Debranding – The next great step for Marketing

Debranding- the next step towards promotion

What initial thought comes to your mind while thinking of your favorite products. We generally recall their brand names. Admitting the fact, still, products are recognized from their brand images or logo. Many companies are approaching the strategy of Debranding. Instead of using their brand name or logos, products and services will be sold without brand names or logos. Apparently,  Eliminating a well- known brand from a product or a company is an appropriate marketing strategy as it makes the brand look less corporate and more consumer-oriented. This strategy became popular for the companies who want to expand their business and differentiate themselves from others by removing their brand-name or logo.

As Shakespeare famously wrote, “What’s in the name”? A common phrase I know but nonetheless very appropriate.

Well what exactly Debranding is?

Debranding basically means promoting your product without the logo or brand name. In a more broader sense, Debranding is a process of de-corporatizing where a company removes its brand name or logo from its marketing collateral. The key strategy of debranding is to hide commercial logos and even brands completely.  This strategy is adopted by those who want to be more consumer-centric without removing its logo. Also, it can be said eliminating the logo from its products in order to increase the sale and customer engagement. Moreover, the intention of removing logo is to make it less corporate and more personal.

Debranding will certainly attract the customers’ attention. As people are always curious they would find out the whole story for implementing the debranding strategy. As you all know that brand experience is the main dish for all marketers. Initially,  brand-names were used to promote their products using the brand name. But now the scenario has changed and every marketer used the strategy of debranding in order to promote their products. Some of the examples of Debranding is  Nike, Coca-Cola, Stella Artois, Starbucks.

TYPES OF DEBRANDING

Generally, Debranding is classified into three categories:

1). Removing the Logo completely– This type of debranding includes the removal of company’s logo for a specific marketing campaign. The best example of this type of debranding is Coca-Cola. Instead of using the brand name for marketing they used 150 common names for marketing purpose.

2). Removing the name from the logo, just keeping the bug– This is the scenario of removing the company name and just keeping other symbols in order to identify the brands somehow.  “Starbucks” adapted this strategy removed its name from its coffee cup in U.K last year just leaving the siren symbol behind. With the passage of time, the staff of the Starbucks adapted one more strategy, in which they used to ask the names of the customers so that their names can be written on the takeaway cups with the line We are Starbucks. Nice to meet you”. This was implemented to make its services more personal and less corporate.

3).Going Generic–   The best example is peeling of Walmart stickers from apples in order to sell them in the local market after their expiration date. Propelling generic labels on the cans increases the competition and gains the market share.This strategy was another manifestation of modern debranding is the wordless logo. This type of debranding includes the procedure of removing a brand name from its logo and acquiring local independent business without their brands. Usually, multinational companies have begun dropping their names from their logos, leaving only the symbols. It is psychologically easier to relate to a visual than it is to a name, meaning that consumers form stronger relationships with brands they might otherwise be critical of.

Some real-life examples of Debranding-  A brief about debranding strategies of Coca-Cola and Thailand Tourism that resulted positively.

                                                     Coca-Cola’s Debranding Crusade.

• The realistic example of Debranding is Coca-Cola. What is the debranding strategy of Coca-Cola? What it did.
• Under this campaign, Coca-Cola replaced their brand-name with the names of common people like Dan, Lauren, Katee, Peter etc and the idea spread like fire in the market and sales figure of the coca cola reached great height. It was a great success.
• Also, this was approach was copied by Australia, Middle East and in India.

                                   A fire spread all around “I hate Thailand”. Reason?

• Very famous example of “Brand Suicide” is Thailand Tourism. The tour and tourism created the controversial theme “I hate Thailand” and this got viral on all Social Media platforms. Although Thailand could have a negative impact on the business strategy. Thailand tourism will whole-sole responsible if anything bad happened.
• Consequently, customers were curious to know what happened. As a result, people came and experienced travel and the at the end result were positive. Here debrand spread like fire due to media. Media creates a lot of write-ups and can throw positive, negative or argumentative impact.

Some Recent reports on Debranding

• According to a recent report prepared by A.C. Nielsen Company, No‐name brand shares in the top fifty product categories in which they are the strongest range from 4 to 10 percent of the category sales volumes. This is in spite of the fact that no‐name brands have not yet achieved the broad levels of retail distribution enjoyed by branded products.

 

• No‐name brands have captured about 2 percent of the total grocery sales in the United States in just three years. In fact, the share of no‐name brands is as high as 16 percent in certain product categories based on the sales volumes of only those retail outlets that carry them. Contrary to industry expectations, the growth of no‐name brands appears to be a persistent market phenomenon rather than a passing fad. Indeed, retail chains such as Ralph’s on the west coast and Jewel in the midwest now have “generic” aisles in their stores.

 Some of the write-ups for Debranding are:

1). Products should be “Mature”–  Your brand should be capable of presenting the values and benefits of the products and services to the customers. Unless until your brand has a name it will not capture the large share in the market and when debranding strategy is implemented, your brand will not flaunt high awareness and in future also it should emphasize on creating more awareness. For instance- Nike was a mature brand. When they followed the debranding strategy it was a success. So your brand should be mature if you are thinking to implement the Debranding strategy.

2). Brand should be adaptable to future changes– After brand Maturity, the second most important thing is that your brand should be adaptable to changes. Design your logo in such a way that it can be changed in future if necessary. Flexibility is most important in thing in brands. If your brand is not flexible it may have a duplicitous effect. This may affect your brand position and status and also affect the profitability and you will lose faith in credibility.

3). Associate emotional feeling with your brands– Some brands have emotional feelings associated with them.  Like Thailand tourism publicised their slogan was “I hate tourism”now all the customers were curious that what serious thing happened that tourism industry has to take this step. Customers were curious and due to their curiousness, they planned traveling via this tourism. As a result, they found tourism more improved and Thaialndians started traveling through the tourism.

4). Transparency should be at the top–  For adapting debranding strategy you have to keep your company or brand transparent so that in case debranding is adapted for promotional strategy. It should not throw any negative impact on the consumers. Transparency regarding brands are an essential part of the Debranding. Everything is related to the transparency. In case if your transparency brand is adapting debranding then it will reach great heights.

5). Keep it simple and real– One most important thing is to keep your strategy simple and short because if you will opt long length then you will able to implement this. Keep your brand simple so that in case any changes are required in it can be done. The best example of keeping the symbol simple is Nike.

The bottom line of Debranding

Debranding is the latest campaign to flare up people’s interest in this strategic approach. Some of the outcomes of the debranding strategy are:

1). Debrand your products in such a way that your customer can easily identify your brand.

2). Implement Debranding strategy in such a way that it should not affect your current position and the status of the company.

3). Transparency of the brands should the be at the top. In any way, it should not affect the emotions of customers.

4). Your debranding strategy should be genuine and should throw positive impact on the customers.

5). Your brand name should be simple and adaptable so that it can be changed in future if necessary.

6). Keep in mind that your strategy should not harm the integrity of your customers.

7). Even with too many obstacles in debranding strategy, stick to your strategy and surely you will get the success in promoting your products without brand name or logo.

8) Make friendly industry with a brand and this will take you great heights in the field of marketing.

These are the plethora of business reasons to debrand. Aforementioned are general benefits of the Debranding. Undoubtedly, Debranding is a vast term in itself. Debrand can create “gaps in the noise” that will work well in the promotional field.

A great solution from Webkul’s side for you all for implementing the Debranding strategy

Webkul is offering you a module which is helpful for you in implementing a Debranding strategy.  This will help you in implementing the debranding strategy by removing the logo from its backend. Even you have the authority to change the text and page title from the backend Odoo Website Debranding allows you to remove a logo of your company or product and services and promote the products without the brand name. You can change the brand name and favicon, page title and text. On contrary Odoo Backend Debranding is the module provided to change the logo, favicon, page title, text from the backend.You have the authority to configure all the settings on your own from the backend. These are the two modules which will help your online business to grow extensively.

Odoo Website Debranding provides these many features mentioned below:

• It gives the feature of removing the logo of ‘Odoo’ from website Login Page.
• It facilitates us with the feature of default placeholders from social media tags.
• This module has the flexibility to remove ‘Odoo’ favicon from website info page.
• Taglines like “Powered by Odoo” text is also removed from Website Footer.
• You can replace any “Odoo” text from Planner.

Odoo Backened Debranding offers below mentioned features:

• A user can replace Odoo’s default favicon and title from the backend with new ones of your choice.
• You can replace Odoo’s logo from backend to your company’s logo.
• This module also gives the flexibility of removing  “Powered By Odoo” from backend footer.
• It provides us with the feature which removes “My Odoo.com Account” option from the user dropdown at the backend.
• This module provides the flexibility to remove ‘Odoo’ from backend Web login layout.
• Also, it allows us to remove “Odoo” form Settings i.e Apps store icon, Social share, Implementation, email templates.
• It also removes “Odoo” from email templates and help and planners.
• It exchanges “Odoo” from Dialog Box and Odoo Notifications.

This was all about Debranding in general. This effort is common for gigantic brands describing that with brands we know who they are but the challenge is to know them without the brands also. Debranding is an activity that only a brand itself can initiate.

Thanks for giving your time! Keep on exploring more. Have fun in reading more of our blogs. Yes, Stay in touch with me for more interesting blogs on interesting topics. Just hoping that this work will help you around.

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