In the previous article (click to read), we mentioned that IP marketing is a hot term these days, and some tea companies are also consciously investing in building their own brand IPs. How to shape a personified brand IP and build a valuable IP is a necessary path in tea companies’ brand marketing.
Why Should Tea Companies Turn Their Brands into IPs?
A tea company must not only have a brand, but also an IP \u2014 this is something tea companies must pay special attention to in their development today.
In earlier years, to quickly raise brand awareness, tea companies often enlisted IPs such as celebrities to boost their brands; in addition, things like being a designated product of such-and-such an event, winning such-and-such a gold award, or launching co-branded products with a well-known IP were all ways tea brands leveraged IPs.
But more and more tea companies have realized that this kind of IP marketing may face ever-higher costs, that the IP’s useful life is very short, and that sometimes there is even the risk of a “flop.” So for tea companies, turning the brand itself into an IP is the long-term strategy.
It is not hard to see that in an era of full mobile internet penetration, brand IP-ization is especially suited to achieving a continuous and stable state of communication amid fragmented dissemination, and can outline a more three-dimensional brand image in front of consumers \u2014 things traditional brand image systems struggle to accomplish.
At present, tea consumption is gradually becoming popularized and branded; turning the brand into an IP fits market development trends. With the help of a brand IP, tea companies can strengthen interaction and emotional resonance with consumers. In the short term, a successful brand IP can influence consumers’ purchasing decisions and boost end-market tea sales; in the long term, brand IP-ization is also an important process for forming consumer trust and loyalty to the brand \u2014 a process in which the tea company itself completes a significant accumulation of brand assets.
How Can Tea Companies Turn Their Brands into IPs?
When it comes to the process of brand IP-ization for tea companies, it must include at least these aspects: form of expression, the IP story, and core culture.
Define the Expression of the Brand Image
First, find a brand image that fits the tea company’s own characteristics \u2014 this is the basic feature of an IP image. Common approaches include expressing the image of the company’s own core figure, or using an anthropomorphized cartoon portrait: think of Xiaomi and Lei Jun, Tesla and Musk, and the anthropomorphized IP images of Three Squirrels and Mixue Bingcheng.
Of course, whichever form of expression is used to present the brand IP image, the goal is to establish a vivid persona in consumers’ minds. So the expression of a tea company’s brand IP is best kept simple \u2014 “concise, memorable, easy to understand.”
Shape the IP Story
A brand shaping an IP must have the ability to tell a good story. This tests how well the team can transform a three-dimensional IP story into real-world influence for the corporate brand \u2014 only then can better brand communication effects and greater overall benefits be achieved.
In the process of brand IP-ization, a tea company needs an infectious IP story, and it must keep enriching that story. For example, the founder’s journey of making tea with ingenuity, or the birth of classic tea products, can all become the core of the IP story, conveyed to the public through the IP’s expressive image so that consumers more quickly embrace the brand’s values.
Of course, a tea brand’s IP story should lean toward professionalism, viewpoint and topicality. In this way, the brand itself develops content-generating capacity and topics \u2014 with the benefit that the brand no longer needs to keep producing content by itself; instead, consumers create content and topics for the tea brand, becoming transmitters of the brand’s IP story.
IP Positioning Is Best Rooted in Corporate Culture
IP positioning should build on brand positioning and, combined with the tea company’s own cultural system, excavate the IP’s persona and distinctive style \u2014 ideally making it a carrier of the corporate culture.
Here we want to emphasize that brand IP-ization is an enhancement of brand assets; in the process of positioning a brand IP, the IP cannot exist separately from the brand culture.
To a certain extent, brand IP positioning should aim to support the company’s strategic development: through IP-ized image building, it increases the tea company’s intangible brand assets and builds a mindshare barrier for the branded tea company within the industry. At the same time, in building its corporate culture, a tea company should integrate IP elements, making the IP a part of its corporate cultural activities.
In fact, brand IP-ization has become an important part of brand marketing strategy in the tea industry, and it is a sustained and challenging marketing task. For branded tea companies, it is also brand management work worth systematically executing today.
In short, the tea industry is still at a stage of low industry concentration. A good tea brand IP can maximize a company’s brand voice in the market and capture consumer mindshare, achieving greater recognition and an enhanced reputation between the corporate brand and tea consumers as well as partners. We hope more tea companies will attach importance to shaping their own brand IPs, laying a solid foundation for their brands’ long-term development.
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—<\/p>\n
Author: Lam Sam (LamSam), the Old Tea Head
ZENTEA MANOR
Alliance Supply Chain Services Limited
Unit 902-3, 9\/F, Mini Cube, 10 Sam Chuk Street, San Po Kong, Kowloon, Hong Kong
www.zentea-shop.com Email:info@zentea-shop.com<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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