Brand Management: Research, theory and practice

If the brand strategy is perceived as central for the overall strategy of the organi-
zation, but with the same conception of the customer, Louro and Cunha label it as a
projective paradigm. The third paradigm is characterized by the brand having a low
strategic priority and a tactical focus supplemented by a conception of the customer
as an active and primary co-creator of value, called the adaptive paradigm. The
fourth and last brand paradigm in the Louro and Cunha categorization of branding is
the relational paradigm. Here the brand is perceived to be key in relation to the
overall strategy and consumers are assumed to be active co-creators of the brand.
The product paradigm reflects a product-centred approach to brand management.
The product and its functional benefits are central to the profitability of the organi-
zation in the product paradigm. The brand holds two primary functions: the statement
of legal ownership, and as a communicative tool upholding visual identification of
differentiation in the marketing of the products of the company. In this brand
management paradigm, brand equity is seen as something created by having the
optimal marketing mix: the right price, right product, price, placement and promotion.
The product paradigm is comparable to the economic approach of this book.

Product

paradigm

Strategic orientation

(high)

Tactical orientation

(low)

Brand centrality

Multilateral

(high)

Customer centrality

Unilateral

(low)

Adaptive

paradigm

Projective

paradigm

Relational

paradigm

Figure 11.2Two dimensions and four brand management paradigms; from Louro and
Cunha, ‘Brand management paradigms’, Journal of Marketing Management, 17 (2001),
p. 855, reproduced by permission of Westburn Publishers Ltd

252 Taxonomy