Marketing Buzz

Brand Activation - Definition

Here is a simple definition of 'What is Brand Activation'

Brand activation can be defined as marketing process of bringing a brand to life through creating brand experience.Next question now is what to activate? Generally, the core features or brand values of a brand are used for activation. That’s what every brand manager strives to achieve i.e. communicating their brand values to their target customers. But a word of caution here: select only one or two features or brand values to activate. Don’t try to communicate each and every detail of your brand. One has to appreciate the fact that branding is based on the concept of singularity.This concept assumes a greater significance in case of services which are intangible in nature.

Benefits of Brand Activation:

1. You can convey your positioning using brand activation.

2. It supports your ad claim if used carefully.

3. Distortion is minimum in this case.

4. It increases your brand salience.

5. Helps in revitalizing a brand.

6. Brand activation can elicit customer insights as people interact with the brand.

Marketing ROI - Misunderstood but Demanded

It’s amazing how clients - especially the ones who have yet to wet their feet with any creditable experience in planning and running marketing campaigns - demand an ROI measure - before they commit spends on marketing. Infact if you are from the agency - you will be faced with a demand from ROI linked fee models - because that’s what's 'in'.

The success of a marketing campaign depends on numerous variables. However at the core is the relevance of the product and the relative value that it is trying to market. There is immense rigor that clients and pitch consultants go through when evaluating agencies to handle their marketing & communication mandate. Dangling the carrot of large marketing spends they get the agencies down on their knees on the fees - however worse so - without adequately committing on the product - its competitive relevance , the quality and service standards that the brand shall be adhering to - they demand that the agency upfront commit a 'ROI' linked fee structure.

Clients are justified in demanding for accountability from the agency and ask for them to stake their fees. However this accountability needs to be a 'shared accountability’. The marketing campaigns succeed when it the brand delivers the promise that the campaign entices the consumer with. Needless to say - the advertising and marketing is all about exaggerated claims - however if there is a dissonance in the promise and the deliver - we can be sure of a suboptimal return on the campaign cost.

Only mature brands - who have invested considerably and more importantly taken pains to garner data of response - analyze the same then having arrived at metrics - which comprehensively take the core success variable into account have a right to demand an ROI linked compensation proposal from the client.

Sun Tech Days 2009 - D minus 2

Passion is best felt - when it is shared.At Sun Tech Days - one of the  largest developer conferences - I witness the passion. I have been closely engaged with the growth of Sun Tech Days over the last 9 years.It started with a modest attendance of 900 developers in 2000 and today it attracts close to 10000 developers to attend , this gathering.

Sun Tech Days 2009 - India  - is scheduled from the 18th - 20th February 2009.Just a couple of days from today.The preparation of this conference however starts 6 to 8 months prior.The key objective of the conference is to facilitate a congregation of developers in India and provide a platform for them and technology experts to share and learn about the latest technologies from Sun Microsystems.

Marketing a conference like Sun Tech Days , poses a challenge year after year - a challenge to come out with an engagement and provide and experience - which a evolved human being like a technology developer will find interesting enough to spend 3 full days.

This year we did not promote the take aways from this conference - however are celebrating the unique individual that every  developer is .The developer is not  (just) a geek - who responds to tech talk and code.He is in a true sense an artiste - who like an painter - uses the same set of colors  and the same set of brushes but  creates a unique expression. The developer - uses the code to create  applications - which touch millions and billions lives across the world. It is intriguing how in leveraging the talent of such individuals - and layering it with processes - the life of these developers becomes monotonous - measured by the lines of code that he or she has written. At Sun Tech Days I see the developers in their elements ; they perhaps leave the rigors of the job behind and immerse themselves in the sea of fellow developers - and inspiring experts - who collectively ignite a passion to  imagine and experience the possibilities.

The registrations for the conference are closed and we are up to full capacity ...we have set up the stage for 'Advantage : YOU'. I shall over the next few days share with you the developments at Sun Tech Days , 2009 at Hyderabad - up close and personal  with the developers.

Don’t use recession as an excuse!

The current recessionary economic conditions have been identified as the major cause for the strife that we are witnessing in most organizations and the performance of their brands. It is worth pondering on the thought that in the last few months, ‘recession’ has also become a legitimate excuse to defend sub-optimal performance. In most cases – for brands that do not have significantly large market share it seems to be used as an excuse. I believe that especially for brands which are not the market leaders there is always a scope to grow at the originally planned pace in the toughest of economic conditions. Below are 5 recommendations that I would make to the clients/brands – which could help them to track on their growth targets.

1.       Avoid Being Paralyzed

The information overload is perhaps deepening the perception of the slowdown. It is highly important to be informed about how this drama of slowdown is unfolding – and what measures are being proposed by the various governments, federal banks and corporations to alleviate the pain. However in the process of being connected – one at times  gets depressed by unpleasant news of layoffs , dipping sales , production lines being shut down  and more. This growing perception of doom aided by sensational media – and multitude of expert opinions – can lead to professional paralysis. The dramatic change in the market environment – has shaken the belief in the well drafted marketing strategy (based on only optimism) that one had – till a few months back and made it completely irrelevant. Most marketers are now left with no real strategy…they are living from quarter to quarter if not month to month. In such a situation one needs to avoid being paralyzed – take only that dose of news and information that is necessary – focus on the CORE around which you have build the franchise of the brand or service and get back into action. Plan - implement, plan more and implement more….it is imperative that you are present and active in the market. In-action on your ‘go to market’ plans would just hasten the decline and eventual death of your brand.

 

 

2.       Take pains to understand ‘alternative’ marketing mediums

The last 5 years have seen the emergence of the ‘alternative’ marketing mediums like digital, mobile, BTL and more. Each of these mediums has their unique strengths and limitations. Their biggest strength however is that they allow you to target your marketing effort with great precision, measure the impact and reduce wastage tremendously. Mediums with these characteristics are useful – when resources are scarce. The proper leveraging of these mediums requires the traditional marketer to do a lot of ‘unlearning’ and enroll himself in the school of New Age media. This task is not easy – however if not done – the brands would be lead by brand managers – with partial or little knowledge of these mediums. The result is more wastage and an incorrect judgment on the efficacy of these mediums. Brands and marketers who have invested effort in understanding the alternative mediums – and have had the courage to persist with them – are most likely to succeed in doing more for their brands with lesser resources.

 

         3.        Win in the Last Mile

  70% of the buying decisions are made in the last mile. The brand needs to be at its best, in the phase when the shopper is turning into a buyer. A multitude of factors impact this phase and it is imperative that adequate effort is made to understand how your brand is performing in the last mile and further more – take corrective action to increase the conversions. Getting more prospects in your fold (pipeline) to maintain demand – or increase it has always been an expensive proposition. The economics of which– may not get a nod from the CFO in the current scenario of financial uncertainty. The solution to this challenge is to win in the last mile. An in-depth assessment of how your brand scores on placement , packaging, pricing ,promotion , display etc in the last mile – will reveal areas that need improvement. Compensate for the cuts in your marketing budget – and still maintain the same revenue or grow them – by investing your limited resources in increase conversions in the last mile.

 

 

4.       Leverage the existing Brand  Equity with  Customers

Most brands undermine the equity that they have created with customers over the years. This equity takes years to build and takes years to erode too (barring a few cases – like corporate fraud). In a growth scenarios and its contagious enthusiasm – too much emphasis was laid on acquiring new customers and relatively little effort was spent on building a robust relationship program with the existing customers. A program which appreciates them for their patronage, gives them genuine privileges, respects them and treats them with special care. In a tough market condition – brands that have had the foresight to invest in nurturing these relationships – have an enviable asset that they can leverage. Each one of their satisfied customer – can be made loyal and more importantly an ambassador who would drive more prospects from their network into the brand’s fold. It is never to too late to embark on the mission to optimize and leverage on your existing customer base and maintain growth for your brand. Putting and operating such a campaign requires relatively less resources – put certainly a lot of resolve and patience.

 

5.       Beware of Communication Agencies disguised as Integrated Marketing Agencies

Traditional communication agencies have had and will always have a very important role to play in awareness building of a brand. However the skills that they have and the mass media approach that they have been trained to take – when addressing a demand generation challenge may not be necessarily useful for a brand which has limited or inadequate marketing budgets. Also the effective operational execution of an activation idea on any of the alternative mediums mentioned – requires a skill set that of a specialist and a agency team which has a temperament to deliver on the ground; where the rubber meets the road. Integrated communication has become a buzz word and every agency claims to have competence to do so – beware! When you have to deliver results month after month and have very little margin to fail – do not be the guinea pig for an agency which is using your brand to build credentials as a integrated marketing agency. Look for the true experts – with a proven track record.  

Staying in action , being precise in your marketing effort , partnering with the specialist agencies who can help you to deliver more with less – is an antidote for the negative impact of recession on your brands demand.

Relationships an appreciating asset.

Changing times call for smarter perspectives. As the corporate sentiment takes a swing from unbridled optimism to caution, professionals given the mandate of driving growth face the challenge of quickly adapting to this changed business scenario. Strategy interactions to drive aggressive expansion plans have been replaced by meetings to closely examine revenue streams, client portfolios, operations costs, and profit margins. The list of short term and long term initiatives that populate the minutes of these meetings is as long as a month-end grocery shopping list. Implementing this list is daunting – especially when you are most likely feeling confused than ever before. Revisiting some often discussed management wisdom –may not be a bad idea. The most important task is to track on your revenue growth targets, in a scenario where the marketing budgets have been cut or accountability of the marketing expenditures is being audited with tremendous enthusiasm.

 

The Pareto principle when interpreted in the context of customers or products – suggests that it is commonsense that we focus on the 20% of those customers/products which are in all likelihood contributing to 80% of the revenues.

 

Interestingly there is also the ‘long tail’ perspective. Long Tail marketing treats consumers as individuals with unique interests and needs. The long tail indicates smaller and smaller volumes of each product sold for an ever increasing number of niche products .You only need a few thousand people in the entire world to be interested in your niche offer, to succeed.

 

Given finite marketing resources, what should be the focus ? Do we align ourselves to aggressively push the 20% or should we spread our resources to squeeze out revenues from the ‘long tail’?

 

The choice is not that easy, yet it has to be addressed and a strategy specific to your business drawn out. I would personally not ignore either. There are risks and opportunities that are associated in both: marketing to finite number of customers and in spreading your marketing resources too thin in promoting multiple offerings across numerous small niches. The risk I realise in both cases is largely associated with the extent of loyalty that we would be able to generate. Though a clicheé, the wise thought would be to focus the marketing energies on building or keeping ‘loyal’ customers. A simple analysis of your customer portfolio over the years – would clearly throw up the potential revenues that you can draw out from your loyal customers – while spending the least of your marketing dollar.

 

Building loyal relationships is a tedious task – one which has to be taken up with passion. There are numerous ‘rule books’ elaborating easy steps to build lasting relationships with customers. The quick fix steps often miss the foundations of building relationships: that of needing to build mutual trust and be consistently engaged with the customers. Both are a function of frequency of interactions that the brand has had with the customer and the quality of these interactions. The engagements that the brand initiates to drive interactions need to be relevant to its existing customers. Here is the key challenge. The prospect who becomes a customer a few years back moves from one segment to another, example from a young single adult to a middle aged married adult. The environment around him has also changed. If the brand has over the years been able to lay the foundations of a rewarding relationship with this customer – there is a potential for it to expand its offerings to remain relevant to him as he traverses from one segment to another. Brands which succeed in doing so – increase their share of this customers’ wallet instead of losing him to another brand.

 

In the current scenario – both the customers and brands seek loyalty from each other. They look forward to a reciprocal relationship, one they can depend on to tide over though times. Brands who have invested (time) in building consistent relationship management programs have an advantage. They can leverage this investment and still grow. At their disposal are also some very sophisticated data modeling tools to profile customers and use predictive modeling to anticipate customer behaviour trends and respond to them by aligning their offerings. The ability to generate advocacy, build communities and use networking platforms can further help in optimising their existing relationships. The business of loyalty and customer relationship management is not restricted to loyalty cards, redemption coupons, bundled schemes and databases, nor is it the onus of the marketing department. It needs to be an organisational mandate.

 

As an organisation I would certainly allocate a majority of my energies on further strengthening my relationship with my existing customers to track on my current and future growth targets. The lifetime value of the equity associated with loyal customers can tide over many a recessions that one would see (in a life time).