Insight

At the centre of all our work is an insight. An insight is the term we use for a phrase, statement or group of words that allow us to understand the fundamental benefit of the brand / business.

We will have arrived at this statement by understanding you and your capabilities, the competition, the category and finally the customer. These are what we consider the four most important influences on your brand's performance.

You

Within this area we consider the organisation and its ability to deliver the brand.  The main areas of consideration are:

• Vision, mission and values
• Business / commercial plan
• Organisational structure
• Organisational culture
• Current staff morale and satisfaction
• Skills, capability and capacity in marketing, communications and sales
• Rostered support agencies
• Current deployment of the brand
• Current brand governance

At the end of this analysis we will understand exactly what the brand needs to achieve in an organisational and commercial context, allowing us to create a foundation for the brand that is fit for purpose.

Competition

In this area we consider your competition.  We always carry out this piece of work simultaneously with the customer analysis.  The main areas of consideration are:

• Who are the main direct competitors?
• What other competitors compete for a share of wallet?
• Do we have co-opetition in the sector?
• Of the competitors what are their relative strengths and weaknesses?
• How can our brand exploit the weaknesses?
• As an organisation can we leverage this advantage?
• Will this provide us with sustainable competitive advantage?

Our role is not simply to acknowledge the competitors but actively seek ways to undermine their authority. This is not necessarily about being aggressive but creating sustainable, long term differentiation.

Category

Our category analysis looks at the category holistically and seeks to understand what is happening to it now and what are the future trends that may affect it.

As Brash works in several locations worldwide, we have the ability to take a truly global view. Using trend information we identify areas were the brand has the ability to create competitive advantage by leap frogging competitors. Our main areas of analysis are:

• How is technology affecting the sector and how is this changing buying behaviours?
• What are the latest customer service standards and how adoptable
  are they?
• What are people attitudes to food, fashion, health, living, etc?
• What are the effects of the global financial crisis on sector spending and confidence?
• What are the new business models that are appearing in other sectors?

Our work in this area is not an exercise in stating the obvious but one that seeks to deliver a source of competitive advantage, from which we can build the brand foundation.

Customers

Customers are of course the most important area for us to consider. In our analysis we look at:

• Who your current customer base is and what their motivations for purchase are
• What the basis for customer loyalty is how important this is to the most loyal customers
• What loyal customers say when they advocate you
• Why customers are lost and end up going to a competitors
• The conversion rate and reasons from potential customers to customer and then repeat customer

All of the above allow us to understand what role the brand plays in the lives of your customer and how we can use that as a basis for developing the brand. It also tells us what the 'crown jewels' of the brand are – the items beliefs / emotions that should not be changed.

In many cases the central insight is directly taken from our understanding of the customer base.

Brand foundation

The brand foundation is our phrase for the four components that make up the overall brand strategy. We call it a foundation as it provides the foundation elements for all that we do in connection with the brand. The four components are:

The role of the brand provides the context to the brand idea providing the background on its purpose, its source(s) of authority and crucially the reasons to believe in the claim made by the brand idea. The brand's role is derived directly from the insight.

The brand idea provides the lynchpin for the entire brand foundation, and guides (alongside the values) the delivery of competitive advantage. ?Ideally the brand idea should be a single memorable phrase that sums up the brand's role and ambition. It is usually derived from both the insight and the brand's role.

The brand spirit determines the personality and attributes of your brand. To create the brand spirit we use a number of projective workshop techniques from 'brand a-likes' to using personality archetypes derived from storytelling.

These are the principles that guide your conduct internally and externally. They are the fundamental principles that the brand will aim to deliver consistently through out all its points of touch. The values are derived from the same projective workshop techniques as the brand spirit.

Implications and imperatives

Within our process we spend time with you highlighting the implications and imperatives of the brand foundation.

In all re-branding or brand development exercises there is a gap between the expectations of customers now and in the future once the brand has been launched. Even completely new brands, that have no history, have the same issues. In order that the brand foundation delivers its competitive advantage to the business, this gap needs to be closed as quickly as possible.

At this point in the program we will have (depending on the size of your business) started to work with the company's project management office (PMO). With their help, we will be seeking to leverage their existing pipeline of projects to close the 'gap' between currently reality and desired perception.

• Helping the PMO prioritise projects that could have the largest impact in closing the gap internally or externally
• Identifying the outline the objectives / rationale for new projects that need to be addressed by the PMO
• Using the plan to manage internal expectations via communications (see internal engagement)
• Identifying any risk as a consequence of not delivering the PMO's scheduled plan

We always carry out this due diligence so that your Executive's know and understand what they are committing the organisation to and do so with their eyes wide open.

Internal engagement

Brand programs create positive disruption in organisations. To minimize this we use a six-step methodology right the way through our projects so that key employees and departments are fully involved. The six steps use a series of intrinsic motivators that regardless of culture, job title or role we all look for within our working lives. The six steps are:

• Announce
• Take part
• Vote
• Results
• Launch (x2)
• Maintain

Obviously the same six steps cannot be used in every time. For instance some organisations will skip the 'vote' element or will not want to 'announce' the program internally. However the main premise is to involve and promote not 'tell'. The results of doing this can be unexpected and far-reaching. .

One recent client who had an employee morale issue we asked them to collate stories from around the business during the 'take part' phase of the program. Over 50 video entries were submitted, many of which will now be the subjects of a customer communications campaign, exemplifying the new brand strategy and raising the profile of the employees involved.

Brand architecture and naming

Brand architecture can be simple or complex depending on the organisation's portfolio of products and services, the lines of business that support them and its ability to change or want to change the status quo.

Our approach is to use our understanding of the business in the analysis phase, the agreed position of the masterbrand and work out which products and services align directly to it, could align to it, can't align to it or don't have a clear purpose. By doing this we are able to work out:

• Masterbrand driven (they share the same dna as the masterbrand)
• Endorsed sub-brands (they share some dna)
• Stand alone sub-brands (they share no dna but access valuable markets)
• Brands that exist but need to migrated to one of the above

By creating this structure we can then write the value propositions for the brands within each level, determine what graphic assets are shared across the portfolio, and determine naming systems, url protocols, etc.

Our aim is to create a sustainable, structured brand portfolio that minimises customer confusion, is commercially viable and delivers the vision and mission of the organisation.

Brand management systems and guidelines

The changes that the organisation will be undertaking will have a relatively high OPEX and CAPEX budget attached to it them. These budgets will probably be spent over an 18 months to two years period during which time the organisation will be dealing with a transition from its current to its desired state.

To deal with this and ensure money is spent appropriately and deliverables are fit for purpose we help organisations design and deliver brand management systems and process. These include:

• Staff secondments from Brash
• Agency roster management and accreditation criteria / training
• Agency pitch / tender evaluation
• Asset management systems (intranet / extranet based sites)
• Image libraries (search, selection and negotiation)
• Print consultancy (roster development and QA)
• Helpdesk services
• Workshops (customer journey, inspire, brief writing)

We also create guidelines and artwork that are suitable for the wide range of brand applications and circumstances that will need to be delivered over the lifecycle of the brand.

Brand identity

One of the most noticeable changes within any repositioning exercise is a change to the visual 'look' of the organisation. This can be achieved in two ways:

• Changing the logo and look & feel i.e. dnata
• Changing just the look & feel i.e. Logica

The key determinate of which option is taken is often what is the size of the gap between the existing position and the desired position (During the implications stage of work we will have advised you which path to take and the relative consequences of that decision).

Changing the brand identity has three main benefits:

• It invites reconsideration of the brand as the changes are public and attract attention
• It is a public display of intent by the organisation
• It demonstrates the commitment of the company to the new strategy

Both are powerful drivers internally and externally, however the positive change it brings must be more than skin deep. Cosmetic changes are relatively easy to deliver but it is important that the organisation doesn't create an aspiration that is not deliverable throughout all points of touch.

Communications

Clients often say to us 'but you're a brand consultancy not an advertising agency?' We don't seek to mirror the discipline of advertising however we have seen that this need is often poorly served.

We work with clients to turn the proof points of their brand into communications, substantiating their brand claims and driving traffic to a sales or information channel.

We work with a range of companies to achieve this, working as a team with world class specialists to create the right solutions for your communications needs. Our range of services include:

• PR
• Traditional digital media
• Social media
• Display advertising (print, outdoor, vehicle, owned site based)
• Events (launches)
• Retail / sales experiences (fixed or pop-up sites)

Digital experience and social

In today's modern world many of our brand experiences come from a digital touchpoint. This maybe a website, a smart phone app, a blog, tweet, a presentation on Slideshare or a like recommendation on Facebook.

Whatever the trigger, we will work with you and with selected partners to create those experiences that act as proof points for your brands position. Currently we are working with a team of games designers to look at an augmented reality display for a retailer and a new employee engagement education 'game'.

However developing the breadth and depth of your digital experience need not be complicated. We find many organisations still don't manage the basics and simply require a better understanding and approach to common tools such as:

• Blogs (and content feeds to bloggers)
• Twitter
• Facebook
• LinkedIn
• Slideshare
• Flickr
• Youtube
• Vimeo

All our work in this space is delivered in both English and various Arabic dialects.

Physical experience and events

In many situations the physical and digital experiences are fused together. Go to any event now and people will be capturing video, photos and using Twitter to communicate the occasion.

To capitalise on this valuable 'free' communication we specialise in helping clients create physical experiences and events that act as proof points for the brand foundation. This can be anything from:

• Pop-up sites
• Invitation only saloon style events
• Exhibition stands
• Retail environments
• Sales centre (real estate)

We are currently working with three new retail concepts and a sales centre. All of these projects actively fuse the digital and physical experiences to create something that's acts as tangible proof point to their respective brands.

Vision, mission and values

The title speaks for itself, but we are often asked why we divorce the vision, mission and values (VMV) from the brand foundation.

We do this primarily to recognise that:

• Brand repositioning may not require a change to the corporate vision, mission and values
• The creation of the VMV is a distinct activity in its own right

The creation of the VMV requires:

• An understanding of the business / commercial strategy
• An understanding of the organisational culture
• The personality of the CEO
• The requirements of the Board

All of these aspects allow us to create statements that are fit for purpose in tone, style and level of ambition.

If a project requires a change to the VMV then we will ask that this is launched internally prior to the brand launch so that the brand launch acts as an immediate proof point to the new VMV.

Measurement

We always encourage our clients to set measurement criteria to monitor the effectiveness of the brand programs. These measures create:

• Confidence in the brand delivering a valuable contribution to the business
• A means to adjust the communications mix / content to drive home specific proof points
• An early warning system that alerts the business to the effect of competitive actions

Measurement criteria are often distinct to an organisation but the most common areas to measure are:

• Market share / market volume changes
• Conversion rates from prospects to customers/clients
• Rise in inbound sales enquiries
• Rise in retail footfall / web traffic / social buzz
• Intent to purchase
• Customer satisfaction (based on key brand proof points)

• Employee morale (and other measures of intrinsic satisfaction)

The above can be measured in a variety of different ways and we would work with your research / analyst team to structure the best way to collect and collate this information to create a measurement dashboard.