Brand Extension: Marketing: Product Life Cycle Strategy

PART -5

Brand Extension is a marketing strategy according to which, a well known brand uses the same brand name to enter into a totally unrelated product category. It is done primarily to leverage on the existing brand equity. Some marketers argue that since building a brand is costly affair, once you have built a brand you should leverage its value by using the same brand name to other new categories as well. For example, Virgin, which was initially a record label, entered into other line of business like aviation, game stores, video stores, telecom, etc. Godrej, which was initially a brand which signified locks and cupboards, later on entered into whole new product categories like refrigerators, furniture and real estate.

Line Extension (or

Similarly, products also have life cycle, from their introduction to decline they progresses through a sequence of stages. The major stages of the product life cycle are - introduction, growth, maturity, and decline. Product life cycle describes transition of a product from its development to

For example, if a company has two product lines, its product mix width is two. Small and upstart businesses will usually not have a wide product mix. It is more practical to start with some basic products and build market share. Later on, a company's technology may allow the company to diversify into other industries and build the width of the product mix.

Length

Product mix length pertains to the number of total products or items in a company's product mix, according to Philip Kotler's textbook "Marketing Management: Analysis, Planning, Implementation and Control." For example, ABC company may have two product lines, and five brands within each product line. Thus, ABC's product mix length would be 10. Companies that have multiple product lines will sometimes keep track of their average length per product line. In the above case, the average length of an ABC Company's product line is five.

Depth

Depth of a product mix pertains to the total number of variations for each product. Variations can include size, flavor and any other distinguishing characteristic. For example, if a company sells three sizes and two flavors of toothpaste, that particular brand of toothpaste has a depth of six. Just like length, companies sometimes report the average depth of their product lines; or the depth of a specific product