Cobranding and Leadership Change in Political Marketing

Transcription

1 Cobranding and Leadership Change in Political Marketing Introduction In May-June 2010, Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd suffered a dramatic collapse in his personal approval rating. At the same time, support for his Australian Labor Party (ALP) fell. Media coverage of these poll trends singled out the Prime Minister as the source of the problem, and in June 2010 the ALP replaced Rudd with his deputy, Julia Gillard. Subsequent media coverage has suggested that this decision was taken by senior party figures on the basis of marketing research, opinion polls and focus groups, which led them to believe that the ALP could change its electoral prospects with a change of leadership (Malkin 2010). In marketing terms the ALP strategy was to change part of the offer, in the expectation that this would result in a favourable change in position. The logic of this strategy is, prime facie, consistent with research on commercial co-branding. The response to a problem with either contributing brand is to drop or replace the association. Although never developed for analysis of political marketing issues, co-branding models have been applied to political marketing problems. This approach argues that the political leader is a human brand, and that the political offer is a co-branded entity between leader and party. Such a model suggests that the political party can reposition effectively by changing leader (Hughes 2007, Neale, Hughes and Dann 2008) However the outcome of events in Australia suggest that the change the leader, change the position strategy is not simple as theory suggests. In this paper, we review work on co-branding, and re-examine the appropriateness of its application in political marketing. We use this examination to provide insights into the contextual dependence of cobranding, and identify factors that moderate the applicability of the model in various contexts, and so explore some boundary conditions for use of the model. Co-Branding Concepts The development of co-branding as a business concept can be traced from co-operative advertising in the sixties and seventies, through endorsed credit cards in the nineteen eighties, to food and ingredient branding in the eighties and nineties. Academic interest in the concept emerged through research on composite brand extensions, where two established brand names are applied to a new product offer (Park, Jun and Shocker 1996). Subsequent work has examined various forms of brand alliance and co-branding such as ingredient branding, licensing and umbrella branding (Erevelles, Horton and Fukawa 2008 provide a good review of this literature).

2 Conceptually, the co-branding literature builds on the associative network model (Anderson, 1983). Contemporary branding analysis utilises the associative network memory model to help conceptualise the way brand associations are built in the minds of consumers (Keller, 1993). Associative learning conceptualises memory as a network consisting of individual pieces of information (nodes) that are connected by associative links. Each node has an association set that represents the pre-existing associates which are related meaningfully to that object. The connections between the nodes are established through experience. Recall of a particular piece of information occurs once the relevant node is stimulated, and stimulation occurs either from an external source, or from a linked node being stimulated. This process is known as spreading activation, and results in stimulation spreading through the network until the level of stimulation or the strength of links have fallen to a point that no further activation occurs. Learning occurs when this memory structure is modified, either by the establishment of a new associative link between nodes with distinct association sets, or by addition of a new associated concept into an association set. Co-branding is one mechanism by which such modifications of the association set may occur. By presenting a new offer with two already known brands associated with it, two association sets are being brought together. Theorising about co-branding effects requires the modification of the brand s association set to be modelled. Cohen and Murphy s (1984) concept specialization model, focused on noun-noun conjunctions, has formed the basis for co-branding research. As work in co-branding has developed, increasingly an explicit link has been drawn between branding alliances celebrity endorsements, suggesting that the association of a known personality with a product represents a form of branding alliance (Halonen-Knight and Hurmerinta 2010). Seno and Lukas (2007) were among the first to explicitly model celebrity product endorsement as a form of co-branding, stating The crux of viewing celebrity product endorsement as a form of co-branding, and not simply as a product promotion, is to recognise that celebrities have brand properties. The advantage of studying celebrity product endorsement from a co-brand perspective is that the meaning of the celebrity in the endorsement process is broadened. Framed in a co-brand context, the endorsing party is no longer simply an agent receiving a financial reward for product support or backing. Rather, the endorsing party emerges co-brand-like as an exchange partner with another brand. Thus, as a unit of analysis, the celebrity is elevated to the same level as the endorsed brand. Accordingly, a richer and, we would argue, more complete research picture of celebrity product endorsement becomes possible. Seno and Lukas ). Cobranding models have begun to be applied in increasingly broad areas of promotional research. Key Cobranding Findings

3 Using Cohen and Murphy s (1984) concept specialization model means that co-branding researchers tend to view co-branding as the conjunction of two nouns. For instance Park, Jun and Shocker (1996) applied the concept specialization model by identifying a modifying concept and a modified concept. (They labeled a cobranded extension with a header (the modified concept) preceding by, and a modifier (the modifying concept) following by, eg Godiva (header) cake mix by Slim fast (modifier), or Slim-fast (header) cake mix by Godiva (modifier)). The most prominent early cobranding work (Park, Jun and Shocker 1996) extended previous work on brand extensions in two key ways. First, the research examined the manner in which perceptions of the parent brands interacted in their effect upon perceptions of the extension, suggesting that the favourable features of each brand combined in the extension. Second it highlighted the potential for favourable feedback arising from the extension s effect on the parent brand. These type of results have been repeated frequently in co-branding research, for instance results suggest that merely the act of pairing with another brand elevates consumers' evaluations of the partner brands' customer-based brand equity, and high-equity partners enhance pretrial evaluation of experience and credence attributes that are relevant to the high-equity partner (Washburn, Till, and Priluck, 2004). In summary, the underlying modeling of cobranding, the concept specialization model, views cobranding as an additive process of combining two independent brands in the conjoined concept. Marketing researchers are increasingly taking cobranding as a model that can be applied in situations where two brands are conjoined in a marketing effort such as celebrity endorsement, ingredients, sponsorships for instance. There are positive benefits associated with cobranding, and their effect on the image of the resulting cobranded extension tends to be based on the combination of positive attributes, rather than the combination of the negative. Finally, there is also research that suggests that where marketers have the option of varying one of the nouns that can be conjoined in a cobranding situation (eg where alternative corporate branding can arise from a merger or acquisition), distinctly different cobranding outcomes can be generated. With this background, we turn to examine one situation where a branding is very clearly a conjunction of two separately identified nouns, and where marketing researchers are already beginning to apply the cobranding models. The Political Offer and Branding The political offer is often modeled as having a tripartite nature, consisting of a the party s heritage and history, the set of policies the party is proposing to implement and the leaders the party is offering as office holders. (O Shaughnessy 1990, Henneberg 2002, O Cass and Pecotich 2005, Butler and Collins 1994). More recently, this network of promises and associations has been interpreted as a brand (Smith and French 2009), with associations added to a network through the policies adopted and advocated, perceptions and history of the party and the reputation of the

4 leader or candidate. The tripartite nature of the political offer, and the possibility of brand associations arising separately from each element, means the political brand can be interpreted very easily using the concept specialization model for instance in American politics the political party (Republican or Democrat) is strongly modified by the candidate (McCain versus George W. Bush, Ohbama versus Clinton). Marketing researchers (Hughes 2007, Neale, Hughes and Dann 2008) have followed this logic to apply a cobranding model to political parties, suggesting that the brand can be viewed as mutually reinforcing relationship between the party brand and the leader brand (branding matters arising from policies tend to be ignored in this analysis). Changing the leadership of a party leads to a modification of the party branding, with associations that are tied to the past leader being removed and a new set of association tied to the new leader being adopted. Rhetorical Intellectual No Carbon Trading Scheme Stimulus Spending Resources Tax Presidential style Leader Policies Party Governed in 1980s Blue collar families Socially progressive Social safety net Trade union Values Figure 1: Possible Association set for Australian Labor Party (following French and Smith 2009) This argument can be illustrated by drawing on figure 2. Replacing the leader, in this model, consists of disconnecting the associations in the top left of the figure, and replacing them with different ones. The expectation is that removal of the original leader s unfavourable associations, and the replacement with a new leader with positive or neutral associations, has favourable electoral outcomes.

5 Rhetorical Intellectual No Carbon Trading Scheme Stimulus Spending Resources Tax Presidential style Leader Policies Party Governed in 1980s Blue collar families Socially progressive Social safety net Trade union Values No Carbon Trading Scheme Stimulus Spending Consultative Resources Tax Pragmatic Leader Policies Party Governed in 1980s Blue collar families Socially progressive Social safety net Trade union Values Figure 2: Leadership replacement conceptualised as co-branding

6 The limits of Co-Branding The replacement of Kevin Rudd largely failed to change the position of the ALP. Although able to hold on as a minority government, its popularity continued to decline and associations that party leaders thought might be expelled with Kevin Rudd continued to dog his successor. In co-branding terms, replacing on element of the composite brand failed to reposition the composite offering. Several reasons can be hypothesized as to why the co-branding model does not work as well as might be anticipated in political marketing. Structurally, it is to be noted that the original research on co-branding was actually a study of brand extensions, offered by two brands acting together, often in a category in which neither can succeed as effectively alone. In other categories, the brands continue to operate independently. In the context of politics, there is no new category, and no independent operation. Our first proposition is that co-branding is less effective as a mechanism for repositioning an existing offer compared with positioning a new brand extension. Secondly, the political leader may bring associations into composite brand offer, however they do so as an actor in that organisation. They have a history in the party, and have a history relative to previous decisions and promises made by the party. Our second proposition is that co-branding is less effective as a positioning mechanism if there is not true independence between the component brands. A final factor is that political leaders and other human brands are not artificial constructs. Regardless of the degree of deliberate construction, they remain people, and the treatment of people is subject to a set of social norms that are considerably more restricted that those than can be applied to inanimate constructs. In short, treating a person as if they were simply a brand provokes questions about their treatment in the eyes of consumers. Conclusions The analysis presented here suggests that cobranding is one of many marketing concepts that has been gradually applied further and further away from the context within which it was originally presented and tested. The concept, originally applied to brand extensions, has been used to discuss other promotional activity, and has finally been used as a model to aid discussion of leadership change in political parties. Conceptually, and practically, this may well be a step too far. Political marketing clearly provides a context in which branding is not like commercial branding, and where alternative models of how brand equity can be developed might well be developed. Having rejected cobranding as such a model, we hope that conference discussion can help the process of developing an alternative, better attuned to the political context.

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