I’ve worked extensively with products that are more expensive than their competition. Sometimes they’ve had feature advantages, many times they haven’t. So, how do you differentiate a luxury brand from a premium brand?
I’ve compiled a content toolkit on strong luxury brands. These are some of the top need-to-know extracts from that toolkit:
Pay great creatives, use top-tier equipment, and ensure things are lit perfectly. The proper lighting matters for the little things — especially in e-commerce photos.
A great example are these shots from a launch. We saw this lighting in a previous shoot, so we brought it to the whole product style guide.
Establish which benefits you want from association with other premium brands:
@type7 is an Instagram daily lifestyle magazine from Porsche. It is also an amazing example of using content to build a lifestyle component for a luxury brand. The magazine showcases Porsche and the luxury lifestyle you can expect to lead when you own a Porsche, side-by-side. These are real stories, in and around the space they want to associate with owning the Porsche lifestyle.
Plenty of customers aren’t looking for the cheapest option, but are instead looking for the best. Showcasing the process of creating your best might not be your top performing content, but it’s a giant validator.
Is this the most boring ad ever made? Not if you appreciate obsessive craftsmanship. Leica Camera spends 45 minutes polishing the new Leica.
It’s always worth giving the interested buyer an extra dive into the brand’s lore. Cover history, materials, sustainability, and values.
Take Arc’teryx, for example: WhoWeAre is EXTENSIVE and immaculately designed.
Showing off concept products showcases the team is thinking of the future, and has the resources to dedicate to R&D. You see this in vehicles constantly, but not much elsewhere.
One of my favourite examples is the one-seat Lamborghini concept car.
Pushing limits and going for records associates your brand with the pursuit of greatness. Doing what hasn’t been done before costs $$ but generates true interest.
Have the best how-to videos. An extremely elegant manual. Bags, shippers, stickers, every single thing needs that extra labour of love that gives customers delight.
Example: The Shoe Surgeon magnet clasp and metallic shoe box
For almost any product: showcase it in a premium way. Show off your processes, push the limits of your content, take the little things seriously, and you can command extra $$.
Don’t be afraid to give yourself the room in your margin to be great, to differentiate a luxury brand within your range of product offerings.
Oftentimes, even with more dollars, the cost to do things like the above makes a company no more profitable than its lower-priced competitors. Is this worth it? Yes, because luxury commands staying power. It’s memorable. It’s a long-term business, not a short-term hustle.
If you enjoyed this, I tweet multiple threads a week on brand identity / the zeitgeist / cannabis. Smash that follow @orenmeetsworld
– Oren
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