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Opinion: Brands That Survive Will Be The Brands That Make Life Better

| 11/11/2011 | Reply

A new study of consumer engagement finds that companies that aren’t making a difference—to the world and to consumers—aren’t going to be around much longer. Instead of just making your product incrementally better than the competitor, you need to create impact.


The state of brands and how they affect well-being was measured by media consultancy Havas Media. Umair Haque, the director of the Havas Media Labs and Harvard Business Review blogger who writes frequently on how business can create real value, says that the study is about discovering how people are interacting with businesses in a world where many people feel that institutions are crumbling: “In an age where institutions are failing and contracts are broken, and people are clamoring for more—pounding their fists for better—we’re asking: What is the role for a brand? And how is the relationship between people and boardrooms changing? People are beginning to say: ‘What you’ve been able to give us in the past isn’t good enough.'”

How is the relationship between people and boardrooms changing? People are beginning to say: ‘What you’ve been able to give us in the past isn’t good enough.’The most tangible outcome of this is that the Meaningful Brands survey—which spoke to 50,000 consumers in France, Spain, the U.K., Germany, Italy, Mexico, Brazil, Colombia, Chile, Argentina, China, Japan, India, and the U.S.—found that only 20% of the brands they interact with have a positive impact on their lives. And they feel that 70% of brands could disappear entirely without them noticing.


Haique cites Nike+ as a prime example. “Instead of putting up another campaign of billboards with celebrities saying ‘Buy our shoes, they’ll turn you into a master runner,’ Nike+ actually helps makes you a better runner. That’s a constructive way to build a meaningful brand.”


  1. Ikea
  2. Google
  3. Nestlé
  4. Danone
  5. Leroy Merlin
  6. Samsung
  7. Microsoft
  8. Sony
  9. Unilever
  10. Bimbo



Want to make sure your company doesn’t fall into that category? It may sound simple, but it’s difficult to execute: “Impact people’s lives. Focus on well-being from your product. That’s tough. You have to have that right from the get-go.”

Category: Branding & Marketing, Opinion, The Americas, USA

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