The brand does not always receive the proper consideration and attention among the fundamental assets of a company. Many studies show that especially during less prosperous economic cycles, brand building, strengthening, and health-keeping projects often take a back seat in corporate investment strategies and just get penalized in favor of price-cut-based short-term revenue generation tactics.

Benefits of a strong brand

However, brand investments shouldn’t be overlooked. Holding a strong brand is one of the key drivers of long-term success, as it ensures the company numerous and decisive benefits:

• Shortlist. A strong brand holds a prominent position in the mental shortlist of potential customers, which means it will always be spontaneously considered among the top potential choices.
• Prominence. Products from strong brands stand out among others on every type of shelf, whether physical or virtual.
• Boost. A strong brand increases the likelihood of a product emerging as the winner at the end of the selection process for purchase.
• Loyalty. Strong brands have a solid emotional relationship with their customers, which generates preference and loyalty.
• Price. The stronger the brand, the less replaceable it becomes. This reduces potential customers’ price sensitivity, allowing for the defense of pricing and profitability.

Evaluating the brand

Then, how do we assess the strength of a brand?
There are three types of approaches, each designed to address different evaluation needs:

• Brand Value For Customers. Assesses a brand’s health from a marketing and commercial perspective through its “fundamentals.” It bases on key performance indicators (KPIs) such as awareness, purchasing intention, loyalty, and brand values.
• Brand Intangible Asset Value. Intended for financial use and serves to determine a value to be recorded on the balance sheet.
• Brand Valuation. Aims to assign an economic value to a brand about external deals such as sales or licensing.

It is clear, however, that whatever economic and financial evaluations should still be more or less direct expression of the brand’s fundamentals.

Characteristics of a strong brand

We can state that a brand is strong based on several key characteristics. 
Here are the most relevant ones:

• Awareness. The percentage of people who are familiar with the brand.
• Purchase intention. The percentage of the target population interested in actually buying a product from the brand.
• Reputation. The brand’s overall image and reputation in the market.
• Word of mouth. Indicates how much people talk about the brand and how central it is in discussions.
• Differentiation. Determines how much the brand stands out from others in product proposition, business model, customer approach, personality, and values.
• Loyalty. The percentage of retention in case of repurchase or complementary purchases.

In practice: measuring brand strength with RTBH.ai

The evaluation of brand strength and health can be performed continuously, objectively, and scientifically through RTBH.ai  (Real Time Brand Health), which intercepts and interprets all opinions shared spontaneously by people on the internet through posts, articles, and discussions. Without filters, interviews, samples, or biases.

RTBH.ai is based on a one-of-a-kind artificial intelligence engine, trained in the interpretation of human language through cognitive sciences and supported by a powerful data collection and cleansing engine.

The tool provides powerful summary indicators such as:

• Brand Health
• Brand Power
• Brand Love
• Differentiation Index

Moreover, it evaluates and presents the data in clear and rigorous numerical form, providing graphical representations, trends, and evaluations from the experts at RTBH.ai:

• Brand values and attributes
• Positioning
• Reputation
• Word of mouth
• Discussion topics
• Performance of the sales funnel, from awareness to advocacy.