Do You Know How to Mitigate Risk to Your Brand? Watch to find out more…

/0 Comments/in , , , , , /by

I recently spoke at the Cyber Threat Summit 2012 which took place in Dublin, host to over 600 delegates from around the world and thought some of the content presented might be of interest to those of you concerned about managing your brand under threat.

  

The talk was focussed on enhancing attendee understanding of brands, how they work, what they are and how, when properly understood, they can be leveraged to mitigate risk and manage it effectively when in jeopardy or exposed to negative market sentiment.

 

At its most fundamental if you and your team can’t simply articulate what your brand stands for and what makes you different to your competition then you’re already at a significant disadvantage. 

 

 

  

Why you might ask, well you can’t adequately protect your No.1 asset if you don’t understand it and the dynamics of your market, key stakeholders and customers alike. 

 

Most importantly you are also potentially financially under performing and commercially vulnerable, in short leaving money on the table, as you slide into commoditisation and genericization because you haven’t developed and leveraged your brand to its full potential.

 

Watch to find out more. 

 

Feel free to leave your comments or get in touch  E: [email protected]

We’d love to hear your views.

Celebrity Brand Endorsement: 7 Tips to Getting it Right

/0 Comments/in , , , , , /by

Michael Jordan and Nike, Michael Jackson and Pepsi, Jennifer Lopez and Venus. For decades now branding giants have paid big bucks to get celebrities to endorse their brand and it’s not hard to see why. It can be a critical and very profitable part of your brand strategy.

 

 Jennifer Lopez Venus

 

From winning athletes to global superstars of the entertainment industry, the use of celebrities as brand ambassadors offers significant advantages to a company.

 

Celebrity endorsement is concerned with the strategic alignment of the celebrity brand and the marketing brand. A celebrity brand spoksperson can attract attention and generate emotional affinity with the brand in a way that may not be possible with traditional advertising.

 

 Michel Jordan Nike

 

A well-matched celebrity endorsement partnership can benefit the brand when the target audience transfers their admiration for the celebrity onto the brand, thereby allowing it influence their purchase decision making process.

 

As well as influncing the bottom line, aligning the brand with celebrity gives the brand greater access to more fans. The wider the fan base the larger the spread of the marketing message and the increased profitability of the brand.

 

 

7 Essential Tips to Getting the Right Celebrity Brand Match

 

Celebrity Brand Mismatch

In the same way brands develop a perceived brand image within their market, celebrities develop a public persona based on their professional achievements and public behavior. The closer aligned the brand image and celebrity image the better the return on investment of the celebrity endorsement.

 

Using a celebrity who’s public image, or what they stand for, which is incongruent or does not align with your brand’s message/image and what it stands for, will cause confusion and largely do more harm than good.

 

 

Damage to Reputation

The danger of using celebrities to endorse your brand is that any discrepancies in their personal life can damage the reputation of the brand. Celebrities as brand ambassadors should be looked upon as role models or inspirational people for your customers.

 

 Tiger Woods Tag Heuer

 

In associating your brand to the celebrity it is intended that their positive public image is reflected on to your brand. An athlete who tarnishes their reputation by using drugs instantly strips value from any brand they were endorsing. Tiger Woods lost millions in sponsorship deals when brands were quick to disassociate with him after his marital indiscretions.

 

 Tiger Woods Carlos Papi Baez 33778 Tiger Woods Sponsors

 

 

Brands Like Winners

Sporting heroes are admired because of their talent and performance. They are desirable brand ambassadors as they inspire audiences and positively influence purchase decisions, as long as they are winning…

 

There is a risk to brands when investing in a sporting partnership in case the athlete is ‘off form’ or performs poorly. The value of the sports celebrity to the brand is only as valuable as his or her performance in the field. The ROI often lies in the amount of media coverage they receive. A player who is not getting the pitch time offers little value to the brand.

 

Personality is also a factor. If the athelete is lacking in the personality stakes then they are of little value as a brand representative at consumer-facing events or brand-focused media activity.

 

 Brian Gillette Endorsement

 

According to a national survey, Brian O’Driscol is Ireland’s most admired sports personality, favoured by one in four irish adults. It is a combination of his performance on the field with his personality off the field that makes him appeal to consumers and the brand alike.

  

While the use of celebrity endorsers has been shown to improve brand recall, increase brand awareness and help develop brand image, the cost of signing up strong celebritiy role models as brand endorsers is often prohibitively expensive to small business.

 

Even by Irish standards, IRU players can command €10,000. for a single corporate appearance, never mind the cost of exclusive brand partnership deals. There are however a number of ways to align your brand with a celebritiy ambassador without bursting your budget

 

 

Gifting

If you have identified a celebrity that fits with your brand identity and can increase your market penetration or reach with your target audience then gifting your product to that celebrity may be a way of gaining greater exposure for your brand.

 

Neff Headware is now popular street wear among snowboarders, surfers and other boarding customrs. Unable to pay for celebrity endorsement in their early days the company sent their merchandise to up and coming influencers in the sport. When the audience began seeing the brand being worn by their sporting idols the demand for the brand sky-rocketed with the company enjoying a 300% increase in revenue over the last 3 years.

 

 

Equity

There is a growing trend of getting aspirational celebrities on board as brand ambassadors by offering them an equity stake in the company. This allows the company to land high profile endorsement while maintaining cash flow. Furthermore, the celebrity has an incentive to continue their association with the brand and continue to offer promotional support.

 

 

Influencers

Traditional celebrity endorsers were those that had wide audince recognition and influence. Some of the biggest influencers of the 21st centuary come not from entertainers and athletes but from those with a large online following.

 

 Fashion Bloggers 600px

 

Frequently bloggers have as wide and significant a reach as traditional celebrities and demand fees of far less to promote a brand. By redefining ‘celebrity’, brands can harness these people with an engaged internet following and use their online voice to fuel marketing campaigns for the brand.

 

 

Charitable Causes

Many celebrities rely on sponsorship to suplement their salary. Therefore remaining relevant and maintaing a positive public perception is equally important for their earning potential.

 

Celebrities that have had their reputations tarnished in some way often look to improve their public image by being associated with charities and non profits. Small companies can use cause marketing to find common ground with potential customers. For every pair of TOMS shoes purchased, the company gives a new pair of shoes to a child in need. This makes the brand attractive to celebrities in public disrepute.

 

Celebrity endorsement is not for every brand but it certainly broadens the potential customer reach for those that find a suitable celebrity match.

 

 

• Have you considered if your brand is suitable for celebrity endorsement?

 

• Does your brand strategy include elements that would be attractive to a potential celebrity ambassador?

 

• What do you think of celebrity brand endorsement?

 

 

Drop us a line we’d love to hear your thoughts.

Olympics Ambush Marketing Winner Goes to… Dr Dre. Beats

/0 Comments/in , , , , /by

World records, sporting heroes, and brand-wars. The Olympic games may be over for another four years but, sports and athletes aside, the legacy of the London 2012 brand police is likely to live on.

 

Long before the first athletes arrived in the London the global coverage of the stringent branding laws enforced by the London Olympic Games Organising Committee (LOGOC) had already spread worldwide.

 

With corporate sponsorship of the games essential to cover the £15 billion cost of hosting the games, it is of course understandable that LOGOC would do its utmost to protect the branding rights of official brand sponsors; each paying up to £100 million over 4 years for the privilege.

 

That said, laws including the possible forfeiting of medals by winning athletes if they promoted any brand or product via twitter, or banning people and businesses from decorating their own private property brought the 2012 brand protection laws to a new level.

 

 

With Rules Come Rule Breakers

Naturally, the Olympic Games are an attractive association for any brand looking to capitalize on the attention and popularity of the international spectacle. For many brands who lack the budgets to enter into a sponsorship agreement, (and some who can), the temptation exists to try and stretch LOGOC’s branding laws, despite the legal risks.

 

Irish brand Paddy Power was one such brand who successfully skirted LOGOC’s brand laws, although narrowly, with their ambush marketing poster campaign.

 

 Paddy Power Ambush

 

Paddy Power’s ad proclaims that the Irish bookmaker is the “Official sponsor of the largest athletics event in London this year! There you go, we said it”. They then go on to reveal that the sponsorship is of an egg and spoon race to be held in the town of London in France. LOGOC’s threatened legal proceedings against the brand Paddy Power, but was unsuccessful.

 

Nike has a history of ambush marketing at the Olympic games that dates back to the 1970s. This years games were no different. As a non-sponsor Nike was forbidden from mentioning the games in their advertisements, despite the brand sponsoring many star athletes and several countries’ team kit.

 

Nike reacted by posting a 60-second ad on YouTube that marked the worldwide unveiling of a campaign called “Find Your Greatness.” The ad cheekily takes on the strict restrictions of the Olympic branding laws. Instead of showing Olympic athletes in action in London, England, viewers will see unknown athletes in towns and villages called London around the world.

 

“There are no grand celebrations here, no speeches, no bright lights,” a narrator with an English accent explains. “But there are great athletes. Somehow we’ve come to believe that greatness is reserved for the chosen few, for the superstars. The truth is, greatness is for all of us.” With 5,108,976 views to date and counting, Nike got their message out there!

  

 

While both Paddy Power and Nike playfully take on the rules governing brand association of the games, you have to question, is doing so in keeping with their brand image? And how well does it fit with the rest of their brand strategy?

 

Both brands benefited in terms of press coverage for their marketing stunts. Nike in particular sets a tone that suggests to LOGOC “if you can’t beat them, diminish them”. As a sponsor of sporting legends does this advertisement by Nike aim to support them during their biggest career challenge?

 

 

Brand Ambush Champion 2012

If there was a gold medal for Olympic ambush marketing it would go to the undisputed 2012 brand winner Dr. Dre Beats. Watching the games, particularly the aquatic or athletic events, you more than likely saw a significant proportion of athletes supporting headphones with the trademark B of Dr. Dre Beats.

  

Cullen Jones Wears Beats

 

Olympic heroes such as Britain’s Tom Daley and the great Michael Phelps were seen by audiences of millions wearing their Beats as they entered the Olympic Arena. The brand that paid nothing in sponsorship fees was arguably the most visible brand for several of the most viewed events in the games.

 

  

Why This Was Ambush Marketing At Its Best

Beats’ brand visibility during the games was a carefully orchestrated strategic move by the company. The brand invited athletes to pick up their free pair of Beats from a collection point set up in the trendy private members club in London. As athletes were not being paid to promote the brand they managed to avoid breaking LOGOC’s rules.

 

Olympian Beats By Dre

 

Their campaign was subtle yet effective. There was no official press launch, no global PR campaign. Panasonic, official sponsor of the games paid £64 million for the association. The cost to Dr. Dre Beats? A few hundred pairs of their headphones.

 

While their ambush campaign paid off in terms of visibility their success is more significant than that. Through their ambush campaign Beats aligned its brand with inspirational globally recognized athletes; role models for audiences the world over.

 

Amy Cure Beats By Dre

 

The campaign worked not only because it fit within Beats traditional strategy of celebrity endorsement, but was further reinforced by the brands natural fit within the context of the games where athletes have used headphones and earphones before their event since the days of the Walkman in the 70s.

 

According to John Lewis sales for the Dr. Dre Beats headphones have increased by 116% in their stores. The number of sports headphones sold is said to have gone up by 42%, with general headphone sales at a steady 19% increase during the games.

 

Like any strategy ‘ambush marketing’ needs careful planning, a clear goal and it must support the existing brand strategy. Dr. Dre Beats deserve to reap the rewards of their winning campaign.

 

• Does your marketing activity support the core values, positioning, profile, story and overall vision for your brand?

 

• Could you use ambush marketing activities strategically planned to fit within your core brand positioning and target audiences needs?

 

What do you think of the various ‘ambush marketing’ campaigns mentioned?

Do you have any stories of your own you like to share?

Get in touch, we’d love to hear your thoughts.

 

Company Culture: Your Brand’s Strongest Competitive Advantage

/0 Comments/in , , , , , , , /by

Company culture may be the most vague aspect of brand management but carefully controlled and nurtured it can provide your brand with a sustainable competitive advantage that even your strongest competitors cannot replicate.

 

Company culture is a culmination of the behaviors, attitudes, relationships, core brand values and environment within a business. Simply put, your company culture can be viewed as “the way we do things around here”.  The manners in which these components are managed make your culture what it is.

 

 

How Does This Support Brand Development?

Many of the strongest brands have a product offering that is similar to that of competitors in the market. What gives them their greatest competitive advantage however is that while competitors can replicate the product, apply similar marketing techniques, and headhunt their staff, they can never fully duplicate their company culture. A company culture is the one truly unique sustainably competitive advantage a brand can have.

 

A winning culture can be a real point of differentiation, but it must be managed, driven, and reinforced in order to truly see results.

 

 Team Culture

  

 

What is the Culture Within Your Company?

Many companies aim to strategically shape the culture that exists within their organisation, but even companies who have never heard of company culture already have one in place.

 

The question is, is your company culture strengthening your brand or holding it back or, worse still, undermining it? A good place to start when developing and understanding your corporate culture is asking your staff and customers what they think of the company; the good, the bad and the ugly. What you need to take from that exercise is what elements of the existing company culture that you like and your customers like, and what needs to be eliminated.

 

 

What You Do, Not What You Say!

The core values you identify for your brand will shape the behaviour of your employees and provide the guidelines they need to best serve the brand. If providing the best customer service possible is a core value of the brand then employees know that they are expected to do their best to achieve this value through all customer interactions.

 

Remember, it is not enough for your brand to have strong core values that are clearly articulated to stakeholders if they are not acted upon. It is what you do, not what you say that counts. It must be a fully integrated and intuitive part of your brand’s signature way of doing things.

 

 

What Is It That Your Company Values?

In order to create a corporate brand culture that yields results you must first identify what is it you value as a company? How to you live and authentically demonstrate the importance of these brand values to your stakeholders?

 

If you want to delight your customers then what is the reward for your employees when they achieve this?  Think of it this way. If your company culture values customer service and your core value is to delight customers, then what happens if two supermarket employees each make sales of equal monetary value but one offers to carry the customer’s bags to the car. Does that employee receive a reward for going out of their way to delight the customer? Or more to the point, is the other employee penalized for not doing so?

 

 Team Hands

 

Reward your staff for embracing your company’s culture. Don’t just review employees based on measuring results, measure their behaviour and what they try to bring to the work environment.  Encourage, support and acknowledge those that not only promote but act on your core brand values.

 

If you want to create a sustainable corporate brand culture than staff recruitment should aim to find employees who fit within the existing brand culture and whose values are closely aligned with the brand.

 

Zappos famously offer potential employees $3000 to leave the company during their initial training to make sure those who choose to stay do so because they believe in the brand and not just the financial benefits of the job.

 

 

The Role of The Leader

The most critical influencer on the development of a corporate culture that supports strong brand development is the leader. Leaders understand that their brand’s identity is shaped through touch points between their customers and their organisation.

 

Leaders cannot possibly anticipate every possible touch point that could influence perceptions of the company’s brand, and advertising can only get you so far, but they can set the example as to the attitude and behavioral cues for the corporate brand culture.

 

Strong leaders understand that in a sustainable winning company culture, the behaviours of employees are intrinsically linked to relationships, informed by attitudes, built on a foundation of core brand values and suitable to their industry environment. By managing these cultural components a leader can create a company culture that supports strong brand development internally.

 

 Southwest Airline Staff 

 

Southwest Airlines embrace a company culture that nurtures staff first and customers second. This may seem counter intuitive but by giving employees the tools to make decisions, by building a culture where people feel respected and valued, Southwest Airlines understood that these values would also be reflected in interactions with customers. Their corporate culture has created an environment where employees want to deliver the best customer service in the business. 

 

 

As Zappo’s CEO Tony Hseih states; “company culture and company brand are two sides of the same coin. Your culture is your brand.”

 

 

• Does your corporate culture nurture your brand and provide a competitive advantage?

 

• How do your core brand values support your corporate culture?

 

• Do you as a company leader understand your role in the development of your company’s brand culture?

 

• Do you need to engage in a Brand Discovery Programme™ to re-evaluate your company culture and brand values so you can reinvigorate your brand’s offering to make it stronger, more relevant and more profitable?

 

Are Your Brand Values On The Money? They’re Critical to Your Profitability

/0 Comments/in , , , , /by

The last five years has seen a massive shift in the fundamentals that shape the corporate operating environment. Technological advances and economic influences have led to fundamental changes in global business practices and customer behaviour.

 

These changes demand businesses to alter and adapt their business models in order to maintain relevancy and profitability, but it also challenges companies to reinvent their strategies while maintaining the company’s vision and staying true to their core brand values.

 

 Brand Values Chalk

  

What Are Core Brand Values?

Core values are essential to the integrity of every brand while also underpinning every organisation’s culture and priorities. They provide a framework through which all decisions surrounding the brand are made.

 

Explicit core values empower employees and provide them with information they need to understand the brand. Strong brand values help employees articulate what makes their brand different compared to their competitors and enables them to communicate its message effectively to their customers, thereby making them far more effective brand champions and sales agents for your business.

 

In times of market turmoil and change the temptation exists for business leaders to abandon or compromise their brand values in an attempt to capture market share or adapt to new customer demands. A high quality brand that changes their core values and lowers prices in an effort to capture market share only confuses both customers and employees alike, which in turn undermines the brand, the very heart and life blood of their business. 

 

While every business must keep profits front of mind, with ongoing plans for increasing sales, failing to act with an authentic representation of the values and beliefs of the brand leads to loss of credibility for the company and brand erosion or devaluation and eventually loss of market share.

 

 Starbucks Beijing China

 

Remain True to Your Core Brand Values

Starbucks is a global brand but their commitment to their core values is evident in every market in which they operate. Their success in the Chinese market, a market where many American branding giants have failed, was due to their ability to adapt their strategy to meet the dynamics of the Chinese market while staying true to Starbuck’s core brand values.

 

Understanding the difference in the Chinese consumer tastes and expectations, Starbuck’s altered their product to include flavours preferred by the Asian consumer. Unlike their western peers, Chinese customers preferred to sit in rather than take out and so Starbucks encouraged this element of the customer service experience. They could have adopted a low price strategy more in keeping with the purchasing power of the average Chinese customer. They could have changed their entire business model to match that to other tea and coffee houses in China.

 

What Starbucks refused to alter was their dedication to the highest level of customer service and a high quality product. Their commitment to their core brand values paid off.

 

While many of their Chinese customers claimed they actually preferred the taste of rival brands, they continued to go to Starbucks because of the level of customer service they received. By maintaining their core values Starbucks captured the market of the higher-spending middle class Chinese consumer while also becoming a status symbol along the way.

 

 

Flexible in Strategy, Firm in Core Values

A brand strategy should be flexible and capable of adapting to changing market demands, but solid core brand values are essential to provide structure and direction for the brand to evolve and grow profitably. 

 

Customers need brands to adapt to their changing demands and brands must alter their offering and communication in order to stay relevant. A brand that tries to offer everything to the customer without remaining true to the underpinning direction of their brand values will fail. 

 

Customers are quick to recognize a brand that is acting disingenuously and without substance. Customers develop brand loyalty based on identifying and aligning themselves with the values of that brand. In order to capture and deliver value to your customers you must first identify and commit to the values that are core to your brand and your business, in order to meet your customers’ needs authentically.

 

Brand Values Text

  

4 Elements of Brand Strategy That Allow More Flexibility:

 

1. Location:

In most cases the ability to transfer the brand from one market to another is not something that is fundamental to the brand, unless the brand is built around a specific location. Las Vegas’s Sin City brand is intrinsic to that one location.

 

2. Communication:

New communication channels can and should be adopted in order to maximize customer value. Even television, radio and print brands expand their communication channels to include a mix of appropriate online communication channels such as Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, web sites and appropriate blogs to name a few.

 

3. Product Features:

While the core product should be consistent across markets, strong brands can adapt some features to suit changing local market demands.

 

4. Message Creation:

Brands are learning that they need to relinquish some control of the brand message and embrace customer-created content. If the communication of the core value is strong then the message created by the customer will more than likely still fit within the core brand strategy too.

 

 

When it comes to brand strategy there is no one-size-fits-all model. There are countless channels available and it is about selecting the most relevant to the brand at that current time. However having concrete core brand values is key to your success.

 

Core values are the focal point from which the brand message is shaped and communicated to and through customers. Remaining true to your core brand values ensures that no matter what turn the markets take, your brand will have a clear vision of what the brand strives to achieve, your brand promise and the direction on how to achieve those values through re-shaping your business strategies.

 

  

Volvo Safety Video Image

  

Volvo is a brand that has steadfastly remained true to their core value across the various markets in which they operate. Volvo state that “safety is a fundamental core value… safety is and must be the basic principle in all design work”.  They consistently offer value to their customers through their commitment to safety.  

 

Your brand strategy should be flexible and capable of adapting to changing market dynamics, integrating new methods of communication, satisfying new customer tastes, even entering new product markets, but your core brand values must remain true and underline everything you do.

 

• Does your brand have clear brand values?

 

• Does you brand strategy allow your brand to adapt to changing market dynamics?

 

• Do you need to redefine what values are core to your business?

 

• Do you need to engage in a Brand Discovery Programme™ to re-evaluate your brand values and revitalize your offering to keep it relevant and profitable?

 

 Brand Discovery Blog Ad 

http://www.personadesign.ie/brand_discovery_programme