What is brand dilution? How can brand dilution happen? There are many ways that brand dilution can be caused, but often times it’s a result of not understanding the true value of your brand or product.

Knowing what causes brand dilution and learning how to keep it from happening will help you build your business and save your brand from failure. This article explains what causes brand dilution, how you can recognize it, and what you can do to prevent it from happening in the future.

What Is Brand Dilution?

Brand dilution is when a company’s core values are watered down or lost altogether. This can happen when a company expands too quickly, tries to appeal to too many different markets, or makes changes to its products or services that don’t align with its original mission.

Brand dilution can be dangerous for a company because it can lead to customer confusion and loyalty loss.

Examples of brand dilution include Coca-Cola’s introduction of New Coke, Gap’s logo redesign fiasco, and Microsoft’s decision to rebrand Bing as Decision Engine.
Brand dilution is a serious issue that companies need to be aware of. To avoid it, companies should focus on staying true to their core values and mission.

A great example of this is Apple. When Steve Jobs returned to the company in 1997, he began with three goals: make the best computers in the world, put an easy-to-use computer in every home, and change how people think about computers so they’re less intimidated by them.

Those goals have remained the same throughout his tenure at Apple—despite all of the innovations they’ve introduced since then—and have helped them maintain strong sales and customer loyalty.
A great way to test if your branding has been diluted is by checking whether you’re still delivering on your core values.

Why Does it Matter, Then?

When Brand dilution happens, the quality of the brand decreases and it becomes less recognizable. Brand dilution can also happen when a company is bought by another and the new company changes the original branding. A common example of this is Quaker Oats which was bought by PepsiCo in 2001.

Today, Quaker Oats sells only one product: oatmeal. The purchase from PepsiCo has led to a lack of recognition for the Quaker Oats brand since they do not sell anything else that was made before 2001.

There are multiple ways for brands to become diluted and the effects vary depending on what type of company has been diluted as well as how long ago it happened.

These are just some examples but there are more situations where a brand will be diluted if we looked closely enough at them! It is important to note the process of brand dilution because once it starts happening, you cannot stop it.

If companies continue to stretch themselves too thin then they risk weakening their product’s overall value and losing consumers due to a lack of variety or quality. Remember: Quality should always come first!

What are examples of brand dilution?

Coca-Cola’s recent introduction of Coca-Cola Life is a good example of brand dilution. The new product contains less sugar and calories than regular Coke, but it also has a different taste.

This could confuse customers and make them less likely to purchase Coke in the future. Another example of brand dilution is when a company offers too many products and services.

This can make it difficult for customers to understand what the company stands for, and ultimately makes the brand less valuable. Finally, offering discounts or sales on products can also weaken a brand.

This is because customers may begin to associate the brand with being cheap or low quality. Another important aspect of brand dilution is if there are name changes or redesigns that change the original identity of the company. For example, Air Jordan sneakers were rebranded as Air Jordan I Retro sneakers by Nike after Michael Jordan retired from basketball in 2003.

Customers felt like Nike was trying to distance themselves from Michael Jordan by changing his name on the shoe, which only served to weaken his identity as an athlete and businessman.
Overall, companies should be cautious about how they manage their brands so that they don’t experience significant damage due to brand dilution.

They should evaluate any current marketing campaigns and make sure they align with the company’s overall branding strategy. They should also avoid introducing too many new products at once, since this might cause confusion among consumers.

Companies should also avoid relying on discounts and sales to boost sales; instead, they need to focus on developing long-term customer relationships through high quality products that offer value.

The Illusion of Choice

When a brand becomes too widely known, it can suffer from brand dilution.  While it may seem counterintuitive, this can actually happen to even the most successful brands. For example, consider Coca-Cola.

The soda is so popular that it’s now available in over 200 countries. But with such widespread appeal comes the risk of brand dilution. As Coca-Cola tries to be everything to everyone, it runs the risk of losing sight of what made it special in the first place.

How To Avoid Brand Dilution

There are several ways to avoid brand dilution. The first is to make sure that any new products or services are closely related to the existing product line. For example, if you’re a food company and you start making clothing then you’ve diluted your brand.

A second way to avoid this problem is to make sure the new products or services do not compete with existing ones. For example, if you’re in the retail business and you start offering wholesale goods then this could be considered as competition for your original business so it would be considered as an act of diluting your brand.

A third way is to try not offer additional services in areas where there may be overlap with other brands like competitors that are already established in those areas.

For example, if you were a hair salon and decided to open up a pet grooming service next door then customers might get confused about which place they should go to for what service.

A fourth way is to conduct market research before introducing any new products or services. If your new product idea is similar to one offered by a competitor, it might be wise to find out whether or not people are likely interested in buying the same thing from two different companies before moving forward with development on your idea.

Concluding Thoughts on Brand Dilution and the Paradoxes

Your brand is one of your most valuable business assets. So it’s important to protect it from becoming diluted. Brand dilution can have a negative impact on your business, making it harder for customers to identify your products and services and making it more difficult to build customer loyalty.