Copycat Based on Leader Brand Proximity

A “prototype brand” on your store shelves or racks carries the name and label design best known by consumers in your target markets in that product or service category. For peanut butter, the prototype might be Skippy. Prototype electronics brands include Sony and Samsung. From the geographical angle, the prototype brand of laundry detergent might be Tide in Milwaukee, All Free in San Francisco, and Ala in Buenos Aries. For beer, it would be Budweiser in America and Heineken in the Netherlands.
     A “copycat brand” you choose to carry in your store aims to imitate the appearance of the prototype brand. Copycat brands can sell well. However, researchers at University of Cologne and Tilburg University find that the type of copycat you carry should be based on the proximity of the prototype brand. The researchers distinguished among low-, moderate-, and high-similarity copycats, depending on how much the package design and brand name resembled the prototype’s.
     If you don’t carry the prototype brand in your store, you’ll do best having high-similarity copycats. On the other hand, if you stock the prototype brand adjacent to the copycats, you’ll do best carrying moderate-similarity copycats.
     From a shopper psychology perspective, the second strategy is better:

• By stocking both the prototype and copycat, you offer variety, and variety attracts shoppers.
• When the copycat is physically close to the prototype, the shopper’s mind attributes positive characteristics of the prototype to the copycat. As a retailer, you’ll be hitchhiking onto the strong images prototypes carry. Their manufacturers devote massive amounts of marketing support to maintaining top-of-mind awareness.

     The research indicates that when a prototype is close by, a high-similarity copycat implies trickery to the shopper and so arouses suspiciousness in the shopper’s mind. This is especially likely if you have charts in ads or on store signs which compare characteristics, features, or benefits of the copycat and the prototype. The moderate-similarity copycat doesn’t arouse this degree of consumer suspiciousness. The person realizes they can easily tell the difference in package design, so can’t be tricked.
     Shoppers find comfort in being with brands they’ve known well for a long time. Consumer psychologists talk about “the mere exposure effect.” Shoppers tend to have more favorable attitudes toward something they’ve seen before. Copycats work well because of the mere exposure effect, and as long as product or service performance meets customers’ expectations, the copycat can become their personal prototype.

Click below for more:
Introduce Unfamiliar Products Like Old Friends
Display Unfamiliar Brands with Prototype Brands
Compare Unknown Brands to Best-Known Brands