When brand love belongs to an older product…

Other brands aren’t the only competition. Sometimes the hardest benchmark to beat is one you’ve already set.

When it comes to headphones, Sony’s customers aren’t comparing its latest models with a rival’s. They’re comparing them with Sony’s older ones.

“And the hinges are indestructible because Sony used a higher quality type of plastic in the xm3 vs later models. My xm3 is still going strong after 7 years of heavy use while I have a graveyard of later models”

“Sony should have kept this sony wh xm4 design then improved the hinges durability. Instead, they went with a whole new design on wh xm5 and much more unreliable hinges. 😭”

Another puts it more directly:

“Why would you buy these when the hinges break very easily?”

Three comments, one consistent theme: the hinge.

Across a single month, more than a hundred Sony comments prefer an older product to the current one. Read as sentiment, most would look like praise for the brand. And it is, for products from years ago. It also carries a verdict on what came after.

This isn’t simply nostalgia. Customers are making comparisons between what they got before and what they’re getting now. The old product has become the benchmark, and a new release has to live up to it.

Estée Lauder shoppers do it with a formula. One asks a group what to switch to: “Am using the old formula double wear but haven’t read good feedback on new formula.” Another suggests asking the brand’s own counters for “any old stock of the old formula as it’s literally the last of them.”

Of the Estée Lauder conversation that is about loyalty (nearly 6% of the total), 11% is loyalty to the original formula specifically, a product that has been replaced.

What this means

Positive comments about a brand can contain criticism of what it sells today. Understanding which product or version people mean helps distinguish affection for the brand’s past from confidence in its current offer. For brand tracking, that raises a useful question: do customers’ ratings reflect the products you’re selling now?

The question to ask

When customers say they love your brand, which product are they picturing?