From becoming happier to running faster; brands promise you all sorts of things. They often have convincing arguments for this. Such as superior materials, craftsmanship or optimal designs. But what if products are functionally identical? Is a brand still able to change the behavior of their customers and objectively increase their performance? In other words: does such a thing as the brand placebo effect exist?
From a rational perspective, such a placebo effect is of course nonsense. Two identical products – whether or not they have a logo on them – should lead to similar performance. Yet it turns email id database free download out that certain brands can influence our behavior, and therefore our performance, in surprising ways, through their brand image . In this blog, let’s look at five surprising ways in which brands influence our performance.
1. Red Bull gives you wings
When we think of strong brands, we immediately think of Red Bull. Market research from 2020 shows that Red Bull is the market leader in the energy drink industry, with a market share of 43%.
Red Bull's consistent marketing communication plays a major role in this. The brand's social media channels are full of extreme sports, record-breaking performances and sporting events that actually have little to do with their actual product. Red Bull is thus able to strongly link associations with speed, power and carefreeness to the brand in the consumer's mind.
But what effect do these associations actually have?
Several studies show that Red Bull influences our performance. For example, Red Bull can improve our cognitive performance, and improve our performance in racing cars, but it can also worsen it.