Branding: Recognition vs Recall (Smart Monday/Positioning)

Hello, I’m Jim Glover, That Branding Guy, for Once a Day Marketing.  Today is Smart Monday and we are going to review one of my favorite aspects of branding, the difference between recognition and recall.

Let’s take a moment and define these terms.  Recognition is familiarity with your brand from past experience.  Someone may not know where they have heard of your product, they may not even know what your product does but somehow the brand is in their mind.

Recall is when a brand comes to mind at the time of purchase in a particular product class.  If I am thinking about buying a car Ford, Chrysler or Porsche might come to mind.  All of those are being recalled at the time of a purchase.

There are two additional terms I would like to discuss.  The first is “top of mind”.  That means the first brand that comes to mind when someone is thinking about buying a product in a particular class.

The second is “brand dominance”.  This occurs when a person only thinks of one brand when making a purchase in a particular product class.  How great would it be if that brand was yours?

You don’t need to have sky high recognition across a broad audience.  The goal is to achieve recognition and good recall with your target customers.  On the negative side, there is something called “the graveyard” which is when you have high recognition, however, people are not recalling your product when it comes time to buy.

Your objective is to ensure customers recognize your brand.  Again, that recognition doesn’t have to be off the charts, it just needs to be enough recognition and recall by your niche audience so they think about your brand and your products when they are making a purchase.  Top of mind is even better, so they think of you first.  A long term goal would be brand dominance.  It takes time to accomplish, however, customers won’t thinks about any other brand, they will just think of yours when it comes time to buy that product.

That wraps up Smart Monday.  Try to join us tomorrow for Strategic Tuesday.  If you need branding support, please contact me to discuss an online or face to face service engagement.  That information can be found at the end of my video.  I am Jim Glover, That Branding Guy, for Once a Day Marketing and we will see you next time.