AMPERAGE Marketing & Fundraising

CBAS & Brand Perception Studies: Which Type of Research is Right for You?

“Your brand is what people say about you when you’re not in the room.”

The statement above is attributed to Jeff Bezos, CEO and founder of Amazon. And he’s right—your brand is so much more than a well-designed logo and well-placed advertising. Your brand is a promise to your constituents. Are you delivering on your brand promise? How do you know for sure?

Understanding and measuring your brand’s value is an essential part of any brand strategy. How do consumers perceive your brand? Do perceptions of your brand align with the position you want to portray? Strategic brand research can help you answer these questions, and more. But what type of research should you conduct? Over the years, we’ve developed two primary methodologies designed to collect the information you need—Comprehensive Brand Alignment Surveys (CBAS) and Brand Perception Surveys.

What’s the difference between the two surveys? First, CBAS use qualitative research (in-depth interviews), while Brand Perception Studies use quantitative research (online or phone surveys). Each of these research methods have distinct benefits:

• Qualitative research introduces the human factor and takes the study beyond faceless statistics. You’re interacting with a smaller group of people, but this humanistic approach allows you to look deep into the minds of your stakeholders.
• Quantitative research is where statistics come into play. By interacting with a large group of people, you’re able to use statistics to generalize a finding and project it onto the broader population.

Second, each survey is designed to measure different brand attributes. CBAS provide insights about how your brand position, personality and differentiation are regarded by people important to you and your success. Brand Perception Surveys help you understand your brand’s value as determined by consumers’ positive or negative attitudes as they relate to your brand. You get a comprehensive look at consumers’ perceptions about, experiences with and attitudes toward your organization.

And finally, due to the nature of the qualitative and quantitative research methods being used, each survey is designed to measure the information differently. CBAS use a combination of open ended, scoring and metaphorical questions to capture the language and imagery consumers use to relate to your brand, while Brand Perception Studies are designed to capture data more numeric in nature by asking multiple choice, true/false and ranking/rating questions.

Separately, each of these research methods provide you with the dynamic results you need to strategically position your organization in the marketplace and overcome any perceived shortcomings, but together, they are an electrifying combination, designed to maximize your return on investment and move your needle. And, perhaps the greatest benefit of brand research, each person surveyed will become better educated about you.