Page 250 - Design for Six Sigma for Service (Six SIGMA Operational Methods)

Brand Development and Brand Strategy 219

• Positive and negative feedbacks regarding current promises from
customers
• The results of the brand position analysis

Example 8.3: Starbucks’ Implicit Brand Contract
This example is from Davis (2000). Starbucks promises to do the following:
1. Provide the highest-quality coffee available on the market today
2. Offer customers a wide variety of coffee options as well as complementary
food and beverage items
3. Have an atmosphere that is warm, friendly, homelike, and appropriate for
having a conversation with a good friend or reading a book
4. Recognize that visiting Starbucks is as much about the experience of
drinking coffee as it is about coffee itself
5. Have employees who are friendly, courteous, outgoing, helpful, knowl-
edgeable, and quick to fill customer orders
6. Provide customers with the same experience at any one of the several
thousand Starbucks worldwide
7. Stay current with the times, meet customer needs, and help customers create
the Starbucks experience on their own terms
8. Provide customers with an environmentally friendly establishment
9. Educate customers on the different types of coffee offered

Five Principles of Effective Brand Positioning
Davis (2000) proposed five principles of effective brand positioning: value,
uniqueness, credibility, sustainability, and fit.
1. Value: The proposed brand position should provide the targeted
customers with superior values to that of competitors. It should provide
customers with functional, emotional, and self-expressive benefits that
a wide range of customers will appreciate and be willing to pay a
premium price to get.
2. Uniqueness: The proposed brand position should have some unique
attributes that no other competitors can deliver. These should be important
to and appreciated by customers. The uniqueness should make the
company’s brand stand out in the crowd.
3. Credibility: The proposed brand position should be implementable in
a credible manner, and the company’s effort should be able to make
customers believe that all the promises will be met. The brand position
should be in line with customers’ perception of the company’s ability.
4. Sustainability: Once a proposed brand position is implemented, it is
desirable that this brand position last as long as it can. Changing brand
positioning involves a lot of investment, and frequent change cuts