At BrandMatters we are in the business of helping businesses become more self-aware. It is not until you have a deep understanding of your business, your vision and your marketplace that you can truly develop a unique positioning for your brand, and embed it within your organisation.

With that in mind, we think this presentation speaks for itself. Read it, enjoy it and share it. Our commitment at BrandMatters is to try our hardest to develop content that is meaningful, valuable and relevant – and from time to time, to wow you with a case study of our recent work.

For those who don’t have the time to spend reading the entire presentation (though trust us, it’s worth it), the six core points the presentation is aiming to leave with its audience are -

To deliver a consistent, cut-through content marketing strategy you must:

 
1. Be the buyer. Everything starts with their challenges, needs, prejudices and concerns.

 

2. Be authoritative. Stay in your Sweet Spot, where the things you understand better than anyone else intersect with the things your prospects really care about.

 

3. Be strategic. One-off content islands don’t add up to a content strategy.

 

4. Be prolific. Content Marketing is  a marathon not a shot put.

 

5. Be passionate. If you don’t care about this stuff, why should anybody else?

 

6. Be tough on yourself. You’ll know if you’re being lazy. Don’t be lazy.

The show promises to ‘offer unhappy customers a revolutionary new wonder diet of information and entertainment that’s clinically proven and 70% fat free’. What that means in reality is that it explores consumer affairs and attempts to expose and embarrass brands it accuses of breaking or bending consumer laws via a combination of satirical humour and user-generated content.

But what kind of damage can a show like this do to your brand? The answer to this is quite simple: it depends on your response. Here are six key points to keep in mind to protect your brand against this program and others like it:

1)      Be prepared: If The Checkout contacts you before the show for a statement, research the program and then carefully weigh up the pros and cons of responding.

If you don’t respond, will they pull the segment because they don’t have enough material? (Doubtful). Will they openly state that they tried to contact you for a statement and you failed to return their calls? (Probably).

If you do respond, will they twist your words into lies and make you appear in the worst possible light? (That’s a little extreme). Will they probe hard for any holes in your story and make a mockery of your organisation if your response isn’t 100% professional, legitimate and on-brand? (Probably). In short, put yourself in their shoes, understand the show’s objectives and consider how they will use your response to meet their objectives and drive overall audience experience.

2)      Make sure your response is measured: Before you respond, you need to ensure the strength of your response aligns with the size of the risk to your brand. According to OzTam, The Checkout is generally between the 9^th and 12^th most watched TV programs each night it airs. That means that, for example, on Thursday 25 April it had 740,000 viewers, and on Thursday 18 April it had 902,000 viewers. However, viewership is not the only thing you need to take into account when deciding how best for your brand to respond. Make sure your response matches the size of the alleged threat. Check the response to the segment about your brand on social media. Are people talking about it? What was the length of the segment about your brand? Was it a feature of the show, or a passing reference at the end?

If you did something wrong and you can fix it immediately, do so, and consider contacting the program via email to let them know you’ve resolved the complaint.

If you didn’t do something wrong and feel an immediate need to defend your brand, make sure the strength of your response aligns with the size of the risk of damage to your brand.

3)      Always stay true to your brand. If you have a strong and well-defined brand, your brand positioning will help set the direction of your response. If your brand is irreverent, devise a catchy way to respond boldly and with measured cheek. If your brand has a more corporate style, respond more formally – or possibly, if you’ve effectively weighed up the risks and benefits, don’t respond at all.

4)      Work as a team. Before you respond to any request for information, as always, make sure you adhere to your organisation’s communication protocols. It is more than likely your corporate communications team has an issues management plan that includes holding statements and pre-prepared responses developed with situations like this in mind.

5)      Consider all your target audiences. If you’ve weighed up your options and decided you do need to respond to claims made on the show, make sure you remember all your channels. While a simple holding statement or prepared response on your Facebook page may keep your consumer audience at bay, your trade channels may need additional reassurance, or the confidence that they know what to say if they are questioned by a customer. Consider preparing a statement or fact sheet specifically for trade, or possibly even investors, to reaffirm their commitment to your product and brand.

6)      Understand how the media landscape has changed. In the days of ‘paid-only’ media, the risk of being discovered when your brand and product claims were stacked and stretched were fairly limited. Not so today. With the advent of social media, RSS feeds, blogs and feedback forums your brand’s actions and behaviours are now very public. Who can forget the Nike Asian sweat shop labour rates et al.?  The Checkout is essentially the broadcasting of user-generated content, previously limited to feedback threads on social media – taking it directly into the country’s lounge rooms in prime time. Successful brands and product managers will understand this risk of exposure very clearly and set their product and brand communication strategy accordingly.

Example: Nurofen

Nurofen were featured on The Checkout on Thursday 18 April in a segment entitled ‘Chronic Pain’. The segment ultimately criticised Nurofen’s body part-specific pain relief claims, suggesting the claims were not supported by scientific evidence, and went on to state that Nurofen’s associated pricing strategy and product pack information were misleading.

The Checkout contacted Nurofen owner Reckitt Beckinser before the show, and their response was clumsy. Their PR agency provided a statement and said the statement ‘could be attributed to a Reckitt Beckinser representative’. Too tempting an opportunity for The Checkout to turn down: they read the statement verbatim in mockery of both the PR agency and Reckitt Beckinser.

However, once the segment went to air, Nurofen picked up its act.

After the program the response from customers was muted. There was no social media backlash, with only one comment on their Facebook page, and there was no mainstream media follow up.

How did Nurofen respond? Well, it seems it didn’t. The Facebook comment was responded to with a bland statement referring the customer to their website. There was no media statement placed on the Nurofen or Reckitt Beckinser website. Time will tell if sales are affected, but judging by the complete lack of mainstream response to the show’s claims,   it would seem any drop in sales would be limited.

Ultimately, Nurofen played the game like professionals: their response was measured, they had holding statements prepared and they used them (on their Facebook page at least) and the response on social media indicated their whole team was briefed and prepared.

What could they have done differently? Other than improving the professionalism of the pre-broadcast statement, not much. But if they had sought to do more, they could have considered preparing an online fact sheet and optimising for SEO, with the view of owning the top search rankings, ahead of any references to The Checkout segment. They could also have supplied the fact sheet to their trade channels to reassure them and support them in case of questions from consumers. But ultimately, neither of those actions was necessary.

Not all situations will end as smoothly as Nurofen’s. But by staying true to your brand and ensuring your response is measured and professional, shows like The Checkout will struggle to permanently damage the strength of any professional, well-defined and well-established brand.

 * This post was updated after it was posted to correct (and increase) the OzTam viewership figures and the associated commentary, in response to feedback from The Checkout team. 

So why is trust so important? Trusted brands have committed customers who are not only willing to recommend them to friends and family, but display a willingness to pay higher prices: a ‘trust’ premium. At BrandMatters we often describe strong brands as having customers who are disinterested in alternatives and trust in their preferred brand is what drives that disinterest. You might have cutting edge products or an enormous advertising budget but without trust you will continue to struggle to build a loyal customer base. Additionally, building trust internally will help you to foster innovation, drive commitment; and will give investors the confidence to provide additional capital.

Trust can only be built over time and is not something you can slot into your value proposition and expect to turn up as increased sales the following week. In his article on Forbes.com, Horsager identified the eight C’s that can help drive trust:

So how can organisations apply the the eight C’s of building a great leader to help build trust in their brand?

Clarity

Customers are looking for simple solutions and clear stories. Removing complexity is a must-do for brands. Make sure your customer value proposition clearly communicates who you are; what you stand for; and how you are different. This is essentially your brand’s positioning. Don’t confuse people: give them confidence by making your brand easier to understand. Internally, a clearly expressed employee value proposition will give your employees the confidence to deliver on your brand’s promise and therefore become more productive and more effective.

Examples of brands that display clarity: Peter Alexander, Bunnings, Subway

Compassion

Demonstrating your brand’s compassion is not about donating to charities and working with the underprivileged – it is about how you treat your customers, your employees and also your competitors. If you can consistently demonstrate genuine respect, over time people will come to believe in your sincerity.

Examples of brands that display compassion: NRMA Roadside Assistance, Lonely Planet.

Character

Brands that demonstrate character don’t duck, weave and hide: they are proactive and do what needs to be done. When they do something wrong they accept it and take steps to rectify the situation. If your organisation makes the tough decisions when it needs to, people will recognise it and you will be rewarded.

Examples of brands that display character: Herron, Sherrin,

Contribution

Take a step back and have a look at your organisation from the outside in. It’s not all about you and your brand – it’s how you act within your broader operating environment that will influence trust in your brand. Do you support the local community? What do you do to show that you value your employees? Do you demonstrate that you care about the environment? People notice these things – provided they are aware of them. A sincerely motivated corporate social responsibility program supported by a strong communications program will demonstrate to your customers that your brand is worthy of their trust.

Examples of brands that display a contribution: Bendigo Bank, The Body Shop

Competency

Having expertise and being well-qualified is definitely important for assuring your customers you have the skills and experience to exceed their expectations. However Horsager points out that skill alone is not enough: to build trust and be successful, brands need to stay on top of trends and explore new opportunities. Customers appreciate brands with a can-do attitude. It’s also about listening to your customers, keeping abreast of your competitors and learning from others in your industry. Leading brands are always ahead of the curve.

Examples of brands that display their competence: McDonalds, Google

Connection

Your ability to connect with your customers is critical in today’s world of new technology and social media. As Horsager points out, ‘trust is about relationships, and relationships are best built by establishing a genuine connection’. It’s about more than just having a Facebook page – It’s your commitment in listening to and engaging with your audience. Not only will being connected to your audience help build their trust and confidence, but it is also an important way to evaluate your customer’s experience and expectations and improve your offer.

Examples of brands that display their connection: Kiva, WordPress, Starbucks, VB, Amazon, Caterpillar, M-TV, Kleenex

Commitment

Live up to your promise. With its famous tagline ‘whatever it takes’ FedEx is a strong example of a company with a brand positioning founded on commitment. Commitment is your ability to stay aligned to your positioning and your promise and link all your business activities and actions back to your core reason for being. Often, passion is the driver of commitment.

Examples of brands that display their commitment: Nike, Disney, FedEx

Consistency

One of the first rules of building strong brands is consistency. Consistency needs to be applied to all levels of communication in your organisation. Being consistent in your messages will bring clarity, demonstrate reliability and make your brand memorable. A complete and detailed set of brand guidelines will help achieve visual consistency across your organisation. But it’s not all about design, your tone of voice, or the way you run a TV campaign every September. Successful brands have a unique and compelling value proposition which they consistently deliver against again and again.

Examples of brands that display their consistency: Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC), Macquarie Bank, Mercedes Benz

* * *

None of these elements can be bought, borrowed or created in a few weeks. Trust is a result of a long term investment and commitment. It is slow to grow and quick to destroy. But by applying these eight values against all interactions with your customers and employees over time you will earn the trust and loyalty of all your brand’s stakeholders – and that will contribute to improving your bottom line.

NIBA CEO Dallas Booth has strongly endorsed the 2013 Vero SME Insurance Index as essential reading for all brokers looking to better service their SME clients in the year ahead.

“This report should be mandatory reading for brokers servicing the SME sector,” Booth said. “Credit to Vero for commissioning the report, which identifies clear trends in insurance purchasing decisions in the SME sector in Australia. The challenge now for brokers is to find ways to reach those who do not currently see the value in using a broker.”

The SME report has revealed the next generation of small business owners and the growing number of women small business owners are the next big challenge for insurance brokers.

“Women and younger business owners and decision makers represent a market gap for brokers,” said Andrew Mair, Executive General Manager, Distribution, Vero Insurance.

Read more from Insurance and Risk Professional Online here.

Download your copy of the Vero SME Insurance Index 2013 here.

Read more about BrandMatters’ work with Vero here and here.

The 2013 Index is the second Index BrandMatters has developed in partnership with Vero, and is designed to: identify insurance industry insights; shed light on the attitudes and behaviours of small to medium enterprises (SMEs) with regard to insurance; and highlight challenges and opportunities in the SME insurance sector.

In order to develop the Index, BrandMatters conducted quantitative surveys with almost 900 business owners and insurance decision makers around Australia, along with a series of qualitative interviews filmed on site at small business’ premises.

The key findings highlighted the attitudes of the next generation of business owners towards insurance, the widely different perceptions of brokers held by broker clients versus direct clients, how male and female business decision makers differ in their approach, the importance of a clear value proposition for brokers and how potential price rises may impact SME behaviour.

BrandMatters then worked with Vero to promote the Index to Vero’s insurance broker audience. Promoting the Index involved the development of both a teaser campaign and a launch campaign. The launch campaign featured a series of videos of on-site interviews with SMEs, designed to bring the findings to life. It also included the design and production of animated online advertising and electronic direct mail, interactive web content and face-to-face training presentations with Vero BDMs.

We invite you to download a copy of the Vero SME Insurance Index 2013.

You can also view the Vero SME Insurance Index 2012.

Cover and internal spread, Vero SME Insurance Index 2013

You can watch the Vero SME Insurance Index highlights video here.

Animated online advertising, Vero SME Insurance Index 2013 on Insurance News

Part 2: Diving right in 

Last week we discussed why Facebook is important for your B2B organisation; and how you can get involved with Facebook if you don’t have the resources for a full-blown Facebook page.

But what if you’ve dipped your toe in the water, seen the results and are now ready for more?

The third level of involvement with Facebook is taking a deep breath and diving right in: starting a Facebook page for your B2B business and using it nurture leads and, ultimately, drive sales.

Here’s six quick tips to get you started:

 1)      Get creative: When you are setting up your Facebook page don’t use the same old boring brand photos. Think about using something that reflects the personality of your brand and is vibrant, interesting and maybe even a bit quirky.

 2)      Be active and responsive: If a customer contacts you via Facebook they expect a response in the same way they would expect a response if they contacted you by phone or email.

 3)      Be aware that no-one will visit your page: Followers will generally only visit your Facebook page once – the first time they find you and ‘like’ you. After that, the majority of their interactions with you will be via your newsfeed. Keep this in mind when developing your Facebook content.

 4)      Run a promotion to attract ‘likes’: A great idea is to run a ‘Facebook-only exclusive’ where customers receive a special offer when they ‘like’ your Facebook page. It could be an exclusive eBook, a limited time only discount or something similar. You can advertise the promotion outside of Facebook via electronic direct mail and your main website.

5)      Cross-promote: Make sure you promote your Facebook page on your other social media platforms. Make sure you have a link to it on your website. Make reference to it on your Twitter profile page, your LinkedIn profile and your YouTube homepage and vice versa.

6)      Be interesting: Use your newsfeed to promote interesting content your audience will want to read or view. Mix it up – include links to blog posts or ebooks, videos, pictures and infographics and polls and short surveys. Don’t forget the 10-4-1 rule: share 10 pieces of content from third parties for every four links to company blog posts and articles and every one link to a direct promotion or landing page.

Facebook for B2B does have some differences to Facebook for B2C. Facebook for B2C is about increasing product awareness and driving immediate sales. Facebook for B2B is about lead nurturing: providing valuable content and building relationships. Facebook is another touch point to keep your brand front of mind during the purchasing cycle. Keep this in mind when developing your Facebook content.

Finally, we’ve talked about listening to what your customers are saying, and responding to feedback and inquiries – but it’s also important to watch how your Facebook followers act. The PwC Australia Facebook page is a perfect example.   At the time of writing this blog, PwC had around 14,000 likes. It posts regularly, responds effectively to inquiries and is ticking all the standard Facebook for B2B boxes. It doesn’t get many likes or comments in response to its posts, but it does get lots of comments and posts on its Facebook wall. What accounts for this disparity? Job seekers. The main source of engagement on the PwC Facebook page is with prospective employees and interns. By watching how its fans interact with its content and identifying specifically what is of most interest to its fans, PwC can determine how best to leverage Facebook to meet both the needs of its business: to recruit the best employees; and the needs of its customers: to provide regular, valuable, credible information.

Part 1: Dipping your toe in the water

There are plenty of social media buzz words flying around the marketing community at the moment. You hear people talk about ‘encouraging engagement’ and ‘building stakeholder relationships’ and ‘starting online conversations’. And you might be thinking to yourself ‘sure, Facebook makes sense for marketers who want to accumulate fans based on a shared passion for chocolate milk or holidays to Bora Bora, but what can Facebook do for my B2B IT business?’

The answer? Plenty, and for three simple reasons:

• Facebook has over 800 million active users. Like it or not, your audience is there. CEOs are viewing photos of their grandchildren and senior managers are scheduling after-work drinks with their friends. They may not be using it as a corporate tool, but Facebook is where your potential customers are hanging out.

• It’s a channel for expanding your online presence. It’s not that Facebook should be the only social media platform you use for your business, but Facebook can be a channel for sharing your YouTube videos, sharing website content and for spreading the word about your latest blog post. One extra channel can only improve your chances of being found and engaged with online.

• It captures feedback about your products and services. The old adage ‘I’d rather you said it to my face than behind my back’ has never been more true and Facebook can help make you aware of what people are saying about your business. More importantly, it can also give you the opportunity to respond to feedback, both negative and positive.

The big names of B2B, like PwC, Michael Page and Fuji Xerox, are all making Facebook work for their businesses. It is the medium-sized B2B organisations that seem to be struggling to get involved.

The beauty of Facebook is that it’s not an all-or-nothing medium. If you don’t have the resources to manage a full-time Facebook presence there are still ways that you can capitalise on what Facebook has to offer.

Three levels of involvement with Facebook include:

Dipping your toe in the water: adding Facebook shares to your blog posts or interesting pages on your website

If you don’t have the resources to invest in a full Facebook page, or if your legal team is still saying ‘no’, you can still invite your audience to share your content via Facebook. That amazing blog post or whitepaper? Or that page on your website that boldly announces your new product range? Make sure you have a Facebook ‘share’ button on the page and give your website visitors the chance to share your brilliant content with their online community of friends and colleagues.

But be careful – don’t give visitors too many choices. If you have share buttons to twenty social media sites at the bottom of every blog post or web page your audience will get overwhelmed and will not share your content at all. Try to choose three or four channels and leave it at that. Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Pinterest are common choices.

Wading in waist-deep: using Facebook advertising to reach your audience

If you are feeling a little more confident and are prepare to push the boundaries a little further, Facebook advertising might be the right choice for you.

There are many benefits of Facebook advertising: it is extremely easy to target your audience by demographics including age, gender, location, interests and even relationship status; it is easy to test ads and make changes in response to what is working and what is not working; you can set and manage your budget quickly and regularly and choose whether you want to pay for cost per thousand or cost per click; and it’s measurable – you can tell how many people have viewed your ad, clicked on your ad, what times of day your ad is being triggered and more.

Think creatively about how you promote your brand or product on Facebook and make sure your advertisement has a strong offer or call to action. You could promote your new ebook, upcoming event or competition and drive click-throughs to your non-Facebook website.

If you are thinking about combining Facebook advertising with a full-blown Facebook page the results can be even stronger. New Facebook Premium ads allow you to integrate your newsfeed content with your advertising for even stronger results.

The third level of involvement with Facebook is taking a deep breath and diving right in. Think you are ready? Next week we’ll give you six quick tips to help you get started.

It can definitely be challenging for medium-sized organisations to commit the resources to a dedicated Facebook presence, especially without being able to clearly demonstrate ROI. By experimenting with Facebook shares and Facebook advertising you can determine the success of Facebook as a medium for your business before committing the resources to a full Facebook page.

nabInvest
Our relationship with the NAB Group extends over 6 years. This year we developed the brand positioning, look and feel and a range of promotional materials for international equities manager Altrinsic Global Advisors. We also assisted NabInvest and MLC in the re-branding of Aviva Investors Australia Ltd to Antares; a brand we created back in 2006. This re-brand placed this equities business alongside NabInvest’s existing Antares institutional fixed income team.

Sage Software Australia
Our relationship since 2006 continues. This year we’ve continued with our supervision and implementation of Sage’s integrated marketing and communications program including, for the second year, the Sage Business Index 2012, a research program encompassing 500 businesses around Australia.

Sage MicrOpay
We continue to enjoy an ongoing relationship with Sage MicrOpay, working with them on specific product-level marketing and design projects. In 2012 we delivered multiple electronic direct mail pieces, brochures, animated website graphics, display banners and more. We have just worked with their marketing team to redesign the MicrOpay website homepage, which will go live early in 2013.

Vero
For the second year running BrandMatters is conducting an extensive research study into the views and behaviours of SMEs towards insurance – the 2013 Vero SME Index.  We are also developing the communications plan for the Index and assisting with its execution.

Aspen Pharmaceuticals
BrandMatters conducted a market research study for Herron Natural Health Care supplements as part of a brand positioning initiative.

Healthy Habits
We created a new brand positioning and brand identity as part of a re-brand for this quick service sandwich chain and continued to provide brand and marketing support as they take their new brand to market.

Hyperion Asset Management
We identified and developed the brand positioning for this specialist boutique Australian equities fund manager, then developed the brand identity and assisted with the rollout.

Nobleheart Telecommunications
We continued to assist this specialist provider of telecommunications services with the rollout of their new identity to a new website.

Veda
We continued to assist this data intelligence provider with the rollout of an employee branding program across printed and digital mediums.

Wesfarmers Insurance
We continue to assist Wesfarmers Insurance with a range of research and brand initiatives following work commenced in 2010.

Aspect Consulting
We completed a number of smaller design and communications initiatives for this boutique firm of business psychologists.

We’re also delighted to have established a number of new client relationships this calendar year:

Island Pacific
Island Pacific is a supplier of mobile solutions for retailers internationally. We worked with them on their advertising look and feel, including implementing QR codes to help make their advertisements more interactive and measurable.

Ingenia Communities
Ingenia Communities (formerly part of ING Real Estate) launched its new brand and look and feel in early 2012. We created the Ingenia name for ING Real Estate back in 2010. This year we’ve worked with Ingenia Communities to develop its temporary website, and in 2013 will work with them to develop a more comprehensive, permanent CMS-based website.

QLD Motorways
BrandMatters was engaged in 2012 to assist with a brand positioning project.  We conducted desk research and depth interviews and developed a positioning platform, and we continue to work with QML on the next steps in this initiative.

Totally Natural Products
TNP is an Australian, vitamin and supplement company.  We have assisted TNP with a comprehensive research program and ongoing brand and marketing initiatives.

Financial Services Partners
Financial Services Partners is a boutique financial planning group within the ANZ Group. We assisted FSP in market research that informed the development and positioning of the FSP brand. This also included a comprehensive set of brand guidelines and stationery templates.

Downer EDI
Downer Rail engaged BrandMatters to develop their Hunter Manufacturing Awards Submission in the category of Manufacturing Excellence, including a video capturing the story and achievements of the Waratah Train Project – and they won!

When delivered effectively, thought leadership and lead nurturing build trust and credibility in your brand. By sharing information you can position yourself as a trusted advisor and increase your likelihood of being part of the consideration set when it comes time to purchase or engage.

Trevor Young lists eight things senior executives can be doing right now to generate content and humanise their brands for 2013. He discusses the importance of growing relationships and trust over time as opposed to winning clients from a one-off YouTube sensation or overnight increase in Facebook fans. BrandMatters would also add the following three pieces of advice:

1)      The most important thing is to get started with small, consistent steps.

2)      Lead nurturing through thought leadership is a slow burn: you’ll build relationships and trust over time but you’ll simultaneously be nurturing a long-term sales pipeline and building tangible and valuable piece of IP for your organisation.

3)      For the first six months pick the two channels you are most comfortable with and focus on building those channels well. For some people that might involve a blog and LinkedIn, others might be more comfortable with Twitter and Facebook. After six months you can consider adding a third channel, if you feel it will add value for your business.

4)      Identify the expert in your organisation and set them to work on the challenge.

According to marketing software company Marketo, nurtured leads ‘buy more, require less discounting, and have shorter sales cycles’ – and those are clients every business needs more of.

The survey by Right Management, a division of Manpower Group, highlights a significant financial risk for Australia business and demonstrates the need for companies engage with their employees and make sure they have a compelling Employee Value Proposition (EVP).

The high cost of employee disengagement

If an organisation is only as good as the people who work for it, what are the costs of a disengaged workforce? According to a Gallup study in 2008, the annual cost of employee disengagement to Australian businesses is between $33.5 and $42.1 billion. Disengaged employees are often unproductive and inefficient and are also far more likely to leave, and replacing them is expensive and impacts your bottom line.

Impacts on recruitment and retention

The Right Management survey discovered Australia is the fourth worst performing country in terms of attracting candidates and filling jobs. In Australia, where we have such a shortage of skilled labour, attracting and retaining staff is a key benefit of a developing an effective EVP for your company.

Engaged employees become your brand ambassadors and play an important role in portraying your company as an employer of choice and somewhere people will want to work. They are also far less likely to leave than disengaged employees. In fact, the same survey found engaged employees have a 44% retention rate compared to disengaged employees.

The benefits of an engaged workforce

An engaged employee feels positively connected to their job and passionate about their contribution to your company. Engaged employees are more collaborative and have a more innovative approach to their jobs.  When your employees are engaged they will go the extra mile to deliver improved product quality or customer service with benefits for your business’ productivity and profitability.

There’s also a strong connection between employee engagement and customer advocacy. Red Balloon is a company that consistently appears on the BRW Top 50 Places to Work list and in 2012 appeared at number 17. General Manager of Corporate Matt Geraghty describes Red Balloon as the home of ‘committed and happy employees willing to shout about their employer’.

Your employees have a direct impact on the image of your brand in your customers’ eyes and an enthusiastic, engaged employee will create a positive customer experience. Employee branding is about your employees being your best brand champions.

EVPs: The cornerstone of an engaged workforce

Your employees are simultaneously one of your most important stakeholder groups, and the custodians of your brand, responsible for delivering your brand to your customers and making it genuine and believable.

An effective EVP is the cornerstone of any engagement strategy – it gives your team a ‘reason to believe’. It helps your employees understand who you are, where you are going, and what role they play in the future of your organisation. A well-articulated EVP will help you both attract and then retain employees who are a good cultural match for your organisation.

From disengaged to engaged

Employee engagement is more than simply job satisfaction, employee motivation or company culture. It is about your employees feeling positively connected to their jobs and passionate about their contribution to your company.  It’s about creating opportunities for growth and making sure your employees understand their value and where they fit in.

Determining what drives engagement is critical, and it can be different for difference sections of your team. For example, according to Right Management, Gen X males (aged 30 – 44) are currently the most disengaged group in the workforce.

“Men in this age group are often supporting young families, so they may feel obliged to stay in a role that’s not right for them. Employers shouldn’t ignore the challenges facing this group, and ensure they provide support such as career development and flexible hours,” said Bridget Beattie, Regional General Manager, Right Management.

Once you understand how to motivate them, you can work to set incentives and bring accountability to your team. How? By defining behaviours relevant to your brand values and connecting them with factors that motivate your employees. The ‘sweet spot’ for employee engagement is where the personal and career goals and motivations of your employees collide with the strategic goals and objectives of your organisation.

The team at Diageo Australia manufactures  Johnnie Walker, Baileys and Bundaberg Rum among others. It maximizes staff engagement through opportunities to work overseas, extra leave each year and paid maternity and paternity leave – although the in-house bar open Wednesday, Thursday and Friday nights also helps. Diageo are also regulars on the BRW 50 Top Employers list.

Education plays an important role in improving employee engagement. Employees need the education, tools and resources to both embrace your brand and deliver on your brand promise.

When recruiting, over time an effective and clearly articulated EVP will become self-fulfilling. It will combine with your employment strategy and attract employees who already exhibit your brand values and behaviours and are seeking employment with you because they actively want to engage with your brand.

Can you afford not to engage?

Despite all the evidence, in the current business climate many organisations are focusing on increasing productivity and efficiency but neglecting employee engagement – something that actually delivers the competitive advantage they’re aiming for. By clearly defining your organisation’s EVP and actively engaging with your workforce you can retain your best employees and continue to attract strong talent.

Downer won the award for the Waratah Train Project – the design, manufacture, test and commissioning of 626 double deck stainless steel passengers cars for RailCorp.

BrandMatters worked with Downer on their award submission and the development of a video to provide a visual overview of the project and further strengthen the submission.

You can read more about Downer’s winning project in the Newcastle Herald.

At a time when most marketers are funnelling budgets into online advertising and social media, Swisse Vitamins is bucking the trend and returning to one-way communication directed at consumers. The Australian-owned company is spending up big on mainstream prime time television and print media advertising.

You would be hard pushed to miss the recent proliferation of Swisse television commercials. They feature a host of high-profile sporting and media celebrities including Ricky Ponting, Cadel Evans, Marcia Hines, Sonia Kruger, Dr Chris Brown and Mark Webber.

As the broadcast sponsor of Channel 9’s Olympic Games coverage, Swisse was also the “Choice of the Australian Olympic Team” and is the “Official Vitamin of the AFL”. Other sponsorships include lifestyle and news programs such as The Block, Young Talent Time, The Voice and Channel 7 News plus a range of sports sponsorships that include Australia’s Paralympic Team, the Qantas Wallabies, Swimming Australia and the Victorian Institute of Sport. Swisse has shaken up the relatively boring vitamins and dietary supplements category and the bold move is seems to be paying off at the moment. The company reported a 131 per cent rise in net profits to $8.9 million for the 2011 financial year. Swisse now has products ranked in the top ten selling lines in various supplement segments.

With Australian consumers’ health and wellness concerns driving this fast-growing category, it’s not surprising to see other supplement brands are racing to mimic the success of the Swisse approach.

Bioglan is now sponsoring brand ambassadors Jennifer Hawkins and Sophie Falkiner and has started a program of mainstream, prime time television advertising for some of its flagship products. Likewise, Nature’s Way has jumped on the bandwagon, securing Antonia Kidman, Michelle Bridges and Shannan Ponton as its spokespeople. Not to be outdone, Nature’s Own also has a new television campaign airing in prime slots – “What does your body want?”.

But is there a risk in using celebrities to endorse your brand? Celebrity endorsement of brands only works when the endorser is relevant, credible and performs in line with the brand’s aspirations.

Swisse has already been challenged on this point. The company sponsored 2011 Tour de France winner, Cadel Evans, who withdrew from the Olympics due to fatigue. He clearly does not fit the Swisse tagline “You’ll feel better on Swisse”. And there’s been plenty of social media comments about the [lack of] performance of our Olympic team despite taking Swisse vitamins.

There are many other examples where celebrity sponsorships have been quickly withdrawn in order to protect a brand. Grant Hackett’s drunken rampage last year meant his major sponsor, Uncle Tobys, had to quickly review their relationship with the swimmer despite sponsoring him since before the Sydney Olympics in 2000. And Hackett’s ambassador role for the Alannah and Madeline Foundation – an anti-violence charity – has since been withdrawn.

Jaguar terminated its sponsorship of swimmer Stephanie Rice after her gay slur on Twitter while a host of companies including AT&T, Accenture, Gatorade and Tag Heuer dumped Tiger Woods in the wake of the golf star’s sex scandal in 2009.

Swisse may be reaping benefits from its marketing approach right now but its message has to resonate with its customers – and that will only happen as long as its celebrities continue to perform.

UPDATE 28 August 2012: According to B&T Swisse attracted the highest recall rate of all Olympic advertisers demonstrating that, in the short term at least, the celebrity mass marketing approach is successfully driving heightened awareness of their brand.

The Sage Business Index 2012 was launched in May 2012 at a media briefing. The report is based on a comprehensive market research study involving over 500 business owners and decision makers across all business sizes and industries in Australia. The Sage Business index is a demonstration of the Sage brand positioning: “living breathing business”. It paints a picture of business sentiment, challenges and priorities, enabling Sage to truly understand its customers.

Click here to download the Sage Business Index 2012.

To compare with last year, click here to download the Sage SME Business Sentiment Index 2011.

The Sage Business Index forms part of an integrated marketing communications campaign running from March through to October 2012. It combines TV, print and online advertising with a microsite and extensive PR. The campaign has two objectives – to build Sage brand awareness and to embed and strengthen the brand positioning. Prospects are driven online to a campaign landing page, where they can engage in multiple ways with the brand. They can view the specially created 90 second corporate video, use the Business Advantage Calculator to report on the performance of their current software, read case studies and articles, download the Sage Business Index and click through to more information about their specific software needs – Payroll & HR, CRM, ERP and Accounting Practice software.

Click here to view the Sage integrated campaign microsite.

What will this mean for Australia’s premier airline? And from our point of view, its brand?

Qantas, perhaps more than most national airlines, plays a strong role in the national ethos. Qantas- reputation for reliability, friendliness and of course safety has made their brand alone be valued by some at 1.1billion dollars. It is a brand that has a unique role to play in the Australian psyche, a brand we exclusively call “our own” and one that has no local competition for our loyalties, unlike say Holden and Ford, which are both (of course) of US origin.

This is not the only risk Qantas has faced in recent years. In 2006, almost half the business was sold to an overseas group. While there was concern that jobs and profits were going overseas, there was actually no drop in the quality of service. No passengers were affected. In 2009, an engine exploded, impacting on Qantas’ impeccable safety record. While concern was raised, the blame was pointed at an engineers’ fault, and Qantas was able to pick up the pieces and continue their service quickly. Nonetheless both incidents began a big withdrawal from the brand equity “trustbank” built from its earliest days as the Queensland And Northern Territory Air Service.

So what’s different with this dispute? The difference here is that with tens of thousands of travellers halted, this current crisis impacts directly on Qantas’ customers. Claimed in media reports to be more than 70,000 of them worldwide. This is a much more dramatic and significant withdrawal from the brand equity “trustbank”. Their stories were told to their relatives and friends, and their frustration was shared across Twitter, Facebook and the media. Getting through this turbulence will be much harder for Qantas to explain, and they will find it more difficult to regain the confidence of consumers some of whom have vowed never to fly Qantas again…

Whichever side you take, this is not going to be easy…Qantas has been fighting the competing challenge of managing and controlling its business and minimising the risk on its brand. They have used a strategy of placing blame at the unions’ feet, and the decision to ground the fleet was clearly made by Joyce in an attempt to deflect anger away from the Qantas brand. This has helped mitigated anger to some extent.

They have also apologised in national press and given away free flight tickets. But it will take more than this to restore the faith of their customers and the equity in their brand trustbank.

Traditionally most credit unions have underpinned their proposition around being for their community and for their members. They may never have received exclusive patronage by their members, but we wondered why their traditional value proposition drivers such as lower cost, personal service, member focus  and community contribution did not have the same relevance as they once did.

We believe there are a number of key challenges facing credit unions

Market Uncertainty

Credit unions are seen or perceived as less safe than traditional banks and institutions (this despite their regulation by APRA). Their perceived individual size didn’t sum to a re-assuring stature that had people believe they were as secure as the big banks. The GFC and weakening share markets are associated factors; giving rise to motivations for depositors around preservation of funds above all else.

Increased Competition

New competitors, including mutual and community banks have also entered the picture. More traditional competitors (eg Ubank, Rabo, ING Direct) are competing fiercely for deposits. Additionally the governments’ guaranteed preservation of those significant deposits with the Big 4 is encouraging all depositors that the only truly safe home for deposits is the Big 4. Clearly this isn’t helping.

Consolidation

The benefits of membership have become blurred and post GFC there is significant consolidation and confusion in the entire sector. A number of credit unions made some poor investment decisions during the GFC, as they sought higher returns on members deposits. Post the GFC many of these have been severely impacted resulting in a large numbers of mergers to ensure survival. Word of mouth in these situations spreads like wildfire, fueling concerns related to the risk of placing deposits with credit unions.

Changing Consumer Drivers

Consumer choice drivers are rapidly changing and credit unions are sometimes struggling to respond. Examples here include perceptions around absolute security of deposits (mentioned above), competitive products, competitive pricing, flexibility given their limited locations and best in class internet transacting – compared to the banks.

So what can credit unions do?

The picture isn’t entirely bleak. They have a good story to tell – around safety, security and regulation, personalized focus around servicing members,  as opposed to being focused on profiteering and shareholder returns. But they need more in a positioning sense. They need to raise their profile as an industry as well and strongly push their defining characteristics. As part of  Abacus (Australian Mutuals is the industry body for the Australian mutual financial services sector, a strong alliance of 8 mutual building societies, 94 credit unions, 2 mutual banks and 15 friendly societies), they would benefit from collectively building a stronger united voice. The Superannuation Industry Funds are a classic example here. They have successfully stopped their infighting, got on the same page, and promoted themselves and the investor benefits of their proposition very well. And they’ve done it in a way that positions them quite distinctively, with a focus on how their members clearly benefit. In short, pointed the guns outwards in a very unified and effective way at the common enemy – the (for profit) managed funds industry.

So the Credit Union industry needs to establish greater credibility by being clearer on their collective proposition and brand. They need to move beyond the “we’re for members, not profit” positioning and expand and dimensionalise their offer beyond that. Why? Because it simply isn’t compelling enough to have consumers move beyond their inertia which has them remain with the big 4. In short moving consumers to a point where you don’t just change my attitude, but rather my behavior. They need to get on the front foot and understand the needs, wants, requirements, and expectations of their desired clients and distil a positioning that is relevant to their target audience (which needs more clearly defining); that is credible and build from their key strengths; is sustainable and future proof (as we want to layer and build upon it over time) and differentiating relative to the big four banks as well as other mutuals.

In summary, credit unions will need to establish and prove how they are relevant in today’s consumerist world. A well defined point of differentiation – going back to their roots, finding the stories from the past that resonate loudly today, and connecting that to current needs and trends could establish a strong and unique positioning and identity that re-establishes their relevancy (with a younger generation) and ensures they are around for years to come.

And needless to say, it’s a decision the company will probably live with for its entire duration. It will be one of the most essential elements of the company’s identity, appearing on business cards, letterhead, website, promotional materials, products, and pretty much everywhere in print and multimedia wherever your company’s and it’s services or products are mentioned.

Many businesses fall into the trap of creating a name using descriptive words. Usually these names are effective in describing what they do, but don’t act as the distinguishing start point on which to build their own brand story. In any market category, the first company can get away with this. Hence your General Motors or General Electric. But once there’s competition in that space, differentiation s quickly needed. Particularly now when online media places us all in a global context, it’s vital to carve out your niche and find a unique identity.

Indeed insightful naming is tough!

But if a business can internally find a name that desires their intent, and summarises their story and what makes them different, that’s a huge and cost effective achievement. If you need to bring in the heavies then we have a raft of resources that can aid the naming process.

A Few Tips When Naming

Look to differentiate and distinguish – rather than describe
The easiest and most obvious thing to do is describe your company in your name. Avoid the temptation and push the boundaries. You need to future proof your name so it describes your uniqueness as a brand, and begins to reveal your brand story.

It’s about strategy, not personal preferences
Naming is such an emotionally charged decision – any parent will agree. In business it’s no different, except that business naming decisions are fraught with politics, turf issues, position power and individual preferences. Stick to the strategy and do not allow the lowest common denominator solution.

Watch out for the obvious and the comfortable
The most successful names over the long-term are often those that are initially the most controversial (think Google, Yahoo!, and Ikea). When you select a name, you are looking for something to punch through the marketplace clutter, not add to it. Overtly literal meanings can sometimes limit growth and show a lack of company creativity.

Keep it brief
One word brands are most effective. Lengthy, multiple word names lead to truncation. When people abbreviate your name, you lose control over your brand.

Company or Corporate brands belong in the Boardroom
Names are too important to be (just) left to marketing. But at the earliest stages brand names are very fragile and the naming is a highly emotional and political decision. So engage the most senior personnel from the outset, keep them engaged and build a strong rationale for your shortlisted set and have a clear recommendation.

Avoid long names that will frequently be shortened to acronyms
Simply consider the Australian financial services industry. The long names in the industry have become AMP, MLC, QBE etc. Short (real or invented) words are many times easier for consumers to remember.

Employee contests struggle
While they are often well-meaning, they frequently do not result in names that are based on the appropriate strategic rationale. They tend to be very typical, familiar, unmemorable and unavailable – particularly the URL.

Manage confidentiality
It is very difficult to keep a new name a secret, but nonetheless critically important. At the beginning of the naming process, prepare your press release and press kit in the event of a leak. And lock down your legals, trademark and URL’s early and in confidence.

Don’t expect unanimous agreement
In the first few weeks following introduction, there is often a lot of discussion and publicity about a new name. Not everyone will love it, but familiarity breeds content. As people become more familiar with the name, they will become more comfortable with it.

Final Suggestion

Until you have arrived at your new name, we recommend using a placeholder name like New Co. After legal clearances have been made, do a global search and then replace – once and only once. When you’ve cracked the naming, the next stage is logo development and creation of a look and feel, a corporate profile, power point templates et al as necessary.

How much of Apple’s immense brand equity resides with Steve Jobs? What risks does the brand face now that Jobs has left on another medical leave? When a business has a major brand that is intertwined with a single person its fortunes can rise and fall with that person. So what can Apple do?

Institutionalise Steve Jobs’ Legacy

Look at Coco Chanel. She has been dead for decades, but the brand she embodied has become an international icon and her spirit infuses Chanel. Calvin Klein is currently trying to make this transformation within his own company while his still alive.

Find a successor

Apple has instated Steve Cooks as new CEO, and while he will be filling massive shoes, it’s possible to find a strong and charismatic CEO who can carry Jobs’ spirit and leadership style into a new era for Apple.

Diversify

Build on Steve Jobs’ personal legacy by building additional attributes into Apple. Bring into the picture the immense wealth of talent and innovative thinking within Apple’s team. Celebrate the new Apple University.

Jobs’ departure is a major loss for Apple. However he’s leaving the company while Apple is at a peak. It has untold billions in cash, great products in the pipeline for the next few years, thousands of designers and engineers who learned from the best, dominating leadership in the most important consumer technology area, and a growing reach into enterprise.

How do you create a brand story?

Brands are involved in people’s lives in many shapes and forms. They are popularly perceived as being about products and services. But a brand is not so much the actual product or story per se, but the result that it creates in a person’s life. What people are really interested in are the outcomes that effect them, and that’s where the brand story can start.

Take the CEO of one of one of the world’s most iconic brands – Harley Davidson. He has said that while they technically sell motorcycles, what they really deal in is experiences. They sell the experience of taking people out of their ordinary lives: what they are really trading is the hour a week that an accountant might take to live out a different dream.

Having a brand story is not just for the iconic brands such as Harley Davidson. All brands can have a story.

Where Do You Tell Your Story?

A business’ brand story should be used across all it’s platforms: the website, blog, social media, direct marketing, PR releases and so on. A seeding strategy can be conducted to find “tribes” to whom your story is relevant. A community to whom your brand story is relevant will be open to you when the message you are communicating is done so honestly and openly.

Some basic approaches to brand story

1. Use a simple context
Don’t get overly complex – too many moving parts throw people

2. Be authentic. People like the genuine
Don’t be contrived.

3. Create content relevant to your customer base
Stay on-brand, don’t chase after what’s merely popular.

4. Think long tail content
Be in it for the long haul.

5. Employ people who live and breath the brand story
Your employees are your brand. More about employee branding here

Building a brand has never been more challenging.

Who Owns Your Brand?

The golden era of advertising was defined by one-way communication directed at consumers. However this is far from the case today, and top-down marketing has been forced to make way for networked brand building, characterized by multiple channels and influencers, with the brand “owner” not necessarily the brand’s only voice.

Adjusting To The New Landscape

Positioning has always been about differentiation. But in this unfolding environment, differentiation can be very short-lived. What really matters over the long term is maintaining relevance to a vast number of different stakeholder groups – from current and future target customers to channel partners to traditional and online media. What is relevant to one won’t be relevant to all.

In today’s complex new ecosystem, how a brand is positioned to a variety of distinct audiences is a critical concern.

Responding to the Challenge

Five unique shifts are needed to complete the transformation towards a vision-based brand positioning.

1. From creating marketing strategies to driving business impact.

2. From controlling the message to galvanizing your network.

3. From incremental improvements to pervasive innovation.

4. From managing marketing investments to inspiring marketing excellence.

5. From an operational focus to relentless customer focus.

Adjusting to the new landscape requires leadership that will guide the business from a tactical orientation to one that is visionary in scope.

Chevy used those billboards at the Woodward Dream Cruise – a temporary classic car show in Detroit.

In these depictions, GM are energising their brand as a heritage icon, and nostalgia for a carefree youth. GM owners are appealing to their core audience, reminding them GM represents something cool. The ads also embrace their audience with a self-conscious irony, reminding them that they too are cool for choosing and loving GM.

These demonstrate that GM has plenty of power to appeal to it’s mainstay audience, while also speaking to younger audiences who also resonate with the American heritage GM is presenting as their own. Think how the Gen X’s and Y’s loved the movie Grand Turino. They also evidence a period when American motor vehicle design stood out and was at its absolute best.

The world’s strongest brands build an emotional connection with their customers – both prior and future. Anyone who ever owned one of these cars would have a very warm glow. The extent to which they would move prospects to the Showroom for a 2011 Chevy is an entirely different question. But creating relevance and an emotional connection with a new sector and drawing from the past is not a bad start.

Scope of the Brand Damage

The reputational damage to News Corp has been immense. Their market cap is down $9billion, and $1billion has been lost from Murdoch’s personal wealth. It may impact the ambitions of News Corp, with the first victim being News’ planned multi-billion-dollar purchase of BSkyB.

Damaging News Corp’s Brand Ambitions

James Murdoch has immense ambitions for the News Corp brand. Last month he told a media conference that “The real issue [is that] we aren’t big enough”, in comparison with “monolithic brands like Google, Apple.” Over the next decade New Corp planned on operating “at a much bigger scale.” But this crisis is going to impact the expanding of News’ horizons. In the UK and US political and regulatory bodies, shareholders and the public will be holding Murdoch and News Corp up to far higher scrutiny. It still remains to be seen whether James as head of News Corp will secure larger markets, or oversee their decline.

Recovery For This Brand Damage?

It’s been a while since we’ve seen reputation damage on this scale. The last brand disaster of this scope was BP’s Deepwater Horizon oil spilllast year. News Corp have reacted quite differently from BP to this. BP never scrapped their brand. They removed executive staff, and are riding out the immense damage self-inflicted to their brand.

News Corp may find that folding News of the World does not make them more accountable to either the public, or – importantly for this global media juggernaut – to regulatory bodies. Without a clear brand to confront, contain and work through the fall out there will be no sense of an organisation made to be accountable. This could leave a bitter after taste amongst the public and regulators who will be slow to forgive.

The Sage SME Business Sentiment Index 2011 was launched this year at a media briefing, and is the first in a regular series. The report is based on a comprehensive market research study involving both qualitative and quantitative research and over 600 business owners, decision makers and business experts across all business sizes and industries in Australia. The SME index is a demonstration of the Sage brand promise – Sage lives and breathes SMEs’ businesses.

Click here to download the Sage SME Business Sentiment Index 2011

The SME Index forms part of a sophisticated, integrated Sage campaign which BrandMatters created and is currently implementing, combining traditional media (TV and print) and digital. The campaign has two objectives – to build the Sage brand profile and generate high-quality leads. Prospects are driven online to a micro-site, where they can engage in multiple ways with the brand. They can use the Business Advantage Calculator to report on the performance of their current software, sign up for a free software health check, read case studies and testimonials, and also download the Sage SME Business Sentiment Index.

Like to hear more about the Sage journey from a house of brands to a branded house and the integrated campaign? Join Paul Nelson, BrandMatters’ MD for a two-part webinar series in partnership with the Australian Marketing Institute.

Click here for more information on the webinar series

This is part one in a two-part series about Sage Software. The second webinar will be held on 20 October, 2011, and is titled “Integrating a Branded Communications Campaign Across Multiple Mediums and Different Business Divisions – with Defined Measurement & Accountability.”

Join Paul Nelson on July 21

Registration details here.

At the end of the day the decision really depends on the nature and size of the task and the future requirements of the business or marketing going forward.

Contractors

Strengths

• Accountability & transparency – fixed project stages, deliverables and timelines
• Speed, experience and specialist knowledge
• Flexibility – turn on and off more quickly
• Breadth of knowledge – from different categories/industries
• More timely and contemporary knowledge – eg digital trends, marketing measurement, lead generation and lead nurturing software
• Easier to have the tough conversations – a supplier, not employee
• Access to best in class tools/case studies and the entire firm for ideas, insights, suggestions
• Business based, less employee based recommendations
• goes to a broader understanding of costs and implications around ROI
• Responsiveness – capacity can be dialed up and dialed down
• Other aligned skills of the firm engaged – easily and seamlessly

Weaknesses

• Single point sensitivity – if the contractor doesn’t work out the entire process starts again
• Finding a person with the right balance of skills around strategic insight versus day to day implementation can be difficult
• Commitment – frequently contractors take two day a week opportunities whilst seeking a 5 day one…
• Employee mindset versus accountable mindset, often prevails
• Isolation
• marketing often benefits from cross flow and interrogation of ideas across marketers

Consultants

Strengths

• Accountability around fixed cost
• Seen as part of the team – more seamlessly able to become one later, if this is the intent
• Committed and organised
• in for two or more days a week
• Specialist, knowledge can be obtained based on individuals resume and specific experience Weaknesses
• Hourly cost
• Commercialism – proactive consultants are appropriately looking to grow fee revenue
• As with contractor, quality of the output is directly attributed to the quality of the consultant assigned from the firm

Is eftpos a Brand?

Eftpos is in a unique situation whereby they have market saturation for knowledge of their product – retail payment through electronic transfer – but low recognition of them as a brand. After all the name is simply an acronym of the functional characteristics of the product “Electronic Funds Transfer (at) Point Of Sale. Everyone thinks they know what eftpos is. But the problem for eftpos is that most consumers essentially understand eftpos as a technology rather than as a business or a brand. So what started as a piece of technology needs a brand to compete…for the first time in its 20 year history.

Market Beware

Why? Because the competition has arrived; branded competition from one of the biggest global brands in Financial Services: Visa. So now eftpos find themselves in a growing market space, and are conscious of the rising popularity of alternative forms of retail paying such as Visa, credit cards (with their incentivising points schemes), as well as the decline of other payment systems over the last decade (BankCard and cheques). Eftpos is suddenly in the world of “brand” and having to move from a payment technology gateway, to providing a compelling reason to stay with eftpos (tried, trusted and proven, rationally) and engage emotionally.

For eftpos this will involve a shift in the way the public views what eftpos is. Essentially they are trying to move eftpos from being just an electronic service, over to a living persona that has the potential to build loyalty and trust. And in time, this goodwill could be transferable to new financial products or services, given the consumers actual “relationship” with the brand.

eftpos’ Brand Awareness Campaign

Indeed the move to new services and usages seems to be part of eftpos’ brand awareness campaign. They are attempting to reposition themselves as the card of choice for smaller purchases. Eftpos processes around 5 million transactions daily, with about 20% of them under $20. One of eftpos’ goals is increasing the proportion of smaller transactions. 2012 is earmarked to see new services roll out – think contactless paying, and payments via smartphones.

However Eftpos appears to be in a catch up. Consider Visa’s recent advertising campaign around tap and go, for transactions under a $100. Easier and faster technology (no pesky PIN’s to remember) teamed with a global and trusted brand like Visa. Nonetheless eftpos has trust and huge awareness. Their challenge is bringing brand equity to a piece of check-out technology to lift them up to the brand status of other financial services such as Visa, American Express, Virgin, and PayPal. It will not be easy…

A recent paper by Chris Stutzman from Forrester entitled CMO Mandate: Adapt Or Perish the Five habits Of highly Adaptive Marketers looks at the landscape and lays out essence of the success behind those marketers who are winning in this new space:

1. They Roll with Change

What worked in yesterday’s marketing environment is no guarantee for success today. Marketers who are adaptive and take a more dynamic approach through experimenting with their team structure, emerging media channels, and new technology will be ready for left field change, and able to stay ahead of the pack.

2. They Challenge the Status Quo

Today’s environment calls for anything but sticking by “the way things have always been done.” Adaptive marketers question the status quo, acting as leaders of change in creating new brand experiences, and finding ways to use new technology to their advantage.

3. They Act Continuously

Marketers risk losing opportunities by getting overwhelmed by new options. Adaptive marketers prioritise speed and action when it comes to utilising new channels or creating new customer-facing initiatives.

4. They Engage Personally

The traditional marketers’ world was a top-down structure, whereby those at the top often became detached from the front lines of consumer traction. Marketers today need to get their hands dirty in new media and innovative marketing and lead their team by example into having a personal stake in shaping new brand experiences.

5. They Break the Silos

Siloing stifles creativity and collaboration. Organisational boundaries need to be redefined to motivate people to link up in different ways and share their knowledge. Good leaders will find ways to give them the tools to stay connected with each other.

CMO – The Organisation’s CEO Of Change

Chief Marketing Officers need to give clear direction to effect the changes required to stay ahead, and channel them for competitive advantage. They need to redefine their own role amongst the company’s leadership.

Become the CEO of Change

Marketers should become that voice in the company pushing innovation through the business. As the CMO role grows across new customer-facing initiatives, it will also expand to internally facing projects. CMOs should seek out a more prominent role in building brand internally, identifying brand heroes within the organisation, and building the bridges between marketing, sales, and service for total brand experience.

Build Bridges with CIO

CMOs need to develop a dynamic relationship with CIOs to bolster the usages of new technology. This can be done by having a chief marketing technologist in place to stay ahead in emerging technology, utilising learning labs where marketing and IT can experiment with new technology together, and by using new tech and social media tools that are gaining traction with consumers.

End point

The agenda for the adaptive brand marketers is immense: developing an agile approach where marketers quickly response to their environment, constantly aligning consumer and brand goals to maximise the return on brand equity.

But those days are over, and without clear and consistent branding confusion spells death. Channel Ten’s many woes are all part and parcel of this issue, and it all massively impacts the bottom line: Channel Ten is currently the least profitable network.

Confused Management

The confusion begins with Ten’s board and management. James Packer bought up 18% of shares last year, and then sold half of that to Lachlan Murdoch. Gina Reinhart, WA’s mining billionaire took out another 10% of shares and joined the board. This has been widely seen as a move to buy media influence. Packer and Murdoch have wrought large scale management turbulence. Chairman Nick Falloon and CEO Grant Blackley were both shown the door. Soon after, Murdoch pinched advertising boss James Warburton from Seven as Ten’s CEO, sparking legal action from Seven, while Pack quit from the board. None of this is smooth sailing, and it doesn’t exactly inspire confidence in the organisation.

Branding and Programming

The confusion is also manifest with the network’s programming strategy. First off, Ten has junked their traditional youth orientation. The Simpsons have gone (as has Neighbours) to make way for more news shows. George Negus’ show has been brought up to the 6.30pm slot where it will compete with Nine’s A Current Affair. Negus’ focus on international stories and his un-youthful appearance will not square well with what many have associated with Ten and this timeslot specifically. Andrew Bolt has been given a half hour Sunday morning slot. Bolt is an old school conservative, and the issues he will deal with are well outside the interest of Tens’ traditional youth heartland. While many people listen to the AM radio jocks such as Alan Jones, these kind of abrasive talk shows never translate well to a TV format.

Ten’s programming and management issues don’t end with the incoherence around news and youth audiences. The blockbuster MasterChef franchise returns after Easter. While it’s been a cash cow for Ten, apparently this year MasterChef have made a deal that will deliver a bulk of money straight to them and not to Ten, so that Ten will get ratings but little profit.

Lost Brand

Channel Ten has lost its way as the brand for people aged 18-39. They have spent decades developing an identity as the channel for the under 40s and then suddenly last year they tried to broaden their appeal to include, well everyone. In effect they have clearly lost appeal, and confused audiences and advertisers. Murdoch is trying to bring some kind of coherence to bear on Ten’s identity, whilst lowering costs and driving revenue. By focussing on Ten’s core identity and building a programming strategy and management from that he may well steer Ten back to its former high ground.

Nokia have commented on their blog:

“It’s a new brand image that’s simpler, fresher and stronger than before… the letters flow into each other somewhat, creating the impression of forward movement.”

 

New Nokia Tag Line

The primary tag line for the company now is “Nokia Pure”. It is expected that the new font will be followed by a new logo as well, with the eventual adoption of both into all future Nokia products and user interfaces.

Branding and Fonts

The right type face, designed to perfectly capture the personality of the business, is an essential element of a coherent branding strategy. Font designer Maag said, “It was a balancing act. An elegantly simple typeface that doesn’t draw attention to itself, but is still distinctive and different. For me, it’s the rhythm of the typeface and the relationship between characters that’s critical. After all, when it’s set in Arabic, you still need to know that it’s Nokia, and this is achieved by creating a recognisable rhythm.”

Nokia’s Much Needed Brand Overhaul

The new font is part of a brand overhaul that Nokia is desperate to usher in. Nokia was the leader of the pack in mobile phone brands before the iPhone, and the smart phone as a category sent them to the back of the classroom. Nokia is now, under the leadership of CEO Stephen Elop leaving behind their operating systems Symbian and MeeGo to partner with Microsoft and use Windows Phone 7. Nokia is seeking to develop a device and operating system that will compete with Android, iPhone and Blackberry.

The new font face is meant to express this new ambition. But whether it goes far enough is questionable.

Welcome to the price wars.

Discounts to branded products are often met initially by consumers with glee, seeing products brought closer to their reach. However this can wreck damage to a brand. Over time if such discounts are continued they tend to dangerously erode the cachet of a brand, and this can lead to a gradual but often irreversible loss of brand power.

The price wars thus far have been around house brand commodities such as milk. These put pressure on processors and then back to farmers. In this case, however pricing wars are putting pressure on brands that companies like Fosters have spent billions of dollars building and protecting. The issue at stake here is protecting Brand Equity.

Fosters vs Loss Leaders

Fosters and other alcohol beverage producers have recently launched into overdrive to stop key retailers (including Coles) from using their products as loss leaders. Fosters have now refused to sell their merchandise to retailers who loss lead with their products, and have gone on raids to Coles to buy back their products.

John Pollaers (managing director at Carlton & Untied Breweries) last month withheld supplying getwines.direct.com.au for selling their beer below cost. Chris Flaherty, wine marketing chief, noticed Coles advertising Penfold 389 (baby grange) at less than $37 per bottle. He sent staff to buy as much of it from Coles shelves as possible. He ended up purchasing 10% of its annual allocation (around 1000 cases). The Fosters cellars are now packed to the brim with products that would normally be in consumers’ hands and fridges. They will have to decide when to let these back onto the market, and how to further protect their brand from a slide downwards.

Legal Action

Another tactic has been to flex legal muscle by recourse to the Consumer and Competition Act which gives scope to producers to stop supplies to protect their brands. Competition laws rule out price maintenance whereby a producer dictates retail prices. However the Consumer and Competitions laws do allow producers to withhold their products if goods are being advertised and sold below cost. This has been the exemption argued to defend resale price maintenance cases. The aim here is to prevent brands being treated as cheap and discounted goods that ultimately have deleterious effect on profits and leverage.

Value, Price and Competition

Central to to the way a brand is perceived by consumers is the matter value vs competition. Value can be understood as the relationship between quality and price. However prices are easier to change and tamper with than quality. Quality is a judgement made within the context of the experiences and predispositions of consumers; consumer commitment ranges from unshakable through to flimsy. For an established brand, discounting can have a severely adverse effect on value.

Value and price exist somewhat inter-dependently in consumers minds. Deep discounts can indicate to consumers that something is wrong with the product. And frequent discounting acts to lower brand value through a subconscious reaction by consumers who believe quality (as well as the associated cachet) has also been lowered. What happens then is that the brand is bought on only through discounts and deals.

Discounting Can Affect Entire Categories

Such discounting can effect not only single brands, but entire categories. People rarely expect to pay premium prices in categories such as tires, mattresses or bottled water. Constant discounting on these products has resulted in categories where consumers expect to be offered discounts no matter which brand they desire.

In the current environment, consumers have access to more retail information than they have ever had thanks to the internet, and the rise of discount aggregation services such as GroupOn. Today brands need to be particularly sensitive about when and how they offer discounts, as well as the way retailers and other onsellers present and price their goods and services.

The Bank of Melbourne was purchased by Westapc in 1997 and closed in 2004 amidst public anger that a community bank had been swallowed by a major bank.
Bank of Melbourne – A Community Bank Brand

From a branding perspective, Westpac’s revival of a community banking brand makes good sense. The move comes at a good time, with people feeling alienated by large national banks, who are seen as anonymous and removed from the communities they serve.

Westpac’s challenge will be convincing customers that the rebirth of the Bank of Melbourne – a somewhat untainted brand – is not just a marketing strategy but will genuinely provide better service. There needs to be an authentic alignment between Westapc and the Bank of Melbourne brand. Rather than just bring back an old logo, they will need to credibly demonstrate they are committed to running a bank committed to their customers. The bank has to be a genuine approach in helping people and communities, and not just serve as anther revenue stream for Westpac. If they can build on the Bank Of Melbourne brand this way they stand to gain much from the current climate of distrust and alienation.
The Competitive Environment

In some ways the bank can build on the opportunities that lie on different sides of their competitive environment. They can establish themselves as an alternative to the big banks, whilst competing against more localised banks such Bendigo and Adelaide Bank.

So far Westpac has not clearly indicated where Bank of Melbourne will be priced. Analysts are expecting to be situated somewhere between the premium Westpac brand and above RAMS (home loans).

Westpac’s revival of the Bank of Melbourne brand sends a clear message. Consumer’s desire for a locally based bank, close to the community it serves will be met. Success now depends on people’s willingness to changes banks for it.

In this context I want to look at the the upward trend of CEOs dressing down, and the brand messages that conveys.

The dress of any member of a company will convey something about the brand that they embody, whether it’s ‘on brand’ or ‘off brand.’ But the outward appearance of a CEO conveys a particularly strong message about that businesses brand. Many of the CEOs wearing non-descript clothing are broadcasting strong branding messages about their company.

On a recent tour of Chrysler’s assembly plant, Fiat CEO Sergio Marchionne wore a black sweater and a checked oxford shirt. He was spotted later that week in the exact same outfit at the North American International Auto Show in Detroit. That Saturday night at a prize award function, he was again sporting the same outfit.

Commenting on Marchionne’s dress sense, Cristiano Carlutti (previous head of Fiat’s used cars division) said, “the message he wanted to pass is [that by] not wearing a tie, not wearing a suit, means we are more flexible and what really matters is not the uniform but something else.”

Marchionne is successfully projecting Fiat as a lean, reliable company that can quickly turn around new products. He has said that he is trying to have the company benchmarked against brands like Apple. In this case informality (and associations of accessibility, conversation with their audience, and honesty) is a large part of that. Before Marchionne joined the board, Fiat was a very formal company, and Marchionne has been determined to break this formality, by dressing casually as well as with a new approach to office culture, such as replacing solid office doors with glass.

Marchionne isn’t the only high profile CEO wearing the same bare bones outfit day in and day out.

Facebook’s CEO Mark Zuckerberg wears a hoodie and sneakers. His hoodie represents youthfulness, and ties in well with the social utility that is Facebook. Andrea Jung, chief executive of Avon Products likes to stick with sleeveless (usually red) sheaths and pearls. Steve Jobs of Apple famously wears his New Balance sneakers, Levi’s and black mock turtlenecks, while Oracle’s CEO Lawrence J. Ellison, feels comfortable 24/7 in a black mock turtleneck, frequently topped with a blazer.

Steve Jobs uses his non-descript clothing to push the emphasis away from individuality, and to promote the collective approach of Apple. His bare bones attire turns the spotlight away from him and back onto the product. Talking about the messages that Steve Jobs wanted to convey when retuning to Apple as CEO, former Apple marketing executive Steve Chazin said, “he didn’t want any individual to kind of overshadow the brand, and that includes him.”

These CEOs have all discovered the power of dressing down. Not just on casual Fridays, but throughout the entire week. In some quarters the bare bones personal uniform is the new power suit.

We always knew the CEO was essentially the summmarised embodiment of an organisation’s brand. Perhaps however we didn’t realize the subtlety around the CEO simply modifying his/her dress code and the impact this can also have in conveying important elements of the brand. These messages have a strong impact not only in presenting the brand to external audiences – perhaps more importantly they also impact how the organisation is understood internally.

The Australian Government’s IP Department defines a trademark as

A trade mark can be a letter, number, word, phrase, sound, smell, shape, logo, picture, aspect of packaging or any combination of these.

It is used to distinguish goods and services of one trade from those of another. This means you can’t register a trade mark that directly describes your goods (e.g. radios) and services (e.g. electrician).

While it is difficult to register a geographic name or surname, someone who has used one extensively in the marketplace for a considerable period of time may be able to achieve registration.

But what constitutes a distinguishing mark isn’t always so cut and dry. Consider the ongoing trademark dispute between Australian wine company Casella Wines and US based The Wine Group. Casella own the export brand Yellow Tail, who use a wallaby as their logo on their wine labels, while The Wine Group use a kangaroo on their label Little Roo.

How Distinguishable are Kangaroos and Wallabys?

Casella argue that to US consumers, the difference between a wallaby and a kangaroo are nil. They’re just two interchangeable Australian marsupials. They accuse The Wine Group of “piggy backing” on their brand, launching with a label that is uncannily close to Little Roo.

Casella Wines managing director John Casella is quoted as saying, “There are probably three or four thousand Australian animals out there and they had to pick the kangaroo.”

On their side, The Wine Group are adamant that a wallaby and a kangaroo are entirely separate animals who’s usage won’t confuse north American consumers.
Casella argues that Casella is doing well in the US, and that having the brand equity they do is helping them compete with Little Roo. But he asserts that piggybacking won’t succeed for Little Roo in the long term. “You can build sales that way, but you cannot build brands.”

Brands Going International

Registering a trademark gives you exclusive legal right to use it (and license or sell) within the country for the goods and services for which it is registered. However this case highlights some of the issues that can be raised when brands enter international markets. Some brand names and logo marks are culturally specific, and don’t always translate as well in the context of other markets.

Focus on Brand Equity

While Australians may easily differentiate between a kangaroo and a wallaby, American consumers may not be able to. These problems are not always easily anticipated, so the best advice here is to undertake exhaustive international research into logos, trademarks, and brand names on an international scale from the outset. But perhaps more importantly, focus on your brand equity. While distinguishing animals may be challenging, an instantly recognisable brand name will be easily recognised in a crowded market, and will have the strength to ride out rough moments – even if a change of logo mark is required.

• Philips Dynalite We’ve completed the transition from the Dynalite brand following their acquisition by Philips and continue to assist across all elements of their global marketing mix including marketing collateral, digital micro sites and advertising.
• NabInvest This year we’ve completed the re-branding and advertised launch of Lodestar Capital Partners. We’ve also continued to work on the Antares brand (which we created back in 2006) and completed the re-branding of Cambridge Industrial Trust in Singapore.
• We enjoy our fourth year of assisting Sage Software Australia and its operating companies. Highlights from the last 12 months include the management and oversight of a multimedia advertising campaign reflecting their brand positioning.
• We’ve again assisted IFSA (investment and Financial Services Association) through our recommended name change to Financial Services Council, which reflects their renewed and broadened aspiration.
• Tasman Belting Our previous business transformation, channel and brand work commenced last year is about to be reflected in an entirely new corporate identity, aspiration, Corporate Profile and internal launch program.
• AMP/Hillross We’ve continued to assist Hillross in their expansion of financial planning services via brand partnerships with trusted Accounting practices.
• Genworth Financial This year we’ve created and designed a range of Brand Values posters, subsequently presented at a range of employee roadshows.

We’re also delighted to have established a number of new client projects this year:

• Charles Sturt University (CSU) Following extensive market research we are soon to reveal the outputs of a significant brand positioning project for CSU, Australia’s largest distance education university. It’s been a fascinating dive into a new and exciting industry sector which is undergoing fundamental change.
• Vero Insurance Having created this brand back in 2002, we’re delighted to be re-engaged on a brand and internal communications program for one the most important brands in Suncorp’s General Insurance portfolio.
• BT Investment Management Here we’ve completed brand positioning work for this division in the context of BT Financial Group.
• Aurora Projects specialises in planning for the delivery of health and aged care services. We’ve assisted in creating an exciting brand identity refresh, designed to be revealed early in the new year.
• ING We’ve completed an extensive review and subsequent series of confidential brand recommendations for a specialist division of this global Banking, Investment, Insurance and Real Estate group.
• Lloyds International Following their acquisition of the HBOS Group, we’re assisting in the organisation and communication of their newly formed brand architecture.

Charles Sturt University (CSU) found itself in this position. CSU was a model regional university, yet its regional location often meant the broader role it performed was overlooked. Large-scale growth over the last two decades resulted in a confused set of overlapping identities, and inconsistent use of logos and visual styles exacerbated this confusion and eroded the brand.

BrandMatters was engaged to complete an entire re-brand for CSU. After extensive qualitative and quantitative research into the higher education sector, the brand, positioning and CSU’s unique role in the market were defined. BrandMatters then created a new logo, visual identity and key messaging to align with the brand positioning, and encapsulated all of this into a comprehensive set of brand guidelines. The new brand was launched in February 2011.

Paul Nelson, Managing Director of BrandMatters, recently wrote an article about this project, which was published in Campus Review Magazine.

Read the complete article here.

In a recent article, Buffett looked at the top Aussie stocks he would consider investing in. Each of his recommendations highlights the qualities and strength of that businesses brand. In the article, Buffett list his six key considerations when purchasing stock. Coming in at number #2 is the power of brand, specifically to leverage stand out identity in competitive markets. In his words, “While a monopoly would be great, they are rarely available, so a strongly branded business that can pass on higher costs to customers via price increases is desirable.”

Brands Translate to Good Returns

Warren Buffett has been referred to as a “brand investor.” Most of his investments are with highly regarded brand names – Coke, Wrigely, Gilette, Kraft Foods, Johnson and Johnson and others. Buffett’s understanding is that even though a strongly branded business may experience a range of degrees of success within their own portfolio, their qualities – backed by strong management and good marketing – will translate to consistent and above average returns over a long time period.

On his website, Warren Buffett continues to extol the importance of brand in considering which stocks are worthy of investment. Possessing a strong brand name gives businesses a “big advantage.” The first advantge is that the customer knows the name and the product or service that it represents. In the case of consumer products, distributors need to stock the product (a supermarket without Coke is a rare thing), and brand power allows the company to keep pace with inflation with price rises in a way that unbranded companies cannot.

Good Brands Are Stronger In The Market

Businesses with a strong brand presence can change more for their products and services than less established competitors, and their loyal customer base will help them weather storms with more ease. They will be able to leverage their name recognition to increase business, and their entrenchment in the market place will make it harder for new entrants to gain market share.

Robert Millen is chairman and portfolio manager of Jensen Investment Management, is another investor who places brand as a foremost consideration in his investment approach. He has recently said, “brands themselves are what one might call soft assets – they don’t actually show up in the balance sheet of a company’s financial statements, but the value of that brand is clearly in the business – and it takes years and years to build. Once you’ve built that strength and you continue to feed it and support it over time, then you get . . . pricing power that allows the business to maintain margins throughout varying economic periods. Secondly, you get repeat business. And those two things lead to consistent earnings.”

This approach to investment reinforces the financial and investable return gained from executing a powerful brand strategy.

Steve Jobs as Celebrity CEO

Steve Jobs is an exceptionally gifted and profiled CEO. With his signature black sweater, grey stubble and circular glasses, Steve Jobs embodies the celebrity CEO. He also embodies the Apple brand – sleek, intelligent, and well ahead of the curve. But how can a company that has become so accustomed to having such a high profile CEO at its helm survive when he cannot continue? Can Apple cope without Jobs?

Half of the world’s top 50 brands are over 50 years old, proving that prominent companies can maintain their success with their inspirational leader. As a matter of survival, companies must have the ability to lose staff – even highly senior staff – and continue. This is an operational issue as well as one of market confidence.

CEO Insurance

There is growing awareness that companies have to, as part of corporate responsibility, to protect their executives by way of insurance. Insurance companies have begun the tricky business of assessing the exact worth of executives to their business. Corporations are continuing a trend that began in the sporting world, where such insurance is commonplace. An injury that would end the career of an English Premier League striker with a transfer value of 50million sterling ($80.76m) would have devastating consequences on his club. The club would miss both goals, as well as the potential money to be received from trading him on. Companies that have god succession plans face hard questions about life after a celebrity CEO has moved on.

Does Virgin Need Richard Branson?

Richard Branson is one of the most recognisable CEOs today, and his personality and the Virgin brand are pretty much indistinguishable. Nevertheless, while Branson is still centre stage for Virgin advertising campaigns and new product line launches, in terms of daily operations he takes something of a back seat. He remains controlling shareholder and top publicist, but Virgin’s various businesses are run by sturdy professionals on the ground. They would more than likely be able to continue operating the Virgin Empire without a hitch in the event Branson retired or fell ill.

Separating Company Success From CEO Brand

Making a separation between a CEO that embodies its brand so deeply is never easy. On occasion other directors need to assert themselves to give the business more balance. Boards must ensure they are in control of a succession plan, rather than leaving it in the hands of the CEO to decide when they will retire. Some CEOs damage the company by overstaying their time.

Room for New Stars

Steve Jobs has made much forward planning, and even if he were never to return to Apple, their product line extends for another few years to come. Furthermore, Apple has a very strong management team which Jobs put in place. Apple has many other rising start, including Jonathan Ive, who is the company’s principal designer, and Tim Cook the Chief Operating Officer who will stand in for Jobs while he is away. As is the case with many other companies with CEO brands, there are other stars yet to shine.

The video was posted to YouTube last August and since then has been incredibly popular on motorcycle and BMW forum sites, altogether clocking up nearly 350,000 views.

The backstory of the video is an amazing story of how a brand can work its way across generations, interweaving itself in the emotional bonds of a family. Here it is as told by YouTube user 42bill:

“This is a photo story of my father’s 1958 BMW R50:

Boy meets girl, gets married, buys motorcycle. Rides it for 60,000 miles and has accident when wife is pregnant with 3rd child. (me) Wife orders motorcycle to be taken off road until all her children are grown and on their own. One day when bike is moved to a different storage location, son sits on bike and dreams of being a Jedi Master like his father. Couple grows old together and bike is not ridden for 40 years. Husband is now a grandfather of 7 and married for 50 years, when he dies of a stroke at age 71.

Son looks over the old rotting machine and finds note attached to it from his father to him. Son decides to restore the old 1958 BMW R-50 as a tribute to his father. With the help of many friends, especially Peter Nettesheim, world renowned BMW collector, bike is restored to look even better than it did when it was built in Germany.”

42bill – Dream Brand Champion

When a business knows and is able to effectively communicate its core values, it will then connect with your brand champions, internally and externally. Brand champions are internal and external story tellers who live the brand vision and values. Every organisation requires committed and passionate brand champions. The more employees that an organisation is able to nurture as brand champions, the better it will be able to grow and maintain strong brand equity. L’Oreal, Harley Davidson, Nike, Google and LEGO are some good examples of companies that have benefited greatly from having strong and dedicated brand champions as employees.

Can anyone show me a more moving, brand-championing piece of work anywhere than 42bill’s video? This guy even forked out $1,000 of his own money to secure the rights of the Pearl Jam song. This is the sort of passion and dedication that BMW has earned and is able to capitalise on.

He was anticipating a moment when people would bing an address, or bing a restaurant.

There was a time when companies like Microsoft would have gone to any length to stop people using their brand name in such a casual manner. Businesses loathed their brands becoming verbs because they feared the loss of their individual identity.

The Example of Xerox

A classic example is Xerox. Xerox has been adamant in urging consumers to photocopy documents rather than xerox them. Their concern was that if “to xerox something” became the default way of saying “to photocopy something” then the verb would define what Xerox’s company does, rather than who Xerox is. If this were to happen, the company’s differentiation in the market place would be lost amongst its competitors.

That is one reason why companies sought trademarks: by controlling their brand name, businesses wanted to prevent the moment when their brand name grew so popular that it defined all similar products. That would have led to genericide.

But things are seen differently today. Marketing experience has clearly shown it as a very good thing when people start “verbing up” with your name. The internet has speeded up the way reputations are made and destroyed. And it’s now seen as advantageous to get market share when you can and worry about the details later, when the brand name has entered the vernacular and possibly made the brand less distinctive. Having a brand name that is foremost in consumers minds, even at the possibility of genericide is a risk many businesses would be delighted to take.

Everybody’s “Tweeting”

While Bing would love to replace googleing with binging, a company on the other side of the momentum is Twitter. In recent years “to tweet” – sending a message on twitter – has become a verb, and Twitter moved to trademark the term in 2009.

Twitter treaded carefully here. They announced that the company would not seek legal injunctions against those using the term for third party Twitter-related services and applications. However, speaking in a manner typical for companies who are quickly verbing up, they warned that they would take action in the event of a “confusing or damaging project ” to protect both users and our brand.” It appears that Twitter is not worried about the term ‘tweet’ becoming too popular, rather they are trying to exert some control over what is a desirable company, product or service for them to be associated with. Ultimately controlling who can use the terms Twitter and Tweet will allow Twitter to confer a level of exclusivity to some. This control is sort of like one step down from a patent.

Staying in Control of Brand Verbing

Steps can be taken to allow and encourage the use of verbing, whilst preventing – to some extent – the risk of genericide. These include:

1. Make clear to consumers that the action suggested by the brandverb (eg “Googling”) cannot be made without using the branded product or service (eg Google).

2. Build the verbed brand into taglines, slogans, and/or logos to reinforce the above point (eg “Googling is Impossible Without Google”)

3. Register the form of the brand name being used as a brandverb.

4. Incorporating appropriate usage into brand guidelines.

Since December, news has been buzzing with a coalition of traditional retailers, led by Gerry Harvey (Harvey Norman), Solomon Lew and the heads of Myer and David Jones in their public campaign against online retail. They are focusing on the GST-free threshold for items under $1000 that provide overseas based retailers with a competitive advantage. They are also bringing out the emotional arguments that the use of online retail will result in lost Australian jobs.

The campaign has been successful in placing the matter at the top of the national agenda. However in doing so it has unwittingly brought an uncomfortable fact to the entire public: great value can be found online. Newspaper articles about this issue have printed price comparisons between shop and online products, which have proven rather embarrassing for local retail outlets.

Backlash

There is evidence that these high profile Australian brands are facing a public backlash as a result of this campaign. Many feel they are being asked to forgo significant bargains for businesses now paying the price for their inability or unwillingness to create their own online retail experiences. Furthermore consumers are used to being appealed to for value and competition, and in this context it is hard for many consumers to sympathise with retailers crying foul for having a formidable opponent.

Sob stories are not enough to keep customers away from online shopping. In retail, brand loyalty is not a given but needs to be constantly earned, particularly when concepts of value and good price are part of the brand identity. As one commentator was quoted by the Sydney Morning Herald, “When all of a sudden a Canon camera is available overseas 40 per cent cheaper, the loyalty may be maintained with the Canon-brand camera but it certainly won’t be maintained with the retail outlet.”

Missed Opportunities

At present Harvey Norman do not have online shopping on their website. David Jones only relaunched their online store last November. And online sales account for a tiny percent of Myer’s overall sales. These are companies that have failed to invest in globally competitive online presences. Yet they are now complaining about having lost ground to companies who have shown non-stop innovation and leadership in the online retail sector.

If these companies succeed in reducing the GST threshold for online sales, many Australian consumers will be quite incensed. It won’t stop consumers shopping overseas, but they will incur the wrath of consumers who will long remember that it was these brands who increased prices.

The biggest change is the removal of the actual Starbucks name. The ‘siren’ mark has now assumed full focus of the logo mark. Having a logo without a name speaks of brands that have reached a level of ubiquity that allows for mass identification of a brand’s prime identity mark. Other brands who are able to pull this off are the likes of Nike with their swoosh, Target with their bullseye, Apple’s apple, and McDonalds’ golden arches. It’s not inconceivable that within a few years Starbucks (at least in the US) will have brand recognition of that level. In any case all the examples cited above have logo usages which place their name within close range of the logo mark.

The new logo is impressive. It is a confident and authentic evolution from the logos the company has used since 1971. They have done a great job of simplification – from two colours to one; three stars to one; and four circles to one. The new cup design is part of a move to take Starbucks from a retail brand towards a lifestyle brand, and the new logo brings a level of sophistication that will help make that transition.

Starbucks have been experimenting outside a simple ‘coffee experince’ for several years now. They’ve had fingers in retail music and retail, and have been involved with wine bars and brewpubs. Starbucks have taken a commodity and through innovation, quality control, interior decorating turned it into an experience. This has gained them a very loyal following. That loyalty will see Starbucks followed as they take their brand into other markets. Removing the word “Coffee” from their logo may be the first sign of a serious push into new waters for the company.

With over 16,000 stores in 50 countries, this will be a roll out of mammoth proportions. All those hundreds of products and touchpoints (from paper cups, tissues, signage, receipts etc.) will need to be updated with the new look. The changes will be phased in over a year, and will likely be conducted at an appropriate moment in the production cycle of new promotions and packaging.

Is “brand” something tangible that can be measured at all?

Firstly, brands aren’t really things. A brand exists in the emotions, associations, and behaviour of the public. The awareness people have of a company is where the brand is at. How that prompts their behaviour through trial, purchase or repurchase is how brand is measured, and the reliability and effectiveness of these factors constitute brand value.

And in an era of social media, brand strength can be assessed in real time.

Many branding gurus and agencies have devised their own brand evaluation methodologies. A pitfall many of them fall into is viewing brands as static entities that can be measured through arcane formulas about ‘purchasing decisions,’ ‘future reliability’ and other abstract metrics.

Another approach is viewing brand value as going hand in hand with business value. Businesses that are good at what they do tend to have strong brands. Businesses that are ineffective tend to have weak brands. Brand strength and effectiveness should perhaps be measured, not by the sometimes abstract terms used by marketing and branding gurus, but directly linking them to business outcomes. Things such as:

Development

Stronger brands should have the ability to recognise the products their customers want, filling that demand faster and more regularly.

Efficiency

Superior brands should have the resources to makes things quicker and more economically than lesser known brand names.

Marketing

Brand awareness should result in a much lower marketing expenditure, as high brand awareness makes it easier and cheaper to communicate to the public.

Efficacy

Viral and direct marketing efforts should work better than those of the competition. The brand should serve as an umbrella to make tactical marketing more effective.

Premium

When a brand is strong, customers should be willing to pay more for the brand attributes they are acquiring, looking at more than just functional qualities. The weaker the brand, the more functional qualities will pay an exclusive role.

Sustainability

The rate of customers who’ve experienced product failure, corporate crime or another negative impact related to the brand will be far less than less known brands in the same business category.

Repeatability

Bigger brands should have larger, more frequent, and profitable rates of return business than for weaker ones.

Employees

The cost of attracting and keeping staff should be less for strong brands.

Risk

Great brands should have more secure supply chains, lowering insurance exposure and raising expectations for reliable business performance.

The bigger story is a decline in the GAP brand. GAP trailblazed a new approach to retail clothing in the 1990′s, building a well earned reputation for selling basics that were affordable, understated, well made and stylish. Their classic American style was worn to the Oscars, and referenced on Saturday Night Live. They achieved the gold medal for brand, becoming a household name.

But from a position of invincibility, cracks emerged. Their ground breaking approach became too formulaic and lacked their initial boldness. A move towards becoming super-hip in the early 2000′s confused and alienated long-standing customers. Then the push for volume, commenced with too many retail outlets opened. Meanwhile their three primary brands (Banana Republic, Gap, and Old Navy) failed to draw the same strength from the Gap brand they once did. This confusion at a brand portfolio level compounded matters and long -term debt mushroomed from $780 million to $2 billion in 2001. All this sent the business into reactive mode as they looked for new ways to invigorate Gap in their traditional and new markets. Something clearly needed to change, but what exactly?

But Brand is much more than logo…

Gap’s apparent lack of a coherent business and brand strategy appears to have led to them making a classic mistake. They looked for the easiest, most obvious lever to demonstrate change…they changed their logo.

Yes, their logo is their singularly most powerful branding device, and changing it sends a very strong signal of a new direction.

Mind The (credibility) Gap

But what is that direction? And from their customers point of view why have they changed their direction and where are they now heading? And were their opinions considered?

From a business perspective, how does the new logo reflect their new business direction and aspired brand positioning?…. These and many other strategic implications need to be considered in any logo change. And from their customers point of view remain… unanswered…

Their customers response to the new Gap….

The public reaction seems to have served as a reminder to the business about how passionately so many people feel about Gap and it’s logo. The companies hasty return of the blue box was a nod to this.

Gap president Marka Hansen said,

“Since we rolled out an updated version of our logo last week on our website, we’ve seen an outpouring of comments from customers and the online community in support of the iconic blue box logo.”

“Last week, we moved to address the feedback and began exploring how we could tap into all of the passion. Ultimately, we’ve learned just how much energy there is around our brand. All roads were leading us back to the blue box, so we’ve made the decision not to use the new logo on gap.com any further.”

Logo Basics

So Gap forgot some key logo development basics…

An effective logo needs to have immediate impact – attracting attention and providing effective identification. The original one did, the new one didn’t.

It must be effective without colour and be scalable and flexible across applications. Both achieved this, however the original is more powerful as a mono brand mark.

It should create or evoke a positive image. Time is a critical requirement here and the original evoked that image – the new one with its inherent blandness evoked almost no image

It needs to accurately reflect the organization and its positioning and aspiration. Again timing is critical here, as is heritage. The key question of the new logo is asked earlier in this blog – how is the new logo reflective of the aspired positioning?

It needs to be memorable, unique and timeless. The speed of Gap’s response in reverting to the original suggests (with hindsight) just how memorable, unique and timeless the current mark is.

Brand Strategy 101

Ultimately, Gap Forgot Some Key Business and Brand Strategy Basics

Gap forgot that their logo is the ultimate and most singular annunciation of their brand strategy and their positioning. Much too important to consider changing without this change being informed by a change in their brand and ultimately their business strategy.

They forgot that strong brands create and deliver a transfer of emotion not just a material exchange. They overlooked the importance of a brand living an authentic story and how authenticity is created by balancing customer relevance and brand continuity.

Gap forgot to consider their customer’s relationship with their brand. A relationship they were proud to display externally. They forgot their customers had their own stories to tell about Gap and the original mark. Gap forgot that the brand and logo had a past that mattered to their best customers. In summary…they forgot who truly owns the Gap brand…

Changes To Consumer Spending

The biggest change to consumer attitudes has been the GFC. And we’ve seen a transition from credit to debit card spending. The increase in interest rates has also contributed to this attitude change amounting to the highest proportion of household saving in 23 years.

The GFC has scared older workers away from retiring, and figures suggest they have a greater capacity to remain in the work force than their younger counterparts. While job security is far less for Gen Y and Gen X, it’s these demographics who prefer to spend rather than save. This doesn’t bode well for retailers.

Consumer spending alters dynamically alongside social changes – and we have seen much of that this year. With the explosion web connectivity, online shopping has taken off massively. This is impacting significantly on the retail sector, and while they’re beginning to attempt an insurgency it will be difficult to predict what the long term changes to retail shopping are going to be.

Win or Whimper for the US Economy?

The US economy is being held back by an oversupplied housing market,high unemployment, bad State finances, and high federal budget deficit. Nevertheless economic indicators have been improving and retail spending is on the up. Once confidence begins to return unemployment figures will drop, and business will grow.

If the US economy battles out of its financial morass, it may lead to a stronger US dollar, which will positively affect the AUS Dollar. It would also be good new for stocks reliant on the US economy (eg Westfield, News Corp).

China’s Rise

China now accounts for 24% of Australia’s exports, and it’s importance continues to grow. While this provides great opportunities for the Aussie economy, there are also inherent risks.

Although China has booming international cities (eg Shanghai), the country as a whole is still very much a developing country. But as they slowly grow to a Developed world lifestyle and economy, their economy will flatten, and so too will their demand for Australian exports.

Strength of the Aussie Dollar

The Aussie dollar is currently at a 28 year high, a situation that can be attributed to the growth of China and the poor US dollar. But constant changes to the value of the US dollar mean importers and exporters need to keep their eye on dollar value constantly. Forces from left field are always able to come in and fluctuate the dollar.

Interest Rates

It seems that the Reserve Bank is working with assumptions of two rate increases in 2011. Some economists are assuming there will be three. It should be pointed out the RBA has a tight monetary policy and that small changes to rates have a large impact on consumer spending.

Are we Experiencing a Housing Bubble?

Home prices rose sharply over 2007 and 2008 because population growth was higher than the supply of new homes. The demand was further inhibited by interest rate rises. Since late 2009, interest rates were lowered and government grants helped raise prices. Since then however they have come back down.

Today, nationally home prices are up 6.5%. Process have picked up in Melbourne (10.7%) and Sydney (8.4%), but lowered in Perth (1.8%) and Brisbane (0.7%).

Impact of climate change policies

The Federal Government has awkwardly put this issue on the back burner, however some kind of carbon pricing looks like it will have to be factored in by businesses eventually. But remember that any drastic changes will have a long phase-in time factored in.

Inflation and Deflation

The high Australian dollar is putting pressure on the retail sector to lower prices (leading to deflation). At the same time, the price for services continues to increase, leading to inflation, or at least cushioning the deflation. At the same time, the general risk weights stronger towards inflation, as we and the US are in a period of strong government stimulation.

When Will Shares Return to Record Highs?

Most observers believe that it will take another three to four years for the stockmarket (both the ASX and the All Ordinaries) to reach back up to 2007 pre-GFC levels. After the 1987 crash it took the market seven years to reach a similar crest.

Is The Job Market Tight?

Unemployment has lowered, but not all the way back to pre-GFC levels. There are two factors to consider here. One is the cut to migration. The labor market works on a supply and demand law, and the cut to supply will have an inflationary effect. The other factor is that while more people are finding work, they are working less hours. This results in lower productivity and under-utilisation, which means that overall the job market is not particularly tight.

From 2010 to 2011

Economic recovery has been a core theme throughout 2010. This has been mirrored in some of the years main issues – China, India, taxation, superannuation, the commodity boom, housing, recession, GFC, rate cuts and debt. While some measure of volatility looks set to continue, let’s look towards a year when the theme of economic sustainability rises to the fore.

The key to building and maintaining a strong brand begins internally; is by building your brand from the inside. Developing a strong culture of employee branding, or internal brand alignment brings many benefits, including the ability to attract top talent, and better financial performance.

So What Is Employee Branding?

Employee branding is all about employees living and breathing the brand – knowing its brand story, and embodying its brand values. Employees need to know far more than just their company’s tag line or latest marketing campaign. They need to embrace and deliver it in action to customers and each other every day. Think of Virgin. A company doesn’t become part of the Virgin family by simply hanging a Virgin logo above their door. What is required are the values, attitude and way of being,becoming infused into the entirety of the business.

Without the brand being infused into the daily operations of the business, you run the risk of employees simply not “buying in”. And it is those areas of the business that affect employees the most, that is likely to directly influence not just attitudes, but actual r behaviour. A classic example is Google. Google has famously delegated time for their employees to work on their own private projects with free access to Google’s immense resources. Geeks around the word drool at that kind of worker environment. What better way to send a message to its employees about the importance of innovation to the Google brand, than to get their employees freely innovating?

Employee Branding and Today’s Management

Management culture has changed dramatically in the last twenty years. The days of micromanagement and iron-fisted CEOs are truly gone. Today, executives require new tools and techniques to deal with the challenges of globalisation, empowerment and rapid technological innovation. Companies need to be cooperatively grown via aligned and engaged employees. The truth is that most employees want to be engaged by a company that’s exciting, that has a firm vision, and where input is valued and taken on board. When engaged this way, workers will be the best advocates of the business’ brand.

Employee Branding and the Bottom Line

The impact of an engaged workforce has on a company’s bottom line can’t be overstated. The Global Workforce Study surveyed 90,000 employees in 18 countries. Their research found an uncontested link between levels of brand-engaged workers and financial performance. Essentially those workers who feel connected and valued by their company work with far more passion than those who don’t. Engaged employees also have a stronger sense of being able to impact their company, and this too adds to an emotional engagement with the brand. Having these factors in place is likely to result in a workforce eager to make the organisation succeed, by pulling them together for a common purpose, so that will be motivated by factors other than just financial reward.

Using Brand To Attract Talent

Internal branding is also a very important way to retain and attract employees. Company’s with strong brands are far more successful at retaining their best employees than companies with a weak record of worker engagement. As companies are constantly competing for the best talent, many companies are realising how the power of leveraging of their brand in attracting and retaining recruits. While companies often understand branding when applied to the realm of products and services, few area aware of how to use it to attract talent. To really use it’s brand as a recruiting tool, it should think of recruiters as customers. Use extensive research to determine key competition, what sort of attributes matter to different types of recruiters and work out the best ways to meet them.

Getting There

Employees only change their behaviour when they see tangible evidence that the brand is infused within the way the business is run. Brands can make the biggest impact by prioritizing areas of the business with the most power to influence employee behaviour:

1. Lead by example – There are a few ways that employee branding and engagement is built. It needs to begin with leaders within the business. Senior leaders need to show inspiration, commitment and communicate a sense of vision. Companies with the highest rates of employee engagement tend to have a charismatic CEO who is able to inspire their workforce with an engaging vision. Just think Steve Jobs of Apple, Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook, Richard Branson at Virgin. Leading by example often entails senior leaders being more accessible to employees, and communicating honestly and openly.

2. Recruitment – begin with talent who already possess the primary traits of the brand, and you’re half way there.
3. Training – give employees the tools and knowledge required to deliver on the brand promise.
4. Management Incentives – define specific behaviours relevant to your brand’s values and bring accountability in to play.

End Note

Nurturing a strong connection between your employees and your brand will result in multiple advantages. Having engaged employees has had massive advantages for companies such as Virgin, Google, and Apple. Engaging workers will payoff in the strength of your brand externally, fostering a unique culture within the business and winning the ability to attract the best worker talent.

Yet despite all this, cracks are quickly beginning to appear in the Harley brand. Motorcycle sales generally have been down 21.3 percent, and in the US (home to their biggest market) net income in general is down by 84.1 percent from the same period a year earlier. The company’s net income for the third quarter of 2009 was US$26.5 million, compared to US$155.5 million for that same period in 2008 (as reported in the Harley Davidson website itself). Obviously a reflection of the GFC and the broader economic malaise; but this is still a significant hit.

What has become increasingly apparent over the last few years is that the brand’s key audience is firmly rooted in the Baby Boomer demographic. Baby boomers overwhelmingly make up the majority of Harley riders. In fact, the average Harley rider is now 45 (up from 37 where it was a decade ago), and 20% of all Harley riders are over 55.

So What of Younger Riders…

Clearly then the brand has reveled in tremendous success over the past fifteen years, but it has yet to gain a foothold in the generation sitting underneath the boomers: the Gen X demographic (35 – 45 year olds) as well as the female market. To do this, they will need to develop ways to broaden and contemporize the brand.

While this presents quite a challenge, there are even longer term benefits of expanding the brand into the more aspirational index of the even younger Gen Y’s. Whilst it is not a brand this audience segment might consider today, by engaging now, it means they will have it in their radar, so that in twenty years owning a Harley Davidson and belonging to the tribe may become a reality…

Importantly we’re not suggesting for one moment that Harley cut and run from their existing mainstay audience; this is akin to financial suicide. However there is something to be said for future proofing the brand, so it remains credible, engaging and relevant to future generations of riders.

Staying True and Evolving – At The Same Time

So the real question that confronts Harley Davidson is how to evolve its brand to become credible, relevant, differentiated, and sustainable against the next generation of Harley Davidson riders, whilst still maintaining its current tribe of older devotees. The answer lies in evolving and re-interpreting their current brand values.

We would suggest starting with the values of “classic” and reinterpreting this in a way that’s beyond nostalgia, and places classic in a contemporary sense. This could involve contemporizing characteristics within classic, such as authenticity and legendary and, contextualizing them away from the past exclusively.

Harley Davidson could also learn from the marketing concept of consumer tribes. This could involve a paradigm shift from brand management to tribe management. It might involve asking who is the potential Harley Davidson tribe amongst today’s 35 – 45 year olds? Perhaps Harley can figure out what this tribe needs, and go about producing experiences, services and products that can be delivered to them.

The additional activity Harley Davidson must engage in is re-connecting with its existing user base and even more importantly its dealerships; both these stakeholders will be critical to engaging with a younger audience. This kind of refocus for the brand could include ‘aspirational’ brand activation events, product placement in movies, or via a new product line that sustains traditional Harley values and attributes. These activities would all be designed to take the brand forward through innovation, making it less reliant on a vintage aesthetic that draws it back to the past.

Examples From Others…

Like many epic brands, Harley’s greatest strength (in this case deep engagement with the current generation of baby boomers) is also its greatest weakness. How do they expand beyond a mentality of “my dad and granddad’s brand – not mine”? Levis’ had a similar challenge by the end of the 1980s. Largely on the back of their iconic 501 campaigns they were able to leverage classic music with a very hip brand ambassador and in turn found a whole new generation of denim wearers.

A more recent example of a world renowned brand facing a similar challenge might be Rolex’s Tudor brand. Faced with a similar challenge of taking a heritage brand and presenting it aspirationally to a younger audience, they too have used music as a channel of communication. The clip below from their most recent marketing campaign features a 30 something looking actor (judging at least by his wrist), with a classic song pulled from the 1970s. The clip, resonating with heritage aspiration and youth, is instantly likeable and begs to be shared with friends.

In Summary

Ultimately, the steadfast Harley riding baby boomers will continue to proudly buy and ride their motorcycles for a long while yet. At the moment the Harley brand has ample power and appeal within its core audience. But we still argue for reasons of long term sustainability the brand needs to move at least a generation younger. Doing this will require a mindset change within the team at Harley Davidson, and a clearer focus and conviction on the future and what’s required to remain relevant in the longer term.

A service is an activity, experience, process, or performance. It is frequently intangible, and can be variable or repeatable, which means that the most recent exposure to that experience is the one that will remain in the mind of customers (the recency effect). Service based businesses should approach marketing differently to those selling goods. The unique challenge with marketing services is transferring the abstract to reality.

Here’s the basic outline for a thorough marketing strategy for any service oriented business:

Marketing Plan = The Elements

1. Market overview
2. Analysis of competition
3. SWOT analysis
4. Primary target market & segmentation
5. Marketing objectives
6. Marketing strategies
7. Action plans & calendar of activity
8. Financials and Evaluation

Market Overview

Understanding your environment is essential. A market overview needs to take into consideration:

• A ” helicopter” view of the market and which products, services and brands exist
• Environmental analysis including economic, political and legislative climate
• Market level analysis for each product and service.

Competitor Analysis

Key activities:

• List each major competitor(s) in relation to key segments
• Inclusive SWOT of each competitor
• Understand their market positioning
• Review their current and expected strategies
• Look to define USP by competitor

Given that many corporate structures involve overlapping levels of specialisation, this exercise may need to be repeated a number of times. You may want to compare and contrast, internally as well as externally.

SWOT Analysis = Get Down To It

List out all the Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats for your SBU.
Quickly identify your 3 primary competitors, as well as their positioning.

Primary Target Market & Segmentation

You should pay attention to both the primary target market and segmentation. There is more than one way to slice a target. Consider:

• Demographic and Psychographic
• Socio-economic
• Geographical
• Attitudinal and Personality
• Lifestyle/Lifestage
• Expectations, benefits sought, repeat purchaser

Think Primary, Secondary, Intermediated, Direct. What’s the best way to define then meet the needs and expectations of your segmented customers?

Marketing objectives

Your marketing objectives will revolve around the following:

• Improve perceived market positioning
• Increase brand strength in the eyes of intermediaries and end customers
• Increase the strength of and buy in to our brand by our staff
• Improve the quality, effectiveness and consistency of marketing strategies/activities within each business unit to drive top line growth and return on capital

Communication Objectives

• Define these by each division or product line

Marketing Strategies

In services, positioning is “what you do to the mind of the customer.” It’s all about people, service processes and physical appearances and comfort. Services marketing mixes strategies from the 7 Ps:

• Product
• Price
• Place
• Promotion
• People
• Processes
• Physical

Differentiation

Your business may contian a number of attributes that identify it. Determine the attributes that are differentiating and unique, and consider what is most important to customers. You can list these out in terms of what is uniquely special, advantageous to have, and just necessary about your business.
Unique
First, Best, Only

Advantageous
Good to have. Competitors may copy easily
in the short to mid term

Necessary
Price of entry to the market

Action Plan and Marketing Activity Calendar

This essentially comprises marketing activity eg What, when, how and who. It should contain a wide mix of elements such as events, web, sales tools, PR, advertising and so on.

Financials and Evaluation

List your budgeting by each marketing activity, and the money that’s been allocated to that. It will also help to get procedures and timeframes in place to assess success and maintain control. As time goes on make changes to your marketing activities as appropriate.

Outside In

The Outside In strategy takes customer value as its starting and end point. Companies using this approach are focused on creating and nurturing their customers by providing high calibre customer value. They put themselves in the position of their customers, and view themselves from their perspective. It’s also about having a firm vision that drives you forward; there’s no room here for looking behind your shoulder.

Inside Out

In contrast, the Inside Out perspective begins with a focus on the company’s own capabilities and strengths. With this approach a business will take account of its resources and look at providing them more efficiently.

The problem with the latter approach is that by nature it’s limiting and demonstrates slowness in adopting changes in the market place.

Shareholder or Customer Value?

Comparing these two approaches suggest a conflict between two fundamental stakeholders businesses need to deliver to: customers and shareholders.

If incorporated appropriately, pleasing and keeping customers will increase profits, which will feed shareholder returns. However it does suggest a shift in emphasis away from directly trying to deliver to shareholders. Having a chief focus on shareholder value can lead to short-term thinking, and an Inside Out approach to business.

The key is understanding that the customer is the source of value, and the market will reward a better value proposition. This is a realignment of values that places shareholder value as an outcome of customer value: customer value should be the primary focus.

Outside In Case Study: Amazon

Amazon has set a new standard for Outside In strategising. They began as an online bookshop, and built an incredibly strong brand around that. But they put themselves in their customer’s shoes and asked what else their customer base wanted. This allowed them to expand into the Kindle, and then into cloud computing, web services for their channel partners, and massive online retailing of a range of products outside their initial offering. Rather than dwelling on what they were good at (selling books), they asked ‘Who are our customers and what do they need?’ By shifting their focus, they were able to leverage their brand to seize opportunities in other areas.

Barriers to This Approach

Executives and CEOS face a number of challenges that keep them focussed on an Inside Out focus. Focussing on annual budgets, outsourcing, day-to-day management etc. are the typical concerns that continue to lose focus from a bigger perspective. Without effective and visionary leadership, it can be hard to rise above these matters. Without an emphasis on innovation, experimenting, and taking a step outside the corporate framework and into the minds and hearts of customers, a business will not be ready for that moment when markets open and their opportunity to outperform competition and increasing market share and brand loyalty arrives.

Outside In Strategy

There are three ways to ascertain whether your business is oriented more towards an Inside Out or Outside In approach. The first place to look is your competition and channels. If you’re continually surprised by new competitors, your own poor results, or the appearance of new product categories from out of nowhere, this is probably a strong indication you’re reactively focussed, rather than setting the pace in the market.

The second question concerns your customers: do you know who they are and what kind of value you’re delivering them?

The third matter to examine is whether your brand stands up. Are you viewed as credible? Do your customers understand you? Are insights from the market and foresight driving the organisation? Are your marketing efforts aligning with your core values and strengths?

How Can Brands Reach Out?

Customers buy the expectation of benefits they will receive from forming a relationship with a brand. Buying from and interacting with a business is guided by a businesses brand. An Outside In strategy means a change of focus and entering into a collaborative relationship with the customer.

Consumers today are well informed and they are over saturated with a glut of advertising and brand messages. They are well aware when they are being spammed with information to buy something. What consumers want is to feel a connection to products, services and experiences. They will only make that purchase when they feel impelled to do so – when they feel it will allow them to join a tribe.

Tribes
The modern consumer is buying experiences rather than commodities, and this explains the importance of branding in many product and service categories. The decision process guiding the consumer involves brand associations, which are largely image driven, intangible and symbolic.

A brand tribe is a formal or informal group of consumers who share the same awareness, passion and loyalty for a brand or a portfolio of brands. Brand tribes can be identified as strong drivers of brand strengths for many international brands like LEGO, Bang & Olufsen, Nike, Giorgio Armani, Banyan Tree Hotels and Resorts, Singapore Airlines, Timberland and many other unique brands.

Building Connection
It’s about creating a meaningful connection between products, services and experiences and people, and letting people form natural tribes around these voices.

Marketing guru Seth Godin fired up the crowd with his keynote address at the Mixx Expo in New York last week, one of the world’s premier digital marketing events. “There is too much clutter … because we’ve branded ourselves to death.” Seth Godwin has been talking about tribes in marketing for years now, and this is sounding increasing true today.

From Brand Management to Tribe Management
Thinking of brand management as a form of tribe managements is a different way of perceiving the world. Its starting point is recognising that the most important asset organisations can build is the privilege of delivering relevant and personal messages to people who want to receive it. People want that information because it helps them to connect with something larger. What people deeply want is the ability to connect not to companies, but to each other. When a company helps them form and connect to their own tribe, gives them a story they can tell and talk about, then the loyalty that grows is tangible. Becoming tribe focussed will mean rather than singling out customers for your products, you will look for services and products you can deliver to the tribe. The organisation becomes completely focused on satisfying and growing the tribe.

Who are some of the great tribal leaders?

Nike Running shoes are nothing new. However Nike created a tribe of runners who proudly wore the Nike swoosh because they felt emboldened by Nike’s messages of athlete’s driven to glory.

The Beatles Teenagers in the 1960s already were a tribe. But they lacked leadership. The Beatles provided a voice in their fans own image, and built intense loyalty through an already existing group who needed a megaphone to champion their message.

Zappos This online retailer sells more than shoes. They present a retail experience consumers love and want to share. It’s not about the shoes, “it’s about the principles of service.”

iPhone Apple introduced the smart phone to a mass audience, but the iPhone is also a badge of a tribe. “No one bought this phone because it’s a good phone. Everyone got it because it’s a badge that you’re on this team, not that team.”

Marketing today needs to be understood as tribal leadership. The role of CMO should really be understood to stand for “Chief Movement Officer,” rather than Chief Marketing Officer. The key take out is don’t market. Lead a tribe or forge a new one. Inspire. Access your brand’s passions, and you’ll tap into consumer’s passions, building a small dedicated following that will grow larger and larger as word of mouth spreads.

New online media avenues have made it easier, according to the State Tourism Minister, to position the state differently for both Australian and international audiences.

It’s been twelve years since the state’s previous brand campaign, with the “˜Where else but Queensland” tagline, and has been guided by the tourism body responsible for the uber successful Best Job In The World campaign.

Full article here: http://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/media/queensland-launches-new-brand/story-e6frg996-1225930886245

As a brand Blackberry is losing its way, and doesn’t appear able to respond in an agile manner to the iPhone. The rational and corporate characteristics that had people buy in to the innovation that was once Blackberry are simply insufficient for today’s users. The apps, tactile design, touch screen and interface of the iPhone combined with the power of the Apple brand and its genius for marketing have created a connection with users at an entirely different level.

The Original Brand Position

When the phone first entered the market in 1999, it was very much geared to a niche audience – a corporate market in need of accessing their email inbox on the road. It’s disciplined focus on email accessibility made it the adopted mascot of corporate IT departments internationally. At a time when mobile email accessibility was perceived as the domain of those who had good reason to be contactable 24/7, BlackBerry was able to position itself as a status object of the corporate world.

To recap the BlackBerry brand story, originally Blackberry marketed its features. They then shifted their message to one of business success. Ongoing campaigns then merged into a brand message about life success. The value promise of BlackBerry was that it’s a tool to let you live your life as a successful professional.

New Environment

However BlackBerry seems to be sitting on shifting ground. They have had tremendous success in expanding their audience outside the enterprise market and selling directly to consumers. While great for RIM’s (the makers of BlackBerry) profits in the last few quarters, this may have diluted its ability to act as a social signaling tool in the corporate world.

With the saturation of the iPhone, many younger workers are coming to view the BlackBerry as a sign of the old school; something they use only because it was given to them by their employer. Having familiarity with the iPhone, many prefer the user experience it provides over the starkness of the BlackBerry.

The Looming iPhone

Corporate workers and executives form their own tribe, and are happy to be identified as such. That’s what BlackBerry has done until now. However the strength of Apple is it’s dynamism – that it can appeal to the corporate tribe as well as the creative / teenager / mums and dads tribes.

If corporates begin technical support for iPhones – as some Wall street firms have begun doing in the States – the tide will change. Official corporate uptake the iPhone would happen in three stages. As the taboo against iPhone usage in the corporate sector is removed, employees will be allowed to use their own iPhones for work. The next stage would be companies paying for data plans, and after that purchasing iPhones. Such a possibility of a wholesale corporate shift should be very worrying for BlackBerry. BlackBerry’s physical keyboard, email system and messenger tool demonstrate huge popularity and loyalty. What’s at stake here is whether BlackBerry will continue to be able to position itself long-term as the preferred phone of the corporate sector.

At the same time this risk looms, BlackBerry purchases are increasing, and the overall market for smart phones is growing massively. In fact non-corporate consumers account for 80% of BlackBerry users. But the loss of the Wall Street cachet could put that growth in doubt. What BlackBerry risks is diluting its brand to increase its audience.