What are company and brand shares?
A share refers to a proportion of the total.
That being said, a company share refers to the proportion of a company’s revenue within a market.
Similarly, a brand share refers to the proportion of a particular company’s brand sales within a market.
Using company and brand share information in conjunction with market size and industry forecasts is essential for effective decision making. A brand owner knows the health of his or her own brands; however, this information needs to be looked at in context with the competition’s performance.
When using any data in building strategy, it is necessary to evaluate its behaviour over a period of time. At a given point, the growth or decline of a company’s share within its industry indicates its respective performance. However, a 5 or 10-year analysis of the data allows for a deeper dive into brands’ overall health, which enables proactive long-term planning.
The principle purpose of company and brand share information is to provide an overview of the competitive landscape for any category irrespective of the country. It answers questions such as:
- Who is the leading company/brand in an industry/category?
- Is the growth rate on-par/above/below that of the industry?
- Is the market leader undisputed or being challenged?
- Which competitor is winning or which emerging players warrant closer attention?
- Who is taking away share from whom and what can be learnt from this?
- Is the market fragmented with lots of players or consolidated with strong leading brands/companies?
The data by itself is only part of the story; answering questions on what a market player has done well to achieve or bolster growth is equally interesting. Better understanding of the data and insights leads to many strategies:
Market entry
A company enters a country when it understands market concentration and assess what has worked for other companies in the existing space. Information on the following helps build an effective plan:
- Who is the market leader? Why is it doing well?
- What does this tell about consumer’s preference?
- Have there been brands that have done well recently? If so, what have they done?
- Who to benchmark? What winning strategies can a company emulate?
White space analysis
As markets become more saturated, companies look for new areas of growth. When brand and company information is analysed across relevant categories, it allows companies to identify white spaces. The chart below highlights an example of such analysis in the beauty and personal care industry in India.
For example, in some countries, Ginger Ale has emerged as an alternative for growth in the full sugar carbonates category. If a company has a well-developed product portfolio in a specific country of a region, it can aim to emulate that in a different country across the same region.
Brand cull/diversification
In today’s competitive business world, it is not always about understanding growth prospects. Sometimes it is essential to scale back operations or streamline brand strategy. This involves asking questions like:
- Are sales coming from a few key brands or does a company have a diversified portfolio? Is it too diverse?
- Will it make sense to streamline to improve efficiencies?
In markets where income inequality is high, many companies launch brand variants at various price points. Interestingly, Procter & Gamble recently exited the powder detergents category in Brazil. Analysing the performance of newly launched brands against existing ones allows for execution.
With growth stagnating in many industries in developed countries, companies need to look beyond core markets or categories. Alternatively, growth is coming from unexpected categories across the world. What worked ten years ago, is unlikely to work now. Similarly, a strategy that was successful in a developed country might need localisation in a developing country. By proactively analysing the market potential using brand and company share data, companies can stay ahead of the growth curve and launch into a country or category at the most opportune moment.
Euromonitor International is the world’s leading independent provider of strategic market research. We create data and analysis on thousands of products and services around the world. All of our industry data provides market sizes, company and brand shares. To learn about how our research can help shape your business strategy, request a demo of Passport.
