Can Consumers Love A Flashlight Battery Brand More than Car Brands? Well...Yup

The other day, I was talking to a colleague about how advertising can contribute to building irrational love for car brands. We discussed how much of car advertising today relies on demonstrating the latest technology and features, in attempts to establish brand superiority. This is despite the fact that feature for feature, car brands are approaching parity in their offerings.  As the conversation went on, I related what I learned when I worked on the Energizer battery brand in the early 2000's

Batteries are a big challenge for marketers. They are one of the few product categories that are invisible when you're using them. The only time you are aware of them is when they stop working. It's also hard to differentiate. By definition batteries must have a standard size and shape; any product claims are fleeting, as advances are easily replicated. 

As such, how can a battery ever drive preference, let alone brand love? 

The answer to that question began to come to life in 1989. Energizer at first took a very effective competitive swipe at their main competitor, Duracell. At that time, Duracell was running a very entertaining product demonstration campaign with identical mechanical toy rabbits. All but one of the rabbits ran out of energy. Of course, that rabbit was powered by Duracell:

In a stroke of what would come to be recognized over time as genius, Energizer responded by creating a cooler, longer lasting Bunny who outlasted all the other staid rabbits, including the Duracell rabbit:

But it all could have ended there if this was just a head to head comparison of a longer lasting battery. Instead, Energizer decided to adopt this cool bunny--not for use in head to head comparisons, but instead to represent the indomitable spirit of the Energizer brand. Suddenly, the Bunny was unstoppable and ubiquitous. It interrupted commercials for other (fake) products. People with boundless energy were referred to as 'Energizer Bunnies'. The Bunny had found a permanent space in culture. And today, the Bunny remains inseparable from the Engineer brand, and the batteries that bear its name.

This conversation spurred me to investigate how strong brand love is for Energizer. And here's where I came to a startling discovery. The Energizer Brand beats the automotive category by 21 points in Brand Love.* 

Source: BERA

Moreover, no automotive brand is rated as high as the Energizer brand!

This made me dig a little deeper, and again I was blown away. It turns out that consumers have more than a 3 times stronger personal connection to the Energizer brand than to the automotive category! And Energizer is seen as better meeting people's needs and making life easier!

Source; BERA

So what can automotive marketers learn from this? How can they forge a stronger emotional connection with their customers? How can they become irrationally loved?

1. Lead With Brand Values, Not Features

While there is a time and place to demonstrate functional attributes, features alone are not sustainable and will never drive an emotional connection. Instead drive emotional love by tapping into shared values.

Automotive brands should ask themselves, what at the core makes you different? What belief in your DNA do no other brands share? How can this create an emotional bond with customers that no other brand can replicate? 

2. Be Consistent Across Products and Time

While Bunny executions have varied over time, the Bunny has remained consistent in representing the Energizer spirit since 1989--with one exception. In 2001, Energizer introduced a new, more powerful lithium battery. Because it was a quantum leap forward and intended for use in high tech electronic devices, Energizer decided to forgo the Bunny. Instead, it talked about lithium and power. After an unsuccessful launch, Energizer reintroduced the lithium battery with the help of the indomitable bunny, and the question--'do you have the bunny inside'?

So often automotive manufacturers want to position each product individually, with no consistent narrative over time. But brand values are tied to the brand, not individual products. Shifting the narrative for each product, segment and powertrain means that each campaign begins with zero equity. Each product must duke it out without a brand safety net. 

Once an automotive brand discovers its core truth, it should carry that truth across time and products, so that the bond between brand and customer strengthens over time. It will create instant equity in as new products and new technologies are introduced. And as brand love grows, people will eschew other brands and go directly to the brand that they love when it's time for repurchase.

3. Behave Your Brand Across All Touchpoints and Beyond

The spirit of the Energizer Bunny lives in all brand behaviors. From packaging to CSR activities, the idea of endless spirit and energy permeates everything they do.

Few automotive brands think beyond the sheetmetal. CSR programs tend to follow the same cost of entry directions--eg sustainability and safety, rather than finding something uniquely ownable.

As evidenced by the data, there is real white space for an automotive brand to grab. Who will take the leap beyond features and begin to chart the course to irrational love?

* BERA's Brand Love scores have been validated by Forrester to be highly correlated to business success