Secrets to Building a Luxury Brand

Your product must be high quality enough to withstand the intense evaluation of the discriminating eye

Sarah Procopio //May 10, 2018//

Secrets to Building a Luxury Brand

Your product must be high quality enough to withstand the intense evaluation of the discriminating eye

Sarah Procopio //May 10, 2018//

Here are a few secret elements to building a successful luxury brand:

CRAFT SOMETHING EXCEPTIONAL

To do so, you have to know your market. A luxury product can’t just be fabulous and successfully appeal to the masses – it has to be something that appeals to high-net worth and ultra-high-net worth population – or, at the very least, people who want to feel like they are in those segments. HNW is considered $1 million in liquid financial assets. For UHNW, the threshold is $30 million or more. To add volume to your target market, you can create a product that also appeals to the “affluent” (someone with less than $1 million in liquid assets but more than $100,000). If that still doesn’t provide you with the population you imagine for your product, don’t worry. Consumers that make around $100,000 are considered “aspirational” luxury-brand buyers who buy the lower-end, less-pricey items within luxury brand offerings.

Your product must be high quality enough to withstand the intense evaluation of the discriminating eye, but also delight your target audience’s senses and make them feel special. From the moment your consumer begins interacting with your brand, they should be enveloped in an experience that leaves them feeling like nurtured royalty. When constructing your concept to take over the luxury-brand sector, customization, craftsmanship and a level of elegance are usually solid elements to incorporate. These attributes are found consistently in brands such as Aman Resorts and Bugatti. But creating an amazing product alone isn’t enough. A few other crucial elements to consider are brand identity and pricing.

LUXURY BRANDS ON A BUDGET

To an outsider, that might seem like an impossible task; but it isn’t. It just takes a little more time, thought and tenacity. The undeniable priority is gaining the attention of high profile influencers and having them support your brand. But in between courting Kim Kardashian and Channing Tatum, there is something else you can do.

Put yourself in the shoes of luxury brand buyers and assess their less obvious behaviors to identify low-cost marketing opportunities.

Case in point, what are the two things the UHNW and HNW can never have enough of?

Time and convenience.

Identify services that give this group more time and convenience and you will find sources your competitors overlooked. A company called QuadJobs is a perfect example. QuadJobs just opened a location in Colorado and, on the surface, it looks like it provides superior quality on-demand labor from college students to those that need help. Dig a little beneath the surface though and you will find that the core customer base for the company is the luxury aspirational and HNW population. According to the head of QuadJobs, Colorado, Sara Howard, “Among the thousands of employers using QuadJobs are countless high net-worth individuals who are attracted to the hard working and enthusiastic college students using the site.”

Why is this important to those launching a luxury brand on a budget?

Because partnering with a company like QuadJobs is fast, inexpensive and could give you access to your precise target market. Identifying companies like this is a scrappy but highly effective approach that will give your budding luxury brand the exposure it needs – quickly. While you’re at it you can source a company like this to execute your guerilla marketing efforts for building your luxury brand like sourcing a team to assemble custom curated celebrity gifts that feature your product.