Why Do Great Brands Take so Long to Build?

There are many case studies to point to when considering what makes a great brand leader, but the auto industry comes to mind. For 50 years or more. Detroit autos and their brand marketing dominated the United States and world markets.

Fast forward to the 1970s and through the ’80s, when those pesky Japanese low-cost cars started to invade the U.S. market. People thought maybe I’ll get one for my second car or kid’s car. Detroit sniffed and said, “Not really our competition.”

Then something quite unexpected started to happen. Japanese and other international automakers started building very-high-quality brands, such as Lexus. Slowly, but surely, their branding pushed an alternative to U.S.-made autos and won over a slice of their perceived protected market.

It took importers a decade to be taken seriously and another to be purchased over U.S. imports. But then, all of a sudden, the U.S. auto industry was looked at in a diminished capacity because its collective “brand quality” had been overcome and imports were now outselling even the most-popular American brands.

Fast-forward to 2000 and Detroit woke up to these facts—too late of course—and started building excellent-quality automobiles. But did the market jump back? No!

It turns out that it takes a long time to build a brand and once you do, you can only continue to offer the same brands for a certain period of time. Equally important, doing so won’t guarantee you a leadership position forever.

Today, Detroit is building automobiles of equal or greater value than the imports, but U.S. consumers are not rushing back to purchase them as they once did. Evidently it’s tough to change brand perceptions, and that leads to our main point.

It’s critical to never take your brand leadership position for granted. Consider Borders, Books and Music or the many other great brands that are no longer with us. It simply takes a long time to build a brand into a leader because customers and prospects want to see the brand’s true value—proven over time—before they fully commit.

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Tom Wants To Hear Your Branding Issues:
Tom Marin, Managing Partner of MarketCues, wants to hear from you! Follow MarketCues on Twitter for branding and social media tips - as well as the latest trends. Tom also welcomes emails, new LinkedIn connections, calls to 407.330.7708 or visit www.marketcues.com. How can he help solve your branding issues?