Understanding your brand is one thing, understanding the public’s perception of your brand is completely different. A brand tracker helps to bridge these gaps, showing you how your brand compares in a certain market. In this article, we will look at what a brand tracker specifically does, and also look at how this relates to your business, competitors, and the market as a whole.

In short, a brand tracker gives you a snapshot of how your brand is performing within the market it is based in. One of the key aspects for many brand trackers is brand recall. This is basically brand awareness within a specific category. Brand recall works by asking members of the public to name as many brands as they can within a given category, in a certain time limit. Thus, if a majority of people surveyed are able to put your brand in a certain category then it can be determined that brand awareness is high. Within your own business, this means that the marketing strategy currently being used is successful.

Brand recommendation is another key aspect of a brand tracker. This is when a member of the public is asked if they would recommend your brand to a friend or family member. This shows faith in your brand. Faith that goes beyond simply repurchasing it, as it’s also good enough to tell others about it too. This is a strong sign that your product/service is meeting customer’s criteria. So, if this is high, and brand recall is low, it shows your product/service is not the problem. Instead it might be your marketing strategy, or even the overall size of your business meaning it is hard to compete with larger competition.

Brand tracking information that is collected over time will have a much greater value than a ‘one off’ piece of research. Due to the fact you can compare a current snapshot of your brand to past snapshots, to see how your brand recall or recommendations have changed. This can show you that either there have been large changes in the market, or might show the results of key business decisions since your last brand tracker. These results will let you know if you’re brand strategy is working or not, if not it allows you to make changes before it’s too late, and before it starts to show in your sales figures.