Brand Management Report: Huawei, Apple and Brand Portfolio Strategies

This report, prepared for Optimum Impression Ltd., examines brand management principles, focusing on the "Brand is Power" concept. It analyzes the strategies employed by Huawei and Apple in building brand equity and managing their brand portfolios. The report delves into the steps involved in building a brand, including defining the target audience, formulating a brand mission, conducting market research, and outlining brand qualities. It highlights Huawei's successful strategies, such as investing in R&D and marketing, and Apple's use of Aaker's Brand Equity Model. The report also discusses the advantages and disadvantages of Aaker's model and explores brand portfolio management, emphasizing Huawei's globalization and customer-centric approach. The conclusion stresses the importance of branding for firms, advocating the use of marketing tools to effectively communicate with consumers and build brand loyalty.

Brand Management

Table of Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................1
TASK 1............................................................................................................................................1
TASK 2............................................................................................................................................7
Brand portfolio and hierarchy Management...............................................................................7
TASK 3..........................................................................................................................................11
Domestic and international partnership of the company...........................................................13
Disadvantages of the collaboration and partnership:................................................................14
TASK 4..........................................................................................................................................14
Measuring and managing brand value......................................................................................14
Conclusion.....................................................................................................................................16
References......................................................................................................................................18

Introduction
Brand management comes through the word brand which means developing a promise in
the eyes of its customers. It means defining the position of the brand and developing its market
hold over its competitors. In sense of marketing brand management means using various
techniques so as to increase the perceived value of a product or service. Effective brand
management builds loyal customers through positive brand association and has a positive effect
on the product portfolio. This report is based on Optimum Impression Ltd. Which is a
advertising organisation and wants to compose an article in companies marketing brochure with
the headline “Brand is Power”. It also shows how a brand is built and how a brand are organised
in portfolios. Also how brand are leveraged and various techniques for measuring and managing
brand value over time is analysed.
TASK 1
“Brand is Power”
Introduction
Optimum Impression Ltd. Is an advertising agency which is having its functions to
advertise the brands of different companies. The company is into this line of advertising the
product portfolio for many years. The companies marketing and advertising strategies includes
different prospects through which they make the brand of a particular company approachable to
the customers. Since Huawei has reached the company to advertise its brand in the western
market various approaches and the ways through which the brand can be advertised are
discussed below.
Brand is an identity symbol, mark, logo, name or a tag line of companies which is used
to distinguish their product from others. It can be defined as company promise to provide
consistently unique set of advantages, characteristic and service to its consumers. Brand equity
is a value and strength of a brand that is used to decide its quality. In other words, it can be said
that brand equity refers to an economic value that a company generates from a product with a
recognizable name when compared to general recognition. Company can create brand equity of
their products by making them memorable and easy to recognise and superior in quality from
their competitors (Annie Jin, 2012). Brand building is a most significant process which helps in
making of overall business strategy. This would help the brand to outshine and stand apart from
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the competition and to play a crucial role creating loyal customers so that objective of higher
sales and profits are achieved. Various steps are included in building a brand which includes:
Defining the target audience: For a brand it is important to figure out and define the
target audience. A brand should determine the nature of offerings which should be according to
the taste and preference of their target customers. They should identify the problems faced by
the target audience so that the offering could be made as per the requirements.
Work on brand mission: Companies managers, promoters and other internal members
should work together and make a mission statement defining the objective to create a brand
position. They should define that where they want to see the brand reach from the current
position. The company should embrace all the departments and use different promotional tools
and tactics so that they can make customers aware about their portfolio.
Conduct market research and study: This is one of the main steps that is included in
creating a brand image. This steps includes a market research that is to be done so as to build a
perfect brand for their competitors. This step helps in making a differentiation factor among its
rivals and it will further help in convincing the customers on how the brand is better than others
in the market and what value it will provide through its products and services offered to them.
Outline the qualities and formulate the brand voice: As the above study is
completed, the managers should outline the qualities and the benefits that the brand offers to the
customers as compared to the competitors by gaining competitive advantages. Also the brand
voice through professional, informal, technical promotion should be raised for achieving the
goals in Optimum impression Ltd.
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Main body
In the recent time frame it is very important for companies to apply different strategies
so that they are able to strengthen their brand equity. As in the world of technology it is seen
that there are various companies who have applied this brand equity strategy so that they are
able to achieve the target objectives on time (Asmussen, et. al., 2013). For example, the
company that has used this strategy to become one of the best player in electronic and
telecommunication industry is Huawei. This company is outperforming its business in context
of smartphone world. The company has obtained the 2nd position beating apple in the context of
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Illustration 1: Stages to build a Brand

global market share. The company has gained market share of 15.9% beating 12% worldwide of
Apple Inc. the company has used various strategies so as to enhance the brand equity.
The company has invested a huge amount in innovating and research they have invested
around 10% of its revenue on R&D activities which has helped them in gaining first mover
advantage over other companies. The company is consistent in empowering the customers who
have different prospective and requirements. They are innovating things with keeping in mind
customers view point. As it can be seen that Huawie has set up world’s first 5G phone network
in the year 2014. however there is risk involved in this strategy as if they fails to fulfil the
demands of the customers then the huge cost that is expended would impact them at most.
Another strategy of the company that has helped them in gaining the brand equity is
investment in marketing and communication. This strategy has paid them off in short run. In the
year 2017 because of its regorus marketing strategy they were able to break top 100 global
brand consultancy inter brand's. This was achieved by them continuous investment in improved
brand management.
The company has used different strategies so as to become best brand in the world. A
business organisation can use different models so as to improve their brand equity. Models such
as Aaker's Brand equity can be used to enhance the brand image. For this the company that has
used this Aaker's brand equity involves Apple Inc. This is the worlds most reputed brand in the
world in telecommunication and electronic industries (Balmer, 2012.). The company is
operating its business worldwide and has customer base who are in the elite class. The model
was developed by David Aaker and explained that brand equity can be seen as the quality of the
product that has been perceived and brand awareness which is considered as successful brand
strategy as per the model. There are four major elements in brand identity which are discussed
below:
Brand as product: This element consists of product scope, its attributes, quality of the
product and its uses. This helps the company in getting the attention of the customer through
providing the best brand which is most impactful in nature and is appealing to customers.
Brand as an Organisation: This consist of how the organisation works. Whether it works
in local environment or in global environment. This helps the brand to grow as this would help
them to grow its market share through working in a local or global sense.
Brand as a person: It specifies brand personality and relationship between its consumers.
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This makes the brand more personal and appealing to the customers. This also helps in
promoting the brand among the customers.
Brand as Symbol: This element specifies audio and metaphorical symbols and the
heritage of the brand that appeals to the customers more. This makes a brand as a symbol
among the people and through which they gets to know about companies portfolio.
The Aaker's model of brand equity has various advantages and disadvantages which are
discussed as below:
Advantages
 This helps in improving the perception of the product and its performance in the market
among the customers.
 This model helps in increasing the loyalty of the customers which would make the
customers satisfied.
 This model can be used as a leverage which would help the company to gain
competitive advantage over others.
 This model also helps company to differentiate their products from other competitors.
Disadvantages
 If in a market a competitor comes then it would become difficult for the company to
promote their product according to this model as their could be decline in the market
share.
 Due to more competition this model can relate to reduction in brand equity.
Conclusion
Branding of the product is most important factors for the firms like Huawie and Apple.
For their customer to recognise them they should brand their products and use different
marketing tools. Using marketing tool, it would be easy for them to effectively send the
message to the consumers that firm is innovating things for fulfilment of the demand of
customer's. This would help in creating customer’s loyalty and would also encourage
motivation among the customers. Hence branding is crucial for the firm and would help in
building a better brand image.
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TASK 2
Brand portfolio and hierarchy Management
It is a term under which all brands and brand lines of a particular company functions to
serve the wants of different customers. In other words, brand portfolios encompasses all the
brands that is offered by a single company under its name. This is generally formed as each
company has certain limitations beyond which they cannot operate and fulfil the needs of
different market segmentations. The advantage of having the brand portfolio is that management
can check on all the brands as a whole and can frame the policies with broader perspective.
Huawie is a renowned brand with vast portfolios of products from smartphones to the computer
hardware that they produce (Braun, Kavaratzis and Zenker 2013). In the present scenario Huawie
is leading and is considered as the fastest growing brand in the sector of telecommunication.
Hence it is important to identify and analyse the strategies that are used by the company to raise
their product and brand portfolio at a higher level. Different brand portfolio strategy of Huawei
that they take so as to make their products better is discussed below:
 Globalisation of brand: The company used the strategy of globalisation so that they will
be able to capture the international market. They used the strategy to enter into the
different markets through mergers and partnerships. The choice of entry into the market
was influenced through the future vision, capacity of the company and market conditions.
While simply focusing on cut price undifferentiated offerings they deployed cost
advantage and deliver advanced technology and customisation at minimum price. They
captured the market with innovative products at a lower rate and provide the products
with value for money.
 Consideration of consumer’s perspectives: Huawie main focus is always its customers
they always build their product keeping in mind the prospective of its customer
requirements. This has made their brand portfolio more diverse and large with giving the
customers variety of choice to select the product according to their preference. To build a
strong brand image company is taking feedback from its customers and their reviews so
that they can implement it in their future products.
Huawie should mitigate their policies so that they are able to effectively make their brand
more compatible with any type of risk that associates them. Also there are some issues which are
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associated with these strategies and should be considered so as to make an effective portfolio
management strategies. These issues involve the following:
 As the company is applying its long term thinking they would not be able to check their
future demand and changing business environment. As they will focus on future demands
of the company more they might not be able to fulfil the current demands. As in the case
of current business environment the companies such as LG, Samsung and Apple are more
focused on establishing the current demand for their products and as well as focusing on
the future innovations.
 As in the today's world consumer preference are incredibly changing and are influenced
by various factors. These changing factors would be risky for Huawie. As the company
will focus on changing the future strategies it will be beneficial for the customer's but not
from the companies point of view.
House of brands: This includes the company which is having a range of separate brand
names under a particular house. These brands are independent of one another with having
different audience, marketing and look and feel. A House of brands works well for many large
consumer companies.
Branded house: It is branded house that is most common form. This technique of the
company covers numerous benefits to the company as they would be able to make their brand
efficient, also confusion and competition are avoided through this type of branded house
approach and it also opens a greater success for the future offerings and new products of the
company.
Hybrid (or mixed) brands strategy: Hybrid is more than likely an ad-hoc plan of action
indicant rather than a pro-active strategical branding choice. This helps the company to use
different brand so that they are able to achieve the objective of increased sales and maximising
the profit of the company.
Brand Hierarchy
It is the process of summarizing the branding strategy by showcasing the number and
nature of common brand elements across the company’s variety of products. It is a useful means
of graphically portraying a company’s branding strategy (Du Preez, and Bendixen, 2015). It is
based on a simple sense that product can be branded in various ways depending upon how many
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existing and new brand elements are used and the ways in which they are combined for branding
one product. Huawie has different product lines with vague relationships which are associated
with each other which requires them to develop brand hierarchy strategies.
Huawei is serving its clients with various brands across the world and fulfilling different
needs of the customers with their different products. It is a difficult task for the company to
manage these wide varieties effectively so as to enhance brand equity and to provide a better
brand portfolio. For the company to develop and manage the brand hierarchy they should focus
on strategies such as:
 Audit of Brand Hierarchy: it is important for a company to determine their current status
in the global market. Audit of the brand is not dependent upon the size and the structure
of the company. The brand audit checks that how a business is performing, this is done
through assessment of various brands within the company. They should check their
present as well as future contributions. Also brand structure is a key criteria that should
be focused upon as this involves different touchpoints through which customer interacts
with the companies brand. This involves the logos, advertising websites and the customer
support service centre that must be always ready to help customers as and when needed.
 Principles of Brand hierarchy: it can be achieved through determining the principles.
These principles would help in setting the foundation for the brand. Some of the
principles in the brand hierarchy involves:
 They should identify the products and the brands in which the money must be
invested so as to achieve the objectives of the company. For example Huawie
HiSilicon, Honor etc.
 Company should focus on developing a new brand only if new product is desired
to be built. The desire should be proven and should contain essential element
which if not done would result into huge brand loss.
This would help the company to better implant its brand in the market and would also
help in achieving the desired results (Ertimur and Coskuner-Balli, 2015). This can be done if the
company is consistently investing in the innovation techniques as the industry is dynamic in
nature.
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Illustration 3: World wide quarterly data
(So
urce: IDC worldwide quarterly mobile phone tracker, 2018)
Brand equity management
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Illustration 2: Huawei Brand Hierarchy

Huawie is the second largest smartphone seller in the world and is renowned brand that is
serving in the different countries across world. Managing the brand is important as it is directly
linked with the sales and profitability of company. Different types of techniques which could be
use by company is given below,
 Advertising: Main moto of advertising is to create the brand awareness of product in the
market so that potential customers would get attracted. Unique and attractive advertising
should be done by Huawie so that people will recognise their products.
 Corporate social responsibility: Company should do their part towards society and
environment as they are using natural resources to earn profit from their working
operations. Huawei should constantly donate some amount of money to various needy
organisation like schools or orphanage so that they can also live healthy life. It assists
company to improve their goodwill and brand equity in the mind of customers.
TASK 3
Brand Leveraging is a strategy that is used as power of an existing brand name to assist a
company’s entry into a new but related product category. It is an essential form of introducing
new product in the market. It broadens the company’s product range by introducing additional
types of products and services. It is important for the organisation because :-
 It provides customers with a sense of familiarity by carrying positive brand image and
attitude.
 To avoid disappointment among the customers and to maintain the quality.
 More product portfolio means more offerings to the customers which will increase
turnover of the company.
Huawei could use effective methods for Brand Leveraging and Extension which are
discussed below:
Line Extension
This strategy is important if the firm wishes to introduce new variants like new or
updated models or development in products, etc. within the similar category under the brand
name (Gatti, Caruana, and Snehota, 2012). Basically, this is a multi branding strategy in which
firm markets one or more new products under an already constituted brand. For instance, the
mate series of Huawei where the firm introduces new products which focuses on pixels and
processors and tends to be ahead in comparison to other phones.
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