Friday, April 22, 2005
Isn’t it odd that despite all the money poured into brand building, it’s considered low value unless backed up with ‘genuine’?
Microsoft’s ‘Genuine Windows XP’ ads are particularly telling: the claims are false and misleading, and hint of a desperation that says Microsoft’s advertising isn’t translating into sales.
Microsoft’s ‘Genuine Windows XP’ ads are particularly telling: the claims are false and misleading, and hint of a desperation that says Microsoft’s advertising isn’t translating into sales.
irq2 — Apr 22, 2005 10:35:29 AM — # ↩
Kiran Jonnalagadda — Apr 23, 2005 2:17:50 AM — # ↩
kshah — Apr 22, 2005 10:46:02 AM — # ↩
I have the pic somewhere on my hdd… will have to hunt for it…
beteljues — Apr 25, 2005 9:55:18 AM — # ↩
I am sure you know this and this post was in jest… but couldn’t resist a few words.
The brand has become the bane in this case. The reason why people put up the “genuine” word is to say that the branded item is indeed what it is called. Not some cheap spurious fake passing off as the real one while charging the real ones price. It is so easy to sell fakes in the name of the brand.
Companies had to start this process of appointing and auditing stores that sold only genuine spare parts as profitability and brand both suffered erosion. I am sure you remember the exploding battery episode for Nokia and the PR heartache it caused the company. It is a bigger problem for pharmaceutical companies.
So I do not know if this post is clear in this context.
Kiran Jonnalagadda — Apr 25, 2005 5:13:45 PM — # ↩
I just found it very amusing. What happens when the fakes declare themselves ‘Genuine Bajaj’? Now that’ll smell of a rat because Bajaj doesn’t call itself Genuine. It’s the reseller who does. So that’s an interesting balance. The brand is placed stratospherically, like there is only one Bajaj and nothing compares to it, and then there’s the consumer end, where the Genuine keyword is added to clarify that this is the real thing.
Should be quite an interesting system to game. But I can’t help but think that Microsoft is shooting itself in the foot using the Genuine keyword in its own ads. That’s overloading the keyword, making it seem like part of the brand name, and therefore having no meaning beyond being just a name.
beteljues — Apr 27, 2005 5:06:31 AM — # ↩
Bajaj indeed calls its spares “Genuine Bajaj Spares” as sold by the Genuine Bajaj Spare Dealer. So does Maruti, Tata, Nokia (Original / Priority) and Genuine Microsoft Software to name a few.
Like many decisions that look a little odd superficially, this is in fact a cleverly crafted strategy for ensuring price/ quality balance and profitability. One company created it but the rest followed it.
Will the duplicate manufacturer badge his stuff genuine? I do not believe that this cross over will happen for reasons below.
The OEM and the alternative seem to have won because two clear market segments have evolved. One that buys the original / genuine the other that does not mind the spurious / counterfeit / equivalent (a la Transcend for IBM / HP)
The reason the OEM won in my opinion is that they were successful in putting the vocabulary in place (vocabulary that was first created by the consumer). Without the terms “Genuine / Original” the consumer did not have much choice but say “Is this Original” or “Is it a genuine product” and not a duplicate.
The problem and solution both arose because the market forced it. Ideally, the company does not want to deal with alternative choices. It does not want to recognize it or it is genuinely too expensive for them to cater too. On the other hand the perceived value or the lack of it is so large that it creates space for imitators and people that can deliver the same physical product with much less economic overhead. So the consumer has a choice that he wants.
The reseller ultimately is a transaction enabler. Weather you buy a genuine product or a duplicate he will still make money. The more mature ones today realize that the two markets exist and will tell the customer upfront the options available. I do not know of any mature trader that will want to deal with customer dissatisfaction or post purchase dissonance, as his business is what will suffer unnecessarily. If he does not mature he will obviously not exist for a meaningful time frame. Even the “Burma bazaar” folks are clear about this now, if you pardon their aggressive sales techniques.