training for your marketing team.

• Brand strategy projects.

• Coming soon: Brand Science, The Book!

Call, email, or message us for more brand science hotness.