When investing in new projects, Michael T Haas looks at a number of things.
Marketing
experts make their living by developing and creating products, prices,
and promotions. They also do a lot of work to identify the right markets
and right places to be, both literally and figuratively. Marketers that
work for big companies continuously change these variables to build
market presence, increasing the volume of sales and market share.
When
you are doing due diligence on a company and are trying to assign
value, it may be very hard to analyze all the different things that a
company does about its marketing. There are two things that you can take
a look at that will tell you a lot about a business.
The first
one is its financial data. If marketing is working, the numbers will
show it. The second criterion is the power of its brand. Most great
brands are easily identifiable. They also stand for something. No brand
is built overnight. A great brand requires a sequence of correct
marketing decisions, a great product, and great presentation.
There are a lot of books on brands, brand development, psychology, names, and even fonts and colors of brand logos.
When
evaluating a brand, you first want to pay attention to its image. Brand
image is what the public thinks about the brand and how it perceives
the brand. Product quality is usually a part of a brand image. Great
brands are associated with general ideas and images. For example,
Harley-Davidson is associated with unrefined individualism, Wrangler
with classic jeans, Starbucks with people communicating and having a
great time.
Even if you use expensive market research, evaluating a
brand may be very difficult. This is why investors like Michael T Haas
often rely on their observations and experience when making a decision
about a particular company.
