Marketing Debate: Do Brands Have Finite Lives?

Instructions:
Often, after a brand begins to slip in the marketplace or disappears altogether, commentators observe, “All brands have their day,” implying brands have a finite life and cannot be expected to be leaders forever. Other experts contend brands can live forever, and that their long-term success depends on marketers’ skill and insight.

Take a position: Brands cannot be expected to last forever versus there is no reason for a brand to ever become obsolete.

Please review the Case Discussion Grading Rubric to understand how you will be evaluated.

The rubric outlines the quantity, quality and frequency of posts/replies expected for effective participation.

The first posting should always be your original contribution to the forum and the postings thereafter should be interactions with your classmates aimed to enrich the online discussion.

Ideally postings should be spread out during the week to better synthesize other perspectives, demonstrate listening, and contribute to an evolving discussion

ANSWER

Do Brands have  Finite Lives?

The answer to whether or not brands have finite lives is not a simple matter of yes or no. This is because it is tied to something bigger. Whether or not a brand’s life is finite or infinite is dependent on the marketing strategy of the brand. A brand is likely to die if the marketing team does not embrace the changes in its market and if the brand does not change with the changing market demands (Freund & Jacobi, 2016). For example, a brand like Coca-Cola has had to evolve over the years. Today Coca-Cola is not only an unhealthy sugary drink. It has other products that promote health, like diet coke which has no sugar. The brand, in this case, has lived this far because it evolves with the market demands, and the marketing team is open to the changes that happen in the world, thus making the strategic changes that need to be done. Therefore, brands do not have finite lives, and whether or not a brand lives or ends depends on brand management, competition, and the ability to evolve with the changing market demands.

There are several factors that can lead to the finite end of a brand. Stiff competition is one. The market is changing, and new products keep coming to the market. If a brand does not keep up with the competition, it is likely to end. For example, Coca-Cola has managed to keep up with the emerging products that compete with it (Stojanović et al., 2019). A product like Pepsi is one of the competitors of Coca-Cola. Coca-Cola has had to develop creative ways of ensuring that it keeps up with the competition and that it is not overtaken. If Coca-Cola stops being innovative at one point, the competition is likely to overtake the market, and Coca-Cola will slowly die.

Another factor that can lead to a finite end on a brand is improper designing and implementation of brands; ineffective management can also contribute to the end of a brand. For a brand to have an infinite life, these factors have to remain the same. For example, the management has to remain creative to ensure the brand does not end. This means ensuring that the working conditions of the employees evolve with the changing times, the brand evolves to meet the having market demands, and that the brand is properly designed and implemented. A brand will become outdated if it does not change to fit in with the changing market demands (Stojanović et al., 2019). For example, in an era of healthy eating and staying healthy, soft drinks such as Pepsi and Coca-Cola have to come up with a way of ensuring that they are meeting these market demands. In an era of protecting the environment, they have to develop a solid plan on how their product will give back to the community by protecting the environment.

Experienced marketers believe that as long as a brand is well-managed, it can live forever. A brand’s life is dependent on the management and how well it is marketed. It is also dependent on its ability to evolve and change with the changing market demands. If a brand can evolve and change with the market demands, then it will have an infinite life. There are brands that will not die and will live on as long as they keep up with market changes.

References

Freund, J., & Jacobi, E. S. (2016). Mystify me: Coke, terror, and the symbolic immortality boost. Marketing Theory, 16(3), 417-422.

Stojanović, S., Janković, M., & Dimitrijević, D. (2019). BRAND MANAGEMENT IN THE SERVICE SECTOR. KNOWLEDGE-International Journal, 31(6), 2047-2053.