Investing In Brand Awareness Can Lead To Larger Market Share.

Based on several research studies, including a new one from Google and brand tracking firm Tracksuit, increasing brand awareness can drive share of search, which can in turn increase market share. 

“The earlier you invest in brand, the greater the return,” the Google/Tracksuit report says. “That’s not a feeling. That’s return on awareness.”

In the new global study, which analyzed 31 brands across 15 categories, Tracksuit conducted always-on tracking of awareness, consideration and preference while Google conducted share of search calculations, according to an analysis of research data in Westwood One’s blog.

“Share of search is a powerful and free predictor of your business’ success, [which] divides the number of searches for a brand over all the searches for brands in a category and competitive set,” Cumulus Media/Westwood One Audio Active Group Chief Insights Officer Pierre Bouvard says. “It’s like an audience share: a station’s time spent listening divided by all time spent to listening in the market.”

The study found that brands with higher awareness commanded greater share of search, where every five points gained in brand awareness translated directly into five points of share of search. “This proves ‘you have to be known before you’re needed,’” Bouvard says, noting that “for small brands, awareness growth generates significant share of search increases, [with] share of search growth for small brands almost seven times greater than for large brands. [So] the earlier you commit to brand, the greater the return.”

Google/Tracksuit’s report concludes that for small and mid-sized brands, “Every point of awareness growth translates into meaningful, measurable behavioral change in search, and ultimately in market share. Growth stage and disrupter brands have the most to gain. Brand investment at this stage isn’t a soft spend, it’s one of the most commercially efficient things a marketer can do.”

Other research shows a similar correlation, noting that the lag time between share of search and market share varies by product category. A study of several categories over 10 years found it took a year for auto brand changes in share of search to show up in market share changes, with six months for mobile phones and three months for power utilities.

Also key to driving a brand’s market share is its share of voice, or its total ad impressions or ad budget divided by total spend in the brand’s competitive category or total impressions. “If share of voice exceeds share of market, sales tend to grow,” Bouvard says. “If share of voice is similar to share of market, sales tend to be stable; and if share of voice is smaller than share of market, sales tend to shrink.”

Researchers have also found that advertising has both short- and long-term effects on search behavior, depending on the campaign. A one-month burst of advertising produces a large short-term effect which dies away within a month, while a smaller long-term strategy displays an effect that fades more slowly.

“Long-term effects are twice as important as short-term effects,” Bouvard says, noting that “two-thirds of advertising impact on search occurs over the long term, while about a third occurs in the short term. This is not surprising, as only 5% of consumers are in the market at any point in time for a product or service. A massive 95% are not in the market. It may take years for people to enter a category, conduct research and make a purchase.”