Branding Blog | Heywood Innovation

Our new blog

2010-12-15T11:47:00.000+11:00

Hello blog readers

After three years of writing for Heywood Innovation's four blogs – branding, employer branding, M&A branding and annual report - I have decided to combine them all into one 'visual' blog that celebrates a new affiliation with our good friends the Taylor & Taylor creative team in Melbourne, and the sensational strategic and creative work that is driving our growth into 2011. The blog features work our teams are producing in the Sydney, Melbourne, London and Birmingham markets. Our new HITT blog can be accessed here.

Best regards

Tony Heywood

Eloquent orators supported by strong branding? Who’d you vote for?

2010-07-09T09:44:00.002+10:00

I’d love to wax lyrical on the influence strong branding has on voters but it may just grate with my supporters in the House. I believe it is a very personal and complex psychological process choosing a political party, akin to the decision-making traumas afflicting many people when compatibility checking a future life partner. It’s like the stuff the fairer sex look out for when selecting a partner... colour of hair, bad breath, IQ, yellow teeth, skin condition, colour of skin, bank account, the Marks & Spencer label on his jacket, gym membership, alimony payments, parking offences, record of mental illness in the family, tattoos expressing his admiration for Mum, sexual preferences, size of ego and other stuff, previous conquests, previous convictions. You know the stuff. They ask pertinent questions along the lines of “Will he discuss the attributes of MasterChef whilst devouring one of Ahmed’s finest shish kebabs after the pub closes?”. “Does he have a sustainable and well paying job in the city or a greengrocer’s shop in Hackney?” “Is that his Hyundai parked outside with the go-faster stripes?” “Does he belong to an exclusive club in the city or Rotherham United Supporters Club?” “Does he talk about his Mum all the time?” “Is that tattooed girl in the corner balancing beer bottles on her head his sister by any chance?” Does he read the Beano in bed?” “Does he prefer to holiday in Bognor Regis?” “Does he have a soft spot for repeats of The Benny Hill Show?”

Well we don’t wear a T-shirt emblazoned with our own personal logo when we’re posturing in the pub eyeing up the opposite sex do we?... lager in hand and Brut liberally applied. ‘Metallica’ yes. ‘Harvard 1997’ possibly, depending on the venue.

I guess it’s much the same when choosing the leader of a political party. I suppose the same questions were running through Samantha’s mind when David Cameron proposed to her. Or was it the visionary Conservative Party logo monogrammed on his Hawes & Curtis shirt that grabbed her? Or the logo etched into his gold cufflinks? The discrete logo tattooed on his buttocks? The bumper sticker on the Bentley? The flag waving gnome sitting beside his garden pond? The monogrammed hankie with which he wiped away her tears after jamming her finger in the car door outside No.10? What do you think?

Looking at the random collection of logos on this page, I’d say there’s room for a rethink. Will a rose really do it for you? Will a green pyramid bring a brave new ecologically satisfying and sustainable lifestyle into your world? Will a tree adjust your thinking? Will Labor in Western Australia have voters reaching for the stars? Will the ‘flashback to 70s Australia’ Liberal logo grab their retro vote?

I reckon the yellow bird would look good on a T-shirt while listening to Nick Clegg and the Democrats down the Nags Head in Bromley High Street next Saturday night. Fair go. It gets my vote. It could do with a more stylish font though.

Tony Heywood is a Fellow of the Design Institute of Australia, founder of Heywood Innovation in Sydney and London with affiliates in Melbourne, Gold Coast, Singapore and Mumbai.

Social Media consumes our lives

2010-05-14T09:40:00.001+10:00

Nielsen’s 2010 Social Media Report has been digging deep inside the minds of Australian internet users and consumers and finding out how aligned they are with social media.

They discovered two important statistics about our online habits:

To source opinions and information about products, services and brands, 86% of internet users rely on social media.
Nearly two in five are interacting with companies via social media.
14% of consumers followed companies/organisations via Twitter – up from 5% in 2008.

Considering that social media is still in its infancy, this is quite a result. With Twitter’s audience alone growing by more than 400% in 2009, expect big things to happen in this space.
I wonder however how many of these are switched on baby boomers?

Mobile social networking is the domain of the young, with 66% under the age of 35 leading the way. And it’s Facebook the winner with 92% of visits, YouTube and Twittter at 18% and not so MySpace at 9%.

Anyway, what does all this mean for mainstream consumers and the companies who sell to them? It suggests that there are big opportunities for brands and companies to engage consumers online.

Does this suggest many Australian need to get a life? Facebook continues to dominate in the world of social networking – 83% of users have it as their main social networking platform. And guess what – they spend an average of more than eight hours each month on the site! Good for online marketers!

Tony Heywood is an international branding consultant and founder of Heywood Innovation in Sydney Australia with affiliates in Melbourne, Gold Coast, London, Singapore and Mumbai.

View some of Heywood’s work on www.heywood.com.au

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Smile on your Facebook

2010-03-22T13:30:00.000+11:00

It was reported this week that Facebook has risen to new heights. Evidently in the week ended 13 March more Americans visited Facebook than Google. It achieved 7.07 percent of total web traffic compared to 7.03 percent for Google. This is the first time Facebook has outdone Google in weekly traffic.

The market share of visits to Facebook.com increased 185 percent during this week as compared with the same week in the previous year. What does all this mean? Do people want to be entertained more than just finding information? Are we now a fully electronically and socially networked society?

The growing popularity of Facebook’s online games is being suggested as the explanation for the site’s surge in traffic. Have we become a planet full of gamers? Is life just one big game?

Here are more stats. Facebook now has more than 400 million regular users around the world. It is suggested that half of these visit Facebook daily to post photos, check their friends’ updates and play games. Do they have a life we ask?

Analysts are encouraging businesses to seriously consider Facebook, and leverage a thriving marketing platform to launch a campaign, information network or even shopfront.

Whatever your views however, I guess this represents 400 million reasons why so many companies are keen to establish their presence and bring a smile to client’s faces.

Tony Heywood is an international branding consultant and founder of Heywood Innovation in Sydney Australia with affiliates in Melbourne, Gold Coast, London, Singapore and Mumbai.

View some of Heywood’s work on www.heywood.com.au

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2010-02-18T13:26:00.001+11:00

Peugeot is a major French car brand, part of PSA Peugeot Citroen, the second largest European car maker.Its vehicles are distributed in more than 150 countries and are universally recognised by their lion logo.

Peugeot’s roots go back to 19th-century coffee mill and bicycle manufacturing in France. The company produced its first automobile in 1891. It was on 20 November 1858 that Emile Peugeot first registered the use of a lion as the brand’s emblem. He asked Julien Blazer, a goldsmith and engraver in the Franche-Comté region of France, to produce the logo for identifying all Peugeot products.

To celebrate its 200th anniversary Peugeot has rebranded courtesy of an in-house design team. The new age lion has apparently got faster and more sensitive with the tagline ‘motion and emotion’. But is it a lion? The reworking or re-interpretation of many high profile corporate logos inevitably prompts often adverse comment from the design community, and this one has not escaped the critical gaze of many outspoken brand experts....

The reworking has been likened to a bear, a wolf, a jaguar on hind legs, a man in a silly rigid bear suit, a man/bear/pig, video game creature or the cowardly lion from the Wizard of Oz!

One of the more intelligent comments was “the least appealing and emotive rendering they (Peugeot) have ever used”.

I think it is certainly more modern but has strayed from its classical lion heritage. Compare it to the Holden lion and it could be suggested that some unfortunate breeding with other species may have occurred. Naughty lion.

What do you think?

Tony Heywood is an international branding consultant and founder of Heywood Innovation in Sydney Australia with affiliates in Melbourne, Gold Coast, London, Singapore and Mumbai.

View some of Heywood’s work on www.heywood.com.au

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A little inspiration for 2010

2010-01-08T16:13:00.002+11:00

Here are a few choice statements that have motivated the team here recently and which seem very pertinent to the challenges and opportunities we perceive for 2010...

“The man who starts out going nowhere generally gets there”.
Dale Carnegie

“If we are to achieve results never before accomplished, we must expect to employ methods never before attempted”.
F Bacon

“Wherever you see a successful business, someone has made a courageous decision”.
Peter Drucker

“Management is doing things right. Leadership is doing the right thing”.
Peter Drucker

“It is not the strongest of the species that survive, nor the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change”.
Charles Darwin

“Imagination rules the world”.
Napoleon Bonaparte

“He who is not courageous to take risks in life will achieve nothing in life”.
Muhammad Ali

“If things seem under control, you are just not going fast enough”.
Mario Andretti

Tony Heywood is an international branding consultant and founder of Heywood Innovation in Sydney Australia with affiliates in Melbourne, Gold Coast, London, Singapore and Mumbai.

View some of Heywood’s work on www.heywood.com.au

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Why an audit is an essential prelude to a branding review

2009-12-07T15:44:00.002+11:00

Prior to undertaking a branding review, you need to gather all applications - tangible and intangible - which contribute to the success of the brand. These range from business cards to mainstream advertising to the way your receptionist is answering the phone to the way your salespeople are dressed to what your employees are saying on Twitter. The objective is to determine how applications are being used, guidelines adhered to, levels of quality and consistency and how these are impacting on the experience your audiences have of the brand and their perception of it.

Putting all of an organisation’s materials side-by-side in the one place can be a sobering experience for many. It inevitably identifies shortcomings such as...

quality issues
levels of inconsistency
relevance to the task
whether materials are outdated
omissions
relevance to the organisation’s short and long term business objectives

A visual audit however, can only achieve so much. The way in which the materials are used is important as this tends to identify whether they remain appropriate for their intended purpose since they were introduced or whether they need to be changed or even deleted. Do employee induction materials reflect the downturn-driven changes the company has made in the last 12 months? Are point-of-sale messages consistent with the organisation’s current advertising? Are machinery operating instructions consistent with workplace safety requirements? Does the organisation’s product packaging suitably reflect its stance on sustainability? Do the messages on motivational posters throughout the organisation truly reflect the culture of the organisation and its attitude to employees? Are customer communications saying the right things for the way in which the organisation wishes to conduct its business moving forward into 2010 and beyond? Is your marketing department disengaged by the events of 2009 and operating with blinkered vision that may just be detrimental to how the business and its products need to be perceived to capture new market opportunities?

Heywood Innovation’s audit reports probe significantly deeper than a simple check on whether the organisation’s logo and colours are correctly reproduced! Key components of the organisation’s brand are its employees and customers. We conduct online surveys and facilitated workshops with employees, key managers, executives and customers to gauge their real perceptions of the brand at this moment in time and collect their ideas. We get to know what employees’ thoughts are on the materials with which they work - whether they are helping them do their job or hindering them, and whether the employees have ideas for improvements or something totally new.

An audit conducted by an external resource like Heywood Innovation will guarantee an objective viewpoint based around questions, comments and recommendations that would challenge most internal resources.

How does your brand stack up with the organisation’s business plans and vision for the future?

Are the materials which represent the organisation’s brand appropriate to support the organisation’s business plans and vision for 2010? Have there been significant changes to the way in which the organisation operates since the upheavals of 2009 to warrant changes to the way the brand is expressed and ultimately perceived both internally and externally?

The answers to these questions can only be answered by a well considered and executed audit. Now would be an ideal time to consider this before the post-Christmas momentum takes hold...

Tony Heywood is an international branding consultant and founder of Heywood Innovation in Sydney Australia with affiliates in Melbourne, Gold Coast, London, Singapore and Mumbai.

View some of Heywood’s work on www.heywood.com.au

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What is sustainable?

2009-10-16T14:32:00.002+11:00

One of the buzzwords that is increasingly used in the corporate world is ‘sustainability’. Over the last few years it has firmly entrenched itself in the vocabulary of branding. Yet I’m not entirely convinced everyone has a good grasp of what it means.

Application 1
In these ‘recovering’ times when there is still much doubt about our future business prospects, ‘sustainability’ is being used to describe an organisation’s potential to survive on a long term basis, suggesting that it will have to adopt beliefs, behaviours and practices consistent with being able to achieve this.

Application 2
‘Sustainability’ can allude to an organisation’s responsibility and commitment to helping save the planet and its people.This can refer to the influence it has on external communities with which it may or may not come into contact, and/or the influence it has on its own employees.

Application 3
‘Sustainability’ can also jump into the change arena and suggest ‘transformation’ and ‘innovation’ and ‘moving away from conventional thinking and practices’. It often refers to the way we live – the new options we have available as individuals to build sustainable communities, living and working harmoniously with the environment.

Not many people associate its relationship with an organisation’s brand. Not many see it as a core function of the business, relegating it to a compliance requirement associated with managing business risks and yet another box that needs to be ticked in the annual report each year. This is an increasingly regulated world where we are expected to cut emissions and move to low-carbon sources. It makes sense for an organisation to do this claim a stake in a sustainable future and add strength to its brand. For companies who are reliant on fossil fuels and water say, their sustainable actions may well determine the future viability of their business. With sustainability underpinning your brand, it may well provide a competitive edge over similar brands. Sustainability may not sell more product, but it can enhance brand credibility of the company behind the product and the potential to impress investors and attract them its way.

Because sustainability is now a consideration at most brand touchpoints, it has become one of the supporting pillars of the brand, alongside such essentials as culture and values. Audiences are increasingly aware of it as it gains more exposure in the media. This has prompted stakeholders, employees, suppliers, government and the press to ask questions on the subject relating to how an organisation manufactures and sells its products, what they’re made of, how it treats its employees, how it supports local communities and so on – questions directly relating to how it operates and whether it thinks beyond the factory gate about ‘the bigger picture’. At the end of the day, people want to know whether the organisation is a good citizen.

People are increasingly less forgiving of companies caught polluting, funding governments, covering up financial irregularities, paying outlandish bonuses and having poor attitudes to workplace relations. Organisations seen as ‘responsible’ and adopting acceptable behaviours are finding new favour in the investor community.

This has lead to companies investigating ways to leverage their sustainability focus to gain exposure and build value into their brand. Sourcing coffee from Rainforest Alliance Certified farms, cars made from high proportions of recyclable materials, energy efficient appliances, proportions of revenue donated to AIDS research, local community initiatives, educating children in Third World countries – there are many opportunities to contribute.

The challenge for companies is to align sustainability initiatives with stakeholder expectations and ensure they are consistent with the overall business strategy. There is a risk however, that some customer segments will have little or no regard for the company’s interest in this area, while some will have high expectations.

Failing to address sustainable business practices can have dire consequences either directly or through supplier relationships. Nike’s image has been battered on several occasions with revelations concerning its supply arrangements with Third World ‘sweat shops’. An article in the San Francisco Bay Guardian from an Indonesian worker summed up her experience of Nike “... labourers faced with forced overtime, minimum-wage violations, illegally low training wages, and abusive employers in countries such as China, South Korea and Indonesia to which Nike has contracted its manufacturing.” This is the stuff that PR company dreams are made of.

Organisations must recognise that ‘sustainability’ needs to be a recognisable mindset, not a part time indulgence. There are many instances of ‘greenwashing’, jumping on the sustainability band wagon and using public relations activities to crank up false perceptions. It is surprisingly easy to identify these organisations.

An organisation’s attitude to sustainability therefore has a direct bearing on people’s perception of the organisation, its brand and the ultimate value of the brand.

Tony Heywood is an international branding consultant and founder of Heywood Innovation in Sydney Australia with affiliates in Melbourne, Gold Coast, London, Singapore and Mumbai.

View some of Heywood’s work on www.heywood.com.au

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The dark art of branding

2009-09-14T11:14:00.004+10:00

With a thankful sigh, the CEO signs the last letter of the day. It is 6.45pm on a cool winter night in the Sydney central business district. Dark rain clouds scud across the darkening sky. The rain batters the window and the muffled sounds of homeward bound traffic are heard in the street below. His secretary, standing close by, clutching her soft kid handbag against her stylish raincoat, takes it from his hand, folds it neatly and inserts it into the waiting envelope. Her tongue briefly caresses the gummed flap. She smoothes it down and a brief smile lightens her face... “Do have a pleasant weekend Mr Donnelly”. And with that she is gone into the night. A distant door slams shut. In the meagre light from the desk lamp a mysterious grin is seen to spread across CEO Theodore Donnelly’s face and transforms his usually friendly features. His body slumps forward in the chair and his hands grip the edge of the desk. He rises awkwardly from his black leather chair, his large frame casting a dark and sinister shadow across the far wall. Slowly and unsteadily he crosses the room to where his wall safe is concealed behind a framed print of a Chinese girl with a face glowing eerily in the low light. He leans awkwardly against the wall as his tortured eyes strain to see the combination numbers of the safe. The tumblers fall into place and the heavy door yields to his anxiously tugging hand. He reaches in. Something suddenly moves in the dark recesses of the safe. His hand is grabbed by something unknown. It feels as though it is being pulled from its socket. He wrenches his arm back and forth in one mighty effort and it is released. He grabs the battered envelope before him and slams the safe door shut.

Crossing the room, he sits once more at his desk. Pulling the desk lamp nearer, he opens the envelope and slides the large dusty book out of the envelope. There before him lay the object of his innermost desires. Ye Olde Booke of Branding Spells. The faded script on the front cover proclaims ‘He who masters these spells shall have control over the hearts and minds of all before him’. He lifts the heavy cover and turns it over. He briefly notices a small imprint on the inside cover ‘First published by K. Roberts, Lancaster, Auckland and New York 1504’ which causes him to wince. His eyes move to the first page. He slowly reads the words aloud. “Mind control. The dark art of visual and verbal persuasion. Mix together words and images to control people’s minds and instil a sense of wellbeing way beyond their financial means. Ingredients: a twist of mystery, two shakes of flippancy, an ounce of bullshit, a teaspoon of hubris, a scoop of overspending and two parts of overindulgence. Mix well and apply liberally. As this is a somewhat unstable set of ingredients, results cannot be guaranteed. Ensure you stand well back following application as after affects can be catastrophic”. He looked longingly at the book. “Thank you”.

Here at Heywood Innovation we do claim to produce magical results for our clients. These however tend to be the result of tried and tested methods honed over a 20 year period and applied with loving care. There are no potions in our cupboard that transform underperforming brands into sector leaders overnight. Our BrandGuidanceSystem however, when diligently applied, triumphs every time over the dark arts. You should try it.

Lizard’s tongue or eye of newt anyone? Good for uplifting brand libido so they tell me!

Tony Heywood is an international branding consultant and founder of Heywood Innovation in Sydney Australia with affiliates in Melbourne, Gold Coast, London, Singapore and Mumbai.

View some of Heywood’s work on www.heywood.com.au

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Essential requirements for a successful brand – PART 2

2009-08-13T15:01:00.003+10:00

A strong brand is an essential contributor to a company’s success. Consequently my company Heywood Innovation encounters many companies who are eager to further their understanding of what branding is and what it can achieve for them. No two companies encounter exactly the same challenges and opportunities. This requires of a dedicated branding consultancy like Heywood Innovation an in-depth understanding of your business and what will influence the future success of your brand. The following are key influencers of a corporate brand’s success.

ENGAGE YOUR PEOPLE
They’ll love you for it
Branding begins on the inside. If the people on the inside don’t understand and respect your brand, how do you expect the people on the outside to? Employees, managers and executives all play a part in the creation of your brand. They must be consulted right from the start. Make them aware of the company’s vision and how the brand must be developed around it. Explain to them the role they play in its development and its success. Excite them, engage them and inspire them to live the brand. Without their support and involvement the brand will undoubtedly fail.
>    involve your people from start to finish
>    keep them informed
>    get them to live the brand
>    appoint brand champions

CREATE POWERFUL AND PERSUASIVE COMMUNICATIONS
... that are consistent with the brand
Your investment in a new brand will be compromised if you do not tell people about it – what it means, the vision that it represents, what its values are and the promise that it makes to its employees and customers. Crafting a ‘look & feel’ that is distinctive and brings life to the brand. Create language that enhances and distinguishes all forms of communications – corporate, marketing, internal and investor. Consistency of branded communications is critical right from the start, to ensure that key messages create the same impression and tell the same story, regardless of the media employed.
>    create a distinctive and recognisable visual style
>    develop brand language and a written style
>    ensure communications styles adapt to various audiences
>    introduce and maintain consistency

STRONG EXPRESSION
Create a positive impression
First impressions are important. To create a positive first impression a brand must look good and be differentiated from other brands. Strength is built from consistency. All applications must be consistent in the way they present the brand – from business cards to brochures to your website. Applications however are not all visual. If you own a health spa network for example, you want customers to be greeted by a distinctive fragrance, one they will savour and one they will remember regardless of location. Remember that people are influenced by what they see, what they read, what they hear, what they smell and what they touch.
>    first impressions count
>    consistency is important
>    consider more than just what people see and read

MEASURE RESULTS
Determine your brand’s performance
A new brand’s performance must be regularly monitored and assessed against predetermined performance criteria. Once the new brand has been launched, it needs ongoing attention, direction and refinement. You need to ensure it is performing and that you are receiving a return on your investment. Without measurement there is no accountability, and without accountability, brands, products, processes and people cannot be improved. What aspects of the brand do you need to measure? ... understanding and appreciation by your employees, how and to what extent it is influencing your audiences, influence on sales performance... and much more.
>    accountability is an important factor
>    brands need constant refinement
>    without measurement it is unlikely that your brand will improve

Tony Heywood is an international branding consultant and founder of Heywood Innovation in Sydney and co-founder of BrandSynergy in Singapore.

View some of Heywood’s work on www.heywood.com.au

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Essential requirements for a successful brand – PART 1

2009-08-06T14:49:00.007+10:00

A strong brand is an essential contributor to a company’s success. Consequently my company Heywood Innovation encounters many companies who are eager to further their understanding of what branding is and what it can achieve for them. No two companies encounter exactly the same challenges and opportunities. This requires of a dedicated branding consultancy like Heywood Innovation an in-depth understanding of your business and what will influence the future success of your brand. The following are key influencers of a corporate brand’s success.

DISCOVERY
Discover the real you
The first stage in any branding project is to understand what your present brand is, what it is capable of becoming and what it can achieve. To source this information we engage your team with our facilitated TeamPlan process that we employ to enormous effect to focus group thinking, ‘cut through the clutter’, develop ideas and enable the team to take ownership of the brand’s direction.
>   provides accurate information on your present situation
>   helps gain insight to what can be achieved
>    ensures the branding team head in the right direction

FUTURE VISION
What you hope to become and to achieve
Essential to the success of your brand is a powerful vision for the future. Without this there are no clear objectives for the brand to work towards and no identifiable goals to achieve. We work with company leaders to create, manage and implement long term vision for their brands. Jointly we develop an achievable vision and bring it to life by visualising it and creating innovative ways of communicating it to your audiences.
>   understand how you see the future of your company and its industry
>   identify opportunities and threats that might impair the vision
>   discover your organisation’s core assets and competencies
>   make it a powerful and passionate story that permeates your organisation

WHAT’S YOUR NAME?
The most important brand element
A name is the one element in branding that you hope never to change. It must reflect your company’s personality and its core brand values. In a world inundated with names, yours must be differentiated from competitors and truly memorable. The opening up of global markets means that your company name and those of your products and services must transcend cultural and linguistic barriers. It must also be registerable as a trademark to protect your rights.
>   make your name distinctive and different
>   ensure it is easily pronounced and understood by your key audiences
>   ensure it has no negative connotations in other cultures and languages
>   register it to protect your intellectual property rights

KEY BRAND DRIVER
The heart of your brand
Deep within your brand lies a quality, a belief, a differentiator that is central to its success. The one thing that drives your business forward, that your competitors cannot match. Why is it essential to identify your brand’s driver? To be successful a brand needs to be differentiated from all others and hold a perception in the minds of its audiences that it is the only one that can satisfy their needs. Ideally their perception should be based on one clear and endearing aspect of your brand that stands head and shoulders above those of all competitors.
>   one clear and endearing aspect of your brand
>   helps differentiate your brand
>   helps build a positive perception of your brand in your audiences’ minds

IT'S A LONG TERM PLAN
An investment with interest
Corporate branding doesn’t happen overnight. It’s unlikely that you will gain the total benefits of a new brand within 12 months. Look at it as a minimum three year programme to establish the brand, ensure it addresses the objectives of your future vision, nurture it, gain feedback, refine it and monitor its performance. Brands grow and must respond to ongoing external and internal forces. Adjustment and refinement are a necessity. Put in place guidelines to ensure that the agreed direction is followed and the brand is consistently applied.
>   results don’t happen overnight
>   determine performance criteria
>   monitor and test
>   be prepared to adjust and refine

Tony Heywood is an international branding consultant and founder of Heywood Innovation in Sydney and co-founder of BrandSynergy in Singapore.

View some of Heywood’s work on www.heywood.com.au

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Brand intelligence. How to take the risk out of brand decision making.

2009-07-23T11:55:00.006+10:00

Being in the branding business is full of risks. The biggest one at the moment is getting paid. And that’s after you’ve been to hell and back trying to win the job in the first place. Seriously, some people in this business take big risks with their clients’ reputations and livelihoods by prescribing ‘solutions’ founded on ‘gut feel’, the direction of the wind, the day of the month, the alcohol content in their bloodstream and sometimes the patterns of tea leaves in the bottom of their cup. Sometimes it just makes you cringe when you witness a client happy to cut corners, rely on an expert’s opinion, go for the cheapest option and neither they nor the brand ‘expert’ have a clue what’s really inside the heads of their customers, employees, shareholders, suppliers and the people who clean the offices. And sometimes the Board neither. There’s a fatal streak in many clients spawned from a level of confidence that ‘we know what we’re doing’, ‘we’ve been there before and it came out alright’ and ‘the tea leaves never lie’. A perverse need to take risks and enjoy the thrills, usually at the expense of someone else’s money, job, reputation or company.

The more intelligent companies realise that you need to get inside the heads of your various communities, the people who really matter – on the inside and on the outside – who are the life blood that keeps the business rolling. What are they thinking right now? And here’s where deep psychoanalysis will reveal your inner fears. Do they like me? Do they fear me? Do they think I don’t know my job? Will they laugh when I open my mouth to speak? Do they think I’m a dangerous risk taker at the reins of the business who never researches before making a decision that may impact on the wellbeing and future of the business? No, it’s not you we want to know about, it’s them. We’ll deal with you and your innermost fears later. It’s about the customers who love your brand. Those who hate it. Those employees who would go to the ends of the earth to work for you and dedicate their life to you. Those who are disengaged by the risky world around them. Those with little faith in the future. Those who think your vision pierces their very soul. Those who don’t work for you but wish they could. Those who speak volumes about you at every opportunity. Those who give you home baked cookies for your birthday. What do they think right now? Are they for you or against you, or simply don’t care? You have to find out. What a wealth of insight and knowledge lies so near at hand. A mass of ideas that could form the blueprint for brand transformation and success. And how many get to do this? Not many. In the words of motivational speaker and philosopher Jim Rohn... “Some do, some don’t”. It’s up to you whether you enjoy the risky stuff. Throw the dice and hope for the best. Be the big shot. On the other hand it makes a lot more sense to commission an online survey – of your customers, employees, shareholders and suppliers. They only cost a few thousand dollars. Look upon it as an insurance policy for the future. How much is your brand worth by comparison? Better find out. Start here. Right now. And tell that ‘expert’ to get lost. You’ve got more intelligent things to do.

Tony Heywood is an international branding consultant and founder of Heywood Innovation in Sydney and co-founder of BrandSynergy in Singapore.

View some of Heywood’s work on www.heywood.com.au

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All part of the service

2009-07-10T15:13:00.000+10:00

Service brands require the services (!) of employer branding more than product brands. After all, service brands are people centric. They rely on people to be always giving of their best – customers who interact with employees see that person as being truly representative of the brand. If that person is offering less than great service, let’s say they’re having a bad hair day, their favourite team just lost or their car just broke down, then there is a likelihood that they will not be truly living and expressing the brand. And it only takes one bad service experience to lose that customer for life.

Customers can therefore have very different experiences with a service brand. If the performance isn’t consistent or fails to live up to the customer’s expectations of what great service should be, the prospects for customer satisfaction and future sales through word of mouth are at risk.

Service-based organisations need to do a more thorough job when it comes to communicating with and engaging their employees. Brand managers in particular are beginning to change their traditional belief system that ‘the customer is always king’ to one where ‘if we don’t value our employees and keep them engaged and motivated, we’ll never have customers in the first place’. Get it right on the inside first before you tackle the outside.

Sadly bad service is all around us. Websites that don’t work. Telephone sales people that annoy. Transport without a timetable. Restaurants that don’t care. Banks that treat you like a number which is never number one. The financial downturn however is teaching companies the hard way that a service company has to offer exceptional service. Many of those that offered only average service are no longer with us.

Change has made companies realise that ‘our staff are essential to the success of our brand and our ability to attract and retain happy and loyal customers’. Conversely ‘a successful brand is essential to our ability to atttract and retain happy and loyal employees’.

Company profits going backwards are stimulating more internal reviews to make staff realise what exceptional service really is and how to achieve it. Companies must ensure that their employees understand what their brand stands for, what its competitive benefits are and how to articulate them to customers, and deliver a compelling proposition of what the brand can mean to that customer.

Remember. Every employee action and everything they say reflects on the brand.

Tony Heywood is an international branding consultant and founder of Heywood Innovation in Sydney and co-founder of BrandSynergy in Singapore.

View some of Heywood’s work on www.heywood.com.au

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Vale One Centre and Billy Blue

2009-06-19T10:23:00.000+10:00

The past few weeks have witnessed the passing of two Sydney-based creative icons.

One Centre was a relatively recent addition to the Australian creative scene, distinguished by a strong desire to create and grow brands on a global scale and seemingly driven with great passion. Rapid growth, stellar ambitions and a craving to employ the cream of Australia’s available creative talent despite the continuing financial gloom, sounded an ominous warning to those who have experienced previous downturns. It is all too easy to criticise those businesses that have tried and not succeeded. One Centre however should be both a warning and an inspiration to all creative businesses of the difficulties that can befall the bold and the brave, but also what can be achieved with high ambition and vision underpinned by a talented team. The business is presently in administration and waiting for a cashed up suitor to run the ruler over the figures and the prospects. I wish them well.

The well known and well respected creative icon Billy Blue is closing its doors after what must be 30 years in business. When I first arrived in Sydney in 1980 from recession-torn England and willingly immersed myself in vibrant new surroundings, I noticed one day a beautifully designed free magazine called Billy Blue, the likes of which I had never seen before. Its wide acceptance, high recognition and ability to integrate fine words and inspired design, succeeded in establishing the name and spawned the Billy Blue empire, comprising creative business, design school and hotel school. What a great shame it has gone. An important chapter in Sydney creative culture has been consigned to the history pages. My regards to all therein who have pushed forward Australian design boundaries. Thank you for the inspiration.

A blight on this recession. May it end soon.

Tony Heywood is an international branding consultant and founder of Heywood Innovation in Sydney and co-founder of BrandSynergy in Singapore.

View some of Heywood’s work on www.heywood.com.au

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Wow, Richard Murdoch gets it wrong!

2009-05-21T08:59:00.001+10:00

Saatchi & Saatchi get’s it right. Neil Shoebridge gains a few column inches but not a lot of credibility. In that hallowed journal the Australian Fin Review today it has been reported by the abovementioned scribbler that Rupert Murdoch, in a moment of weakness while reporting a 47% operating slump in his empire’s operating income, proclaimed that “the worst is over”. Yes, he was referring to the global financial calamity. Really, as if any self respecting business owner would take any heed of that, never mind global chief executive of Saatchi & Saatchi Kevin Roberts as a restaurant critic. Kev goes on to say quite modestly, in a moment of creative and intellectual muscle flexing, that in his talks with chief executives in the US and the UK, 2010 will be another tough year. That must have been a real tricky one to figure out. I guess that’s headline news for many people. Darn it! And I thought I could go out and celebrate in January. Guess that’s another wasted year. Kev, how could you ruin it for so many people. Just when we’d built up some real confidence. You must be a real party pooper from way back. And then he gets on his soap box and astonishes us all with his concept of ‘winning ugly together (with clients)’. This boy just doesn’t give up. Fresh from his famed Lovemarks (really!) concept where brands have replaced women as the object of men’s desires (and vice versa), ‘winning ugly’ naturally requires companies to give up their relationships with all other ad agencies apart from good ol’ S&S and guess what? Yes you got it! They’re obliged to transfer all business to S&S. Just think what this guy could achieve selling Chryslers in up state Noo Joysey right now. With love marks on the dashboard and a ‘Let’s get ugly together’ sign on the back seat... who knows what may happen.

Tony Heywood is an international branding consultant and founder of Heywood Innovation in Sydney and co-founder of BrandSynergy in Singapore.

View some of Heywood’s work on www.heywood.com.au

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Corporate brand used as an endorsement

2009-04-21T17:11:00.000+10:00

In a competitive marketplace consumers need reassurance that the product they are about to purchase has high levels of quality and reliability. Sometimes the product brand needs a little extra support to ensure these demands are met. This little extra can come in the form of corporate endorsement where the strength of the corporate brand is leveraged to support and enhance the product brand. The two appear together, on the product, on packaging and in advertising. The corporate brand as a result is given more exposure than it normally would have.

What is the down side? What if the product bombs? The corporate brand may be tarnished for some time.
Virgin has used the corporate brand name across its entire product portfolio. The much publicised problems relating to its rail franchise could very well have tarnished the Virgin brand. The fact that it hasn’t is testament to the strength of the core brand.

Placing the corporate and product brands together allows the product brand to assume its own identity and positioning, but also source added strength from the corporate brand and its perceived qualities. This approach can help when a company wishes to introduce new products into a mature market, where it can be very difficult to gain penetration without the visual endorsement of a strong and credible corporate parental brand.

Cadbury does this very well with its many confectionery products – Cadbury’s Creme Egg, Cadbury’s Bournville, Cadbury’s Roses, Cadbury’s Caramello where each product name has assumed the role of product brand.

In the case of Heinz the corporate name endorses product descriptors as opposed to product brands eg Heinz Baked Beans, Heinz Tomato Ketchup, Heinz Cream of Mushroom Soup etc.

What should be the visual size relationship between the two brands? This varies from one company to another depending on your objectives. Sometimes the corporate brand has equal prominence to the product name where the corporate brand is used very much as an identifier. Sometimes the corporate brand assumes a small size where it is used primarily as an endorsement.

Endorsement branding is increasingly used as a mechanism to integrate brand structure across country markets, providing a common element to unify product offerings. Sometimes different cultures, different consumer tastes and differing perception of the brands can dictate that the relationship must change from country to country.

A good example of this is leading coffee manufacturer Douwe Egbert with its ‘lady logo’ which appears on its coffee products worldwide. The size of the lady varies from country to country. The related positioning statement also changes so that in Spain the positioning emphasises coffee richness while in Holland, the association is with family values and comfort.

In conclusion, yes there can be considerable upside to corporate brand endorsement so long as you have confidence in the integrity of the product brand.

Tony Heywood is an international branding consultant and founder of Heywood Innovation in Sydney and co-founder of BrandSynergy in Singapore.

View some of Heywood’s work on www.heywood.com.au

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What value brands now?

2009-04-09T17:20:00.000+10:00

Brand valuation companies like Interbrand must be rubbing their hands with glee. All those brand valuations they did in 2007 and 2008 don’t exactly count for very much in 2009. They have to start all over again. All but the fortunate few companies will be shadows of their former selves. Many of these would have paid substantial sums to protect themselves with the brand valuation ‘comforter’, this calculation of brand value using complex and often incomprehensible methodologies lying somewhere between science, accountancy, higher mathematics and astrology. Was this also meant to be a reliable guide as to how the company would fare in future months and years? If so, I guess it didn’t work. The future is as unpredictable as ever, as anyone in the creative business will tell you. After 30+ years in the business my experience has been that you’re lucky to be able to predict two weeks ahead. I guess that’s what makes it exciting, and not the most stable of career paths.

I digress. Brands also are unpredictable. Take Pacific Brands here in Australia. An iconic suite of Australian brands that can trace their origins back to 1893, whose products were spruiked by the likes of Pat Rafter and billionaire Sarah Murdoch – Berlei, King Gee, Yakka to name a few. 1,850 jobs slashed, 200 brands being sold off, manufacturing being transferred overseas, share price at record low. I wonder what the brand value was in 2008 and what it is right now? Get my drift? Brands go out of fashion particularly when price is an issue. In the case of Pacific Brands, its demise has been centred for many years around its inability to manufacture at a price that could compete with overseas manufacturers.

You’d like to think share price comes into the valuation equation. Let’s take good old Royal Bank of Scotland. Back in 2007 shares were cruising around £6.30. At the beginning of this year they were dredging the bottom at 20p.

Controversy can contribute to a decline in brand value. The Satyam brand, yet to recover from the ‘cooking the books’ controversy, has recently been revalued at 87.8% less than its 2008 FY valuation. Brands such as these remain valuable assets but presently are damaged and don’t reflect their true value.

Brands have gotten onto companies’ balance sheets mainly through the efforts of accountants and some branding agencies. Complex formulae have been devised to demonstrate in a logical and rational way that brand value can stand up and be scrutinised along with all the other company assets. The brand is thereby given credibility in financial circles and also with shareholders, who now have something else to ponder over their tea and biscuit at the AGM.

Despite my critical stance, brand valuation does mean a great deal to those brands who maintain a high profile with the buying public eg airlines, fashion labels and alcoholic beverages. Here the brand is by far the most significant asset – as in the case of Pacific Brands, with outdated factories, machinery and manufacturing processes that have little value in the potential fire sale to come. But the brands can live on, providing they fall into safe hands who can revitalise and rebuild brand value.

At the end of the day real brand value is simply calculated as the amount the market will reasonably pay for the brand. There are plenty of examples of companies who have been sold for an amount far in excess of their accepted valuation, either because the purchaser could see new and better ways to leverage the asset or because they made a monumental cock-up.

Tony Heywood is an international branding consultant and founder of Heywood Innovation in Sydney and co-founder of BrandSynergy in Singapore.

View some of Heywood’s work on www.heywood.com.au

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Brand changing times

2009-04-06T09:20:00.000+10:00

Yes, it’s getting really ugly out there. We all thought in our ignorance that this was just a passing phase, that a modest readjustment down on windy Wall Street was all it needed to fix a bit of greed and arrogance. Maybe just a six month thing, then we’d be back cruising the car show rooms, flocking to the open houses and living the social life fantastic. We got suckered in big time. This is for real. Real hurt. Reality do without. The beer ran out and the pub’s gone. Some people haven’t had to 'do without' before in their lives. I tell you there’s nothing like deprivation to bring out the best and worst in people. Truth is there’s no money left. This is change we can really believe in, like the man said. Bankers are copping the flack at the G20 meeting in London. Not a good time to wear a suit in the city. Empty bottle on the bowler time. A good time though for the anarchists to come out of hiding and flex their intellectual muscles with a brick or two. I digress. Who’d want to be in retail? Even retail king Gerry Harvey is crying over his unsold LCD screens and TomToms. The simple formula is: consumers don’t spend, so companies don’t spend. And if you’re in the service industry that sucks. Companies aren’t spending because they have no cash. It’s a consumers paradise if you have a bit of that fondly remembered stuff called cash lying around. Retailers will bite your arm off. Blood on the pavements. I never thought I’d see the day when shop windows would display loud signage proclaiming sales discounts of more than 50%... but they’re out there. Just like the mens fashion outlets, our trousers really are down. All this deprivation has heralded the Age of Big Emotional engagement. Brands have to work hard big time. They really do have to get inside your head and press those emotion buttons like never before. Big attraction and big differentiation are the big requirements for the New Brands. Forget the soppy Lovemarks and posturing in new age restaurants in Heysham. This is Brand Reality time over a pint of Boddingtons in Blackpool. Cut the crap time for products. Truth rules. No more romantic nonsense courtesy of big budgets and head-in-the-clouds admen. Good honest products for a good honest price accompanied by good honest 'emotions penetrating' sales patter. Yes, consumers still want the fancy stuff on which to spend their recession shrivelled funds. But they don’t want a multi million dollar ad campaign assaulting their senses, desperately persuading them to buy it. Now you can really choose what you want in your own time. It’s time to reconsider our approach. Yes, it’s time to beat the competition if there is any left, with innovative and cost-effective ideas to get inside consumers’ heads. It’s also a good time to get inside their heads anyway to find out what they’re thinking right now. Recessions can do strange things to consumer buying habits. What was good last year is now all stirred and shaken. It’s time to think differently. Tap into their present desires. Do they want more or less? Or more for less? Knowledge is king. The sobering thought is... get it wrong now and you won’t have a business left. Get it right and you’ll be laughing like never before. Recessions have a habit of spawning new brand heroes.

(with apologies to Kevin Roberts – he’s not a bad chap really for a north country man, just fell in with the wrong crowd)

Tony Heywood is an international branding consultant and founder of Heywood Innovation in Sydney and co-founder of BrandSynergy in Singapore.

View some of Heywood’s work on www.heywood.com.au

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Car brands fail the crash test

2009-03-20T10:01:00.004+11:00

Oh no, not more recession stuff! ‘Fraid so.

These are extraordinary times we are going through and a total contrast to the free spending, confident and carefree times we were enjoying only a year ago. Following are some chilling statistics regarding the state of the world’s auto brands mixed with a bit of crystal ball gazing.

I predicted in this blog before Christmas 2008 that Chrysler would become a big casualty and it looks increasingly as though my prediction will come true. The company lacks the ability to secure sufficient finance to guarantee a future beyond the first few months of 2009 and has few new models with which to secure an ‘exciting’ rating and win back buyer interest and respect for the brand. GM on the other hand may just be saved by its radical restructuring of recent months into four core brands, its more adventurous new model line up and last minute dash for credibility in the hybrid stakes.

So which other car brands are in strife? Hummer is up for sale. Daimler has a (worthless) 20% stake in Chrysler and is struggling to make money as a result of model succession issues and having no small engines. Smart is down to one model and is losing sales to the Fiat 500 and Toyota’s newly released iQ city car. GM’s German brand Opel may be forced to consider an alliance with BMW and Daimler. Aston Martin’s sales down 28% and Land Rover sales down 30% in 2008. Will BMW be forced to collaborate with its arch enemy Daimler or will it look to Italy? In Australia the gas guzzling Holden Monaro is no more. Lancia’s much vaunted UK launch has been cancelled. Luxury brand Maybach is to be killed off in 2012. The hi-performance Dodge Viper sports car brand is up for sale and unwanted. Honda’s much publicised $200m annual budget Formula 1 team is no more. And Tesla, one of the electric technology saviours, is delaying a much needed new model as it struggles to find $400m in new funding.

But wait, haven’t we been here before? Memories come flooding back from 2005 when MG Rover in the UK went to the wall crippled by funding issues, serious mismanagement, unwanted cars and terminal clashes with unions, which tarnished forever the once illustrious BMC and Leyland brands. To add insult to injury MG, that most loved of British sports car brands, is now in Chinese hands, owned by Nanjing Automobile for which the media is not predicting much success.

And what happened to all those other UK car brands that disappeared over the years? – AC, Alvis, Armstrong Siddeley, Austin Healey, Berkeley, Bond, Daimler, Gilbern, Hillman, Humber, Jensen, Jowett, Morris, Reliant, Riley, Singer, Sunbeam, TVR, Wolseley and many more...

So what does all this mean? For the car industry brands it heralds a potentially lengthy period of brand rationalisation:

> Model brands will disappear eg Viper (Dodge), Solstice (Pontiac), Monaro (Holden), Fairlane (Ford Australia)

> Manufacturer brand mergers and acquisitions eg Tata take over of Land Rover and Jaguar, Nanjing Automobile acquisition of MG, Porsche take over of VW, BMW-Daimler merger?, Chrysler-GM merger?

...and some may go to that big car yard in the sky eg Maybach, Chrysler?, MG?

What does this mean for branding consultants? Probably a lot of work to reinvent/reposition car manufacturers, power up the electric/hydrogen/fuel cell revolution; create new super economy city car sub-brands; define the newly expanding hybrid sector; put new spin on economy motoring, green credentials and the new ‘post combustion engine’ lifestyle era, and rush out and buy an expensive carbon fibre road racing bicycle.

Tony Heywood is an international branding consultant and founder of Heywood Innovation in Sydney and co-founder of BrandSynergy in Singapore.

View some of Heywood’s work on www.heywood.com.au

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Creating a new brand in trying times – embrace the fundamentals PART 3

2009-02-27T15:47:00.000+11:00

Once you’ve created your brand, you must tell people about it – what it means, what’s different about it, the vision that it represents, its values and the promise it makes to its customers and employees. You will need to:

> craft compelling marketing messages that influence and satisfy audiences
> create a ‘look & feel’ that is distinctive and memorable
> develop a brand language
> create advertising that achieves deep emotional connections
> customise communications to your key audiences
> ensure all communications are consistent and recognisable

When it comes to branding consultants – you get what you pay for

Execution
Having put so much hard work into planning the brand and its fundamental components, it makes a lot of sense that your investment in the brand is protected by consistent and accurate application. Your brand consultant should produce brand guidelines that help users to understand the new brand and templates to ensure intelligent and consistent application. Rolling out the brand can include many applications such as stationery, website, presentations, signs, marketing collateral, advertising. This process needs to be planned and managed, particularly from a budget perspective, as it is only too easy to be caught out by the production costs for printing, web development and media placement.

Employee engagement
Employees are the life blood of your business. Choose them well and treat them well. Above all else ensure they fully understand the brand – what it is, what it means, what it stands for, the promise it makes, its values, vision, what you hope for it to achieve and the role your employees play in its success. If they are in customer facing roles, it is critical that they are able to embrace the brand and communicate its benefits clearly, succinctly and with real enthusiasm.

Brands need constant management and refinement

Monitor performance
The launch of your new brand is only the beginning. Regularly monitor and assess its performance against the criteria established at the start of the brand building project. Also measure it against the performance of recognised high performing competitor brands. Measurement must be internal as well as external – find out how engaged your employees are with the brand and how well they are communicating its benefits to customers. Remember that when it comes to employees, regular communication is a must if you want to inspire them and retain them.

I firmly believe a new breed of innovative brands will start to appear in 2009, inspired by fast moving, innovative and committed entrepreneurs with smart ideas to leverage opportunities in changing markets and with new visions for the future. Established brands will suffer as they try to adapt firstly to the challenging conditions afflicting the markets and then again as they manoeuvre to respond to recovering markets. My crystal ball says change will happen in Q3 2009. I guess that gives you 6 months to make your move.

Tony Heywood is an international branding consultant and founder of Heywood Innovation in Sydney and co-founder of BrandSynergy in Singapore.

View some of Heywood’s work on www.heywood.com.au

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Creating a new brand in trying times – embrace the fundamentals PART 2

2009-01-30T16:11:00.022+11:00

PART 2 of three blog posts

Tony Heywood is an international branding consultant and founder of Heywood Innovation in Sydney and co-founder of BrandSynergy in Singapore

Plan from start to finish
Make sure right from the start that you are clear on the scope of the brand building project. Work with the branding consultant to plan the stages and establish the likely budget you will require to build the brand, market it, communicate it and manage it. This can vary significantly depending on the type and size of the business, and its objectives, products, services and locations. Work out a realistic and achievable schedule and determine performance criteria by which you will measure success once the brand is established and working for you.

Ensure you are very clear on the values and vision that underpin your brand

Discover who you want to be and how to get there
Working with the branding consultant you will be challenged with some fundamental questions relating to the objectives you have for the brand. Basically they need to discover the real you and determine whether your future plans are sound and achievable. Questions such as “What activities will the new business engage in now and in the foreseeable future?” “Have you researched the market to determine whether there is a need for your products and services?” “How different is your offer to those of your competitors?” “What perceptions do you believe customers will have of the business?” “What values and vision will drive the business?” “Do you have a name for the business – one that is distinctive and won’t infringe a competitor’s trade mark?”

Create your vision for the future
Without a bulletproof vision for the future, one that is achievable and sustainable, you will falter all the way to insolvency. All the great companies have a powerful, unique and passionate vision that permeates their entire organisation. Without one there are no clear objectives for the brand to work towards and no identifiable goals to achieve. It only achieves success when it is embraced by all employees and becomes inextricably linked to the brand.

The name is the most important element of the new brand
Everyone with whom you interact will refer to you by name. It is the one element you hope never to change. It must appeal to target audiences and be relevant to the nature of your business. The name you choose for a new fashion house for example, will be very different to that you would choose for a new accountancy firm. Remember that new names are very difficult to register, either as a company or as a URL for your website – there aren’t that many words left in the English language! Consider whether you will need to extend the name in the future. Can the name be extended to accommodate a complementary line of business? Can it be registered in another country in which you may want to operate?

Defining the brand
This is the process of determining the essence of your brand – identifying those characteristics that make it unique, attractive and able to generate positive perceptions in your customers that it is the only one that can satisfy their needs. These include personality, values, differentiators and more. To be successful, a new brand must be differentiated from all others and be easily recognised. The objective is to build a high level of brand awareness by creating an emotional attachment with customers and positioning in their minds that drives incontestable loyalty and sales success.

Creating a powerful ‘look & feel’
Your new brand must look unique and distinctive. Key elements of the brand must be created – logo, positioning statement, colours, imagery and brand language for later application into product packaging, marketing, communications and branded environments. First impressions are important but so is consistent application of the brand. Having a ‘look & feel’ for marketing material that bears little resemblance to the ‘look & feel’ of your website will get you nowhere. Audiences are increasingly looking for interactive experiences underpinned by compelling messages that bring them closer – physically and emotionally.

Tony Heywood is an international branding consultant, founder of Heywood Innovation in Australia, United Kingdom and India, and joint founder of BrandSynergy in Singapore.

View some of Heywood’s work on www.heywood.com.au

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HI POD - Are you a brand fanatic?

2009-01-16T12:31:00.002+11:00

Click here to listen to HI POD - Are you a brand fanatic?

Tony Heywood is an international branding consultant and founder of Heywood Innovation in Sydney and co-founder of BrandSynergy in Singapore.

View some of Heywood’s work on www.heywood.com.au

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Creating a new brand in trying times – embrace the fundamentals PART 1

2009-01-06T14:13:00.005+11:00

PART 1 of three blog posts

Sitting here writing this in balmy 30 degree sunshine and blue skies overlooking the most beautiful harbour in the world, I seem momentarily a million miles away from the economic trauma impacting on businesses all around the globe. Connecting to the internet on my laptop, the BBC News website however brings reality into play with graphic depictions of terrorist strikes in Mumbai, Woolworths in the UK looking for a bailout; and GM, Chrysler and Ford in dire straits in the US. We are being assaulted by endless bad news on the business and political scene.

It seems that countless television news articles, media sites and business blogs are only too keen to update us on the bad news. Distinguished captains of industry, business analysts and academics at leading universities are revelling in the opportunity to lecture us on how recessions happen and the financial, psychological, historical, political, scientific and geographical implications, and the impact it is having on the price of petrol we put in our tank… that this is the recession we had to have, driven by greed and flawed governance of global financial systems.

Get it right on the inside first before you unleash it on the outside

The reaction from many companies affected by the downturn is to go on the defensive and either batten down the hatches and hide below decks until the storm passes, or slash and burn marketing budgets, delay business building initiatives and identify the poor performers in the workforce who are most expendable.

The last thing you would expect someone to be attempting in these trying conditions is to kick start a new business venture and crank up the brand building process. Yet for the more astute entrepreneurs this is probably the most opportunistic time in the last twenty or more years to be planning and building a new business. Why do I say this?

> You are likely to have fewer competitors now than you would have had this time last year.

> Established competitors need to reposition their brands and educate customers in line with the new market conditions

> Businesses are averse to change – those that can adapt to change are the new leaders of tomorrow

> It is a lot easier to catch the attention of customers in a market experiencing low levels of marketing activity

> History tells us that downturns breed innovation, and innovation breeds success

> The present market conditions are changing consumer loyalties – they are re-considering their choices, opening up the opportunity for new brands to steal market share

> Consumers will become more demanding and want more value and reward from the brands they associate with

> Brands with the strongest proposition will be the new winners

Make sure it is uniquely different from those of your competitors

Yes people are cautious, but the world doesn’t stop even for a recession. After the initial slashing and burning of marketing budgets, companies will begin to realise that to maintain their hard won position in the marketplace, they will have to start marketing with strong conviction.

Entrepreneurs will be naturally cautious to start up a new business, particularly in the first half of 2009. Market analysts are suggesting that consumers deprived of their natural spending habits will start to feel the retail itch and the need to satisfy their cravings for new products and new experiences, spurred on by the potential for some of the biggest January/February sales in history.

So how do you go about establishing a new brand and priming it for success in these trying times? You must focus much more on getting the basics right. After more than 20 years in the branding business, I have come to recognise the essential considerations that ensure a brand gives of its best. Here’s a sobering thought – if you don’t get all of these right, there is every chance you will never gain maximum benefit from your brand, which in this economic climate may just make the difference between success and early failure. Here are several of the more important ones:

Invest in advice from an experienced branding consultant

Select an experienced branding consultant
Always work with, and gain advice from, people who are specialists in their field. At this critical juncture, don’t rely on ‘gut feel’. Establishing and building an effective brand is critical to your future success. Select carefully, as there are plenty of ‘creatives’ disguised as branding experts who will be only too keen to take your money and design for you a new logo, brochure and some stationery – which won’t get you very far. An experienced branding consultant goes much further by helping you to define your business, differentiate it, market it and prepare you for success. Ensure they are attuned to the changing market conditions.

Part two of this blog post to follow shortly…

Tony Heywood is an international branding consultant and founder of Heywood Innovation in Sydney and co-founder of BrandSynergy in Singapore.

View some of Heywood’s work on www.heywood.com.au

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A glossary of commonly used branding terms

2008-12-19T15:34:00.003+11:00

I have compiled a short list of commonly used branding terms that we use regularly when interacting with clients.

Brand
A brand is a collection of perceptions in the mind of the consumer resulting from their experience of a product, service or company. A brand has functional and emotional elements which create a relationship between customers and the organisation, product or service.

Brand Architecture
The method by which an organisation structures and names the brands within its portfolio. There are three main types of brand architecture system:
> monolithic – where the corporate name is used on all products and services offered by the company
> endorsed – where all sub-brands are linked to the corporate brand by means of either a verbal or visual endorsement
> freestanding – where the corporate brand operates merely as a holding company, and each product or service is individually branded for its target market.

Brand Audit
A comprehensive examination of all aspects of a brand to assess its health, uncover its sources of equity and suggest ways to improve and leverage that equity.

Brand Attributes
The functional and emotional associations which are assigned to a brand by its customers and prospects. Brand attributes can have different degrees of relevance and importance to different customer segments, markets and cultures.

Brand Champion
Internal and external advocates of the brand empowered with the task of spreading the brand’s vision and values and promoting its purpose within an organisation.

Brand Commitment
The degree to which a customer is committed to a given brand based on the likelihood of them re-purchasing in the future. This indicates the degree to which a brand’s customer franchise is protected from competitors.

Brand Equity
The value someone places on an organisation, product or service brand, based on everything that the person thinks, feels and knows about the brand.

Brand Essence
The distillation of a brand’s intrinsic characteristics into a succinct core concept.

Brand Experience
The means by which a brand is created in the mind of a stakeholder. Experiences can be influenced by personal contact, retail environments, advertising, products, services, websites etc. Some are uncontrolled eg word of mouth. Strong brands arise from consistent experiences which combine to form a clear, differentiated overall brand experience.

Brand Extension
Leveraging the values of the brand to take it into new markets or sectors.

Brand Identity
The outward expression of the brand, including its name and visual appearance. The brand’s identity is its fundamental means of consumer recognition and differentiation from competitors.

Brand Management
This involves ongoing management of the functional and emotional experiences of the brand. These can range from exposure to products, packaging and price – to the customer experience of marketing activities and interaction with people.

Brand Personality
Includes all the tangible and intangible traits of a brand, say beliefs, values, prejudices, features, interests, and heritage. A brand personality makes it unique. It describes a brand in terms of human characteristics. It is seen as a valuable factor in increasing brand engagement and brand attachment, in much the same way as people relate and bind to other people.

Brand Platform
The Brand Platform consists of the following elements:
> Brand Vision - The brand’s guiding insight into its world.
> Brand Mission - How the brand will act on its insight.
> Brand Values - The code by which the brand lives. The brand values act as a benchmark to measure behaviors and performance.
> Brand Personality - The brand’s personality traits (See also definition for Brand Personality).
> Brand Tone of Voice - How the brand speaks to its audiences.

Brand Positioning
The distinctive position that a brand adopts in its competitive environment to ensure that individuals in its target market can tell the brand apart from others. Positioning involves the careful manipulation of every element of the marketing mix.

Brand Strategy
A ‘big picture’ plan for the systematic development of a brand to enable it to meet its agreed objectives. The strategy should be rooted in the brand’s vision and driven by the principles of differentiation and competitive advantage.

Brand Tone of Voice
How the brand speaks to its audiences.

Brand Valuation
The process of identifying and measuring the economic benefit that derives from brand ownership.

Brand Values
The code by which the brand lives. The brand values act as a benchmark to measure behaviours and performance.

Brand Vision
A concise statement of what a brand means to its owners and their intent for its future direction.

Tony Heywood is a Fellow of the Design Institute of Australia, founder of Heywood Innovation in Sydney Australia and joint founder of BrandSynergy in Singapore.

View some of Heywood’s work on www.heywood.com.au

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Motor City brands on the road to oblivion?

2008-11-28T16:06:00.004+11:00

The crisis meeting of the ‘Big Three’ US car manufacturers last week in Washington served to indicate how a global financial crisis can impact some of the biggest brand names on the planet and highlight their flaws, the majority of which are management induced.

The behaviour of company leaders can have a profound effect on public and employee brand perceptions. From a public perspective the respective leaders of the Big Three, once sworn enemies in the marketplace, are now seen suitably humbled going cap in hand to Washington in a last ditch attempt to persuade the Democrats to take pity on them and rescue a US industry that is basically bankrupt. Here they are, desperate for a bailout, secure in the knowledge that no bank anywhere in the world will lend them money. Why the reluctance to bail them out? Because they have comprehensively proved themselves incapable of managing their companies and creating products that will sell. Yet the fact that so many employees are involved and such an infrastructure of suppliers are reliant on the Big Three surviving, will ensure a bail out happens. You wait and see. Hopefully it will come with conditions attached and hopefully with an external management group in control, preferably Japanese, Korean or even Indian. Sadly all auto manufacturers will now be treated with extra caution by the banks, which will only make life harder for everyone.

Oh how the Japanese and Koreans must be excited at the prospect of damaged or failed US competitors. The M&A guys must also be excited by the potential opportunities, though the challenge of trying to make something out of such a monumental mess is probably too daunting for them.

The Big Three leaders impressed no-one on the day by flying to Washington in their private jets. Are they so arrogant that they didn’t realise how this may turn public opinion against them? Maybe they just don’t care. Where were their spin doctors?

No one in their right minds would ever believe that US$25 billion split three ways will rescue the three biggest US car manufacturers. No way will it turn around management attitudes, never mind magically produce new, smaller and greener cars and new production lines to make them. And who will bail out the dealerships? Chances are that if the $25 billion bail out magically happens, there will be no dealerships left to sell the ‘new’ cars.

Management were ill prepared to recognise and respond to change. Is it a case that the industry is a dinosaur that needs to die in order for a new and leaner one to replace it, one more appropriate to the needs of customers and the environment? What do the Japanese, German and Korean brands think of all this? How will they respond? Is this the big chance of all time to strengthen their brands and take the US market by storm? You bet.

What has not been considered so far is the damage inflicted on the Ford, GM and Chrysler brands. Let’s face it, the brands are forever tarnished, except in the eyes of the fanatical brand loyalists, whose numbers will inevitably decline. Those people who were at the point of purchasing one of their cars before the crisis set in are hardly likely to do so in the near future. Would you? Who wants to buy a car from a bankrupt car manufacturer with an uncertain future?

There is one hell of a job in the offering for a brand turnaround specialist. The most likely scenario, and this is only my view, is the emergence in the US of a new generation of smaller, leaner, smarter start-up auto brands with a focus on small, fuel efficient cars and trucks. Perhaps they may even be bought out and badged Ford, GM and Chrysler. Or are they more likely to be badged Toyota, Hyundai or BMW? Coming soon to a dealership near you...

Tony Heywood is a Fellow of the Design Institute of Australia, founder of Heywood Innovation in Sydney Australia and joint founder of BrandSynergy in Singapore.

View some of Heywood’s work on www.heywood.com.au

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Showroom models caught in a brand trap

2008-11-21T14:32:00.004+11:00

The quickest way you can destroy the integrity of your brand is to promise one thing while behaving in a way that is totally contrary to this promise. General Motors is experiencing the biggest crisis in its history, which will either see it die in the next few months or be bailed out by the US government. Ford and Chrysler are not far behind and will be eagerly awaiting the outcome. As far as they are concerned one less competitor will give them a market advantage, but on the other hand, if the bail out money goes to GM, will there be any left to guarantee a future for Ford and Chrysler? One possible scenario will be that a Chinese company will buy them, in similar fashion to the purchase of MG in the United Kingdom; or Land Rover and Jaguar by Indian auto giant Tata.

Back to the brand. GM is to be admired for investing heavily in its Volt electric vehicle, hailed as a ‘response to today’s and tomorrow’s energy and environmental challenges’. Here we are witnessing an attempt at a brand makeover – the rebirth of the GM brand as a caring, environmentally focused, world conscious car manufacturer at the forefront of a new era in automotive trasportation. This beggars belief however when you visit the GM website with an array of vehicles that definitely don’t look as though they have economy in mind – dominated by Hummers, Cadillac Escalades, GMC Yukons, Chevrolet Suburbans – a whole fleet of monster gas guzzlers and polluters that would have those nice chaps at Top Gear in the UK slashing their wrists. What were they thinking? Did they think it would go on forever? Surely there must have been one tree hugger in the product development division brave enough to suggest enough is enough?

As regards brand naming – General Motors’ dual values of the moment make the ‘General’ part of the name rather appropriate. Quite ironic really. GM’s Holden Division here in Australia, while having a more balanced model offering, still persists in churning out V8s to satisfy the petrol heads. And guess what? In the Sydney Morning Herald on 19 November is the headline ‘GM Holden to halve car production’. Chilling stuff, particularly for the poor people on the production line and their families.

GM Holden is to be criticised for not having sufficient foresight and not responding fast enough to changing conditions, particularly in the knowledge that it takes a long time to design, test and gain approval for new vehicles and change production lines.

As far as the GM Holden brand is concerned, it doesn’t alter the fact that it can’t be taken too seriously in these troubled times having a Volt on display in one showroom and a Hummer in the next. A conflict of brand values perhaps?

Tony Heywood is a Fellow of the Design Institute of Australia, founder of Heywood Innovation in Sydney Australia and joint founder of BrandSynergy in Singapore.

View some of Heywood’s work on www.heywood.com.au

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Conspiracy theory - the Democrats did it

2008-11-05T08:58:00.001+11:00

I think we’re all sick and tired of reading about the latest round of retrenchments from around the traps. Give us a break. We’ve had enough. Yes, it’s the recession we had to have etc etc, but let’s put it behind us, learn from it and move on.

But just before we do...
Here’s a final round up of the latest Australian stats, before Obama wins the elections, a miraculous overnight turnaround happens and the conspiracy theory guys start to suggest that the economic slump was perpetrated by the Democrats.

Data from ANZ suggests that the number of job advertisements – newspapers and internet – dropped by 5.9% in October. Compared to October 2007, the total number of advertisements was 9.8% lower.

A special survey by the Australian Industry Group asked 303 companies their views:

The bad:
60% of companies said the crisis had negatively affected their business
55% saying they expected production to fall as a result
53% claim employment prospects have worsened.
60% said sales had fallen as a result of the crisis
64% said new orders had been hit
56% said their capital investment plans have been negatively affected by the crisis

The really bad:
40% are planning to reduce employment
40% are revising their business plans
38% are planning to cut costs
28% are planning to reduce investment
25% are planning to reduce production
10% are cutting back on R&D spending

So that’s enough of that. Things are now getting better. Our troubles are over. Markets are improving. So we can all go out and buy that new car that’s been hanging around on the docks for the past few months and make that cheeky offer on the repossessed holiday home on Avoca Beach.

Oh and more importantly, before you do any of this, of utmost importance is that you call Heywood Innovation and get your brand strengthened and ready for the good times ahead. Will branding be on Obama’s agenda I wonder? Kevin take note.

Tony Heywood is a Fellow of the Design Institute of Australia, founder of Heywood Innovation in Sydney Australia and joint founder of BrandSynergy in Singapore.

View some of Heywood’s work on www.heywood.com.au

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Death of a legend

2008-11-04T08:58:00.004+11:00

22 October 2008

At its peak Chrysler was a brand of legendary status. This year the motoring legend is destined to fall from grace and get tossed on the brand scrapheap by private equity.

Herein lies the story of yet another monumental hi-octane blunder fuelled by private equity greed and incompetency. Cerberus – the private equity owner of Chrysler since 2007 looks certain to offload its investment. Described as ‘this terrible mistake’ by a former CEO of American Motors, the purchase from Daimler only last year was widely seen as an ill considered move. Even the transfer of ownership to Daimler in 1998 – an uncomfortable liaison that spawned DaimlerChrysler Motors Company LLC – had many motoring scribes scratching their heads. Auto manufacturer madness.

Here are some interesting facts – Daimler bought Chrysler for US$37 billion, then spent billions more trying to keep it afloat. Cerberus Capital bought Chrysler back from the Germans for US$7.4 billion! Bet the Daimler shareholders were mighty pleased. Perhaps the Daimler brand value took just a slight dip after waving goodbye to US$30+ billion?

So what price will Cerberus now get in this financially battered market? General Motors is seen as the favoured suitor which is presently scavenging in the ruins looking for tasty morsels. Not that General Motors is without its own problems, with estimated debts of US$300 billion – which makes Daimler’s US$30+ billion loss look almost acceptable. All victims of a consumer society once fixated on ‘big is beautiful’ and now too slow to respond to environmental concerns and a global shift to smaller and more economical vehicles – cars that were great for the 1980s but dinosaurs today. Global warming and public sentiment sealed their fate.

So what value is put on the Chrysler brand now? Apparently precious little. Peter DeLorenzo, a former auto ad exec commented “After you get Chrysler, you take Jeep and the minivans, and get rid of the rest”. It seems that in order to restore brand strength and sales of the legendary GM Hummer (down 47.3% this year) all GM needs to do is to align it with Jeep ‘a brand with worldwide appeal’ (sales down 26% this year). What do you end up with? You get two brands with declining sales – one being the most despised and environmentally unfriendly auto brand of them all, sold alongside an honest and reputable ‘fun 4WD lifestyle vehicle’ albeit with a distant military heritage. Guess which brand will tarnish the other? You think Hummer will revitalise, or will Jeep’s brand suffer after the initial showroom frenzy and PR spin die down and everyone checks the sales figures? I’ll leave it up to you to figure that one out. What will all those loyal baby boomer brand diehards, who grew up with the ‘classic’ Chryslers think of these well heeled, smart talking, suntanned, quick buck merchants from Cerberus? Do we need to mention gun laws here? I guess here’s another brand going down the toilet big time, that’s likely to get its ass shot off or run over before it does so.

Chrysler brand RIP. 1925-2008

STOP PRESS 27 October
Chrysler has announced it is to cut 25% of its white collar workforce.
Daimler has announced it is to suspend production for one month after unveiling a big fall in profits.

Tony Heywood is a Fellow of the Design Institute of Australia, founder of Heywood Innovation in Sydney Australia and joint founder of BrandSynergy in Singapore.

View some of Heywood’s work on www.heywood.com.au

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9 important brand considerations – and how to avoid those sleepless nights!

2008-10-09T08:00:00.000+11:00

If you're responsible for the ownership or management of your organisation's brand I wouldn't blame you if you admitted to having a few sleepless nights worrying about what might go wrong next. Let's admit it, there is plenty that can go wrong.
> Trying to make communications read and look as though they come from the same company
> Imminent merger discussions no-one bothered to tell you about
> Getting every department to use the same font on correspondence
> Having a website that looks as though it belongs to someone else
> Employee induction packs that aren't painting the same picture as the interviewers
> Internal sign system that isn't pointing visitors in the right direction
> Corporate profile that's five years out of date
> Powerpoint presentation that the student on work experience put together
> Company mission and vision that no-one can remember
> Advertising agency that charges like a wounded bull
> Staff who look as though they need a good dose of motivation
> Company procedures that don't exist
> Designer who is claiming copyright ownership of the company logo
> The discovery of five different sets of stationery templates circulating internally
> New product launch that marketing wasn't advised of
> Awkward questions on future vision from the media that the Chairman couldn't answer
> Launch of the new product name overseas that didn't translate too well
> The sales team's business cards with the company URL missing
> The three senior executives who resigned all in the same week
> Customer complaints that just increased 200% in one month
> Newspaper ads that use exactly the same headline as a competitor's ad last month
> The pirated software your in-house designer has been using
> New receptionist with tattoos and body piercing that someone hired...

Many of the brand assignments my own company is commissioned for are ones where an existing brand needs rectifying, needs updating or is subject to internal or external change. Companies are getting particularly wise to the fact that, in addition to customers, an underperforming brand can impact considerably on employees and the potential to attract and retain top talent.

I thought it would be useful to touch on a few things that warrant consideration.

1/. Future vision. Does the leader have a vision for the future which everyone within the organisation is inspired by… or is the ship rudderless, off course and without GPS to guide it?

2/. Who owns your brand? Have you negotiated with your designer to hand over copyright, and have you trademarked it?

3/. Do you have control of your organisation's communications? Do they look the same? Do they speak with the same voice? Does anyone check spelling and grammar? Are templates and guidelines available?

4/. Are written HR procedures available for interviewing job candidates? Is there an induction pack explaining the organisation's brand, what it means and the role employees play in its success? Are training and company procedures included in it?

5/. When was the present corporate identity introduced? Does it build an accurate and positive perception of what the organisation is, does and believes in?

6/. Likewise, do communications in print, online, DVD and video build an accurate perception of the organisation's brand? Do they include strong messages to influence your audiences?

7/. Does your organisation have sub brands? If so, do they competently support the main brand? Are they consistent with the parent brand if that is the intention?

8/. Has the organisation's brand been audited within the last 12 months? Are you aware of all applications that are visually branded eg stationery, brochures, Powerpoint presentations etc? How consistent and relevant are they?

9/. When was the last time the organisation's website was updated? Does it contain out-of-date information that may render the organisation legally liable?

These are just a few considerations. Our experience is that there are many more. If you need advice to overcome your branding challenges check us out at www.heywood.com.au

Tony Heywood is a Fellow of the Design Institute of Australia, founder of Heywood Innovation in Sydney Australia and joint founder of BrandSynergy in Singapore.

View some of Heywood’s work on www.heywood.com.au

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Online advertising bonanza

2008-09-24T14:38:00.003+10:00

Ofcom, the independent regulator and competition authority for the UK communications industries, has announced in its annual report that mainstream TV advertising is no longer the medium of choice in the UK. Spending on online advertising has overtaken TV. Online grew 40% last year to A$6 billion, accounting for 19 percent of all advertising, in an industry that is worth A$109 billion. The report also states that in a comparison of the period from 2002 to 2007 the time spent on computers by the British public increased 400%, representing 24 minutes a day per person. Mobile phone time increased 200%. By comparison, Australia’s online advertising market grew 61.5 per cent in 2006 with the full year spend just topping the $1 billion milestone. Way to go.

Tony Heywood is a Fellow of the Design Institute of Australia, founder of Heywood Innovation in Sydney Australia and joint founder of BrandSynergy in Singapore.

View some of Heywood’s work on www.heywood.com.au

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Functional and emotional benefits of brands

2008-08-29T16:34:00.001+10:00

Brands can evoke strong rational and emotional responses in those who come into contact with them. This translates as ‘a powerfully held set of brand beliefs’. To be successful brands must create a relationship with key audiences by meeting both functional and emotional expectations at all points of interaction. The brands consumers choose can reinforce their self-image and generate social acceptance... think iPhone, Absolut, Prius. A consumer will pay a premium for a brand that can help them make a social statement. Brands can also put people in touch with likeminded individuals... think Harley Davidson.

Car manufacturers are experts at combining the rational and emotional. BMW and Mercedes for example, are all about build quality and engineering excellence. BMW however focuses on performance while Mercedes focuses on reliability. They have built brand strength by leveraging their functional excellence into an emotional resonance in the minds of consumers. How do they do this? BMW transforms performance into a form of emotional aggression. Mercedes translates reliability into a form of emotional reassurance.

These functional and emotional associations which are assigned to a brand by its customers and prospects are known as brand attributes. Brand attributes can be either negative or positive, and can have different degrees of relevance and importance to different customer segments, markets and cultures.

Identifiable product features are referred to as ‘functional benefits’. Some brands are easily differentiated by their functional benefits. Where functional benefits aren’t easily identifiable or differentiated, marketers often rely on ‘emotional benefits’. Let’s look at an example.

You’re a middle manager and you need a new car. Your first considerations are likely to be based upon functional benefits: reasonable performance, 2.0 litre engine, fuel economy, reliability, four doors, golf clubs must fit in the boot, must have an iPod connector, must fit in your garage etc. You have a choice of around 12 Japanese, French, German, English and Italian cars. All look much the same, have near identical specifications and capabilities and will meet your requirements admirably. Six of these cars are priced below $40,000, five are priced below $50,000 and the BMW is $65,000.

How can the BMW brand command a premium price level when on paper it has almost identical specifications and performance as the other less expensive cars? The difference lies not in superior functional benefits but in the emotional and self-expressive benefit of having a clearly identifiable high performance luxury brand that will sit in your driveway and be the envy of neighbours and friends.

When owners drive their BMW, they are rewarding themselves with an emotionally engaging experience that satisfies their desire to be part of an elite group of drivers and owners that seek something different and better.

Emotional benefits are often closely linked with self-expressive benefits. For example, does it feel better to buy a recognised and proven brand of baked beans or the No Frills generic brand? It feels better to buy the proven brand even if it has been proven that the contents of both are identical. Doesn’t it?

Tony Heywood is a Fellow of the Design Institute of Australia, founder of Heywood Innovation in Sydney Australia and joint founder of BrandSynergy in Singapore.

View some of Heywood’s work on www.heywood.com.au

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Qantas brand takes a dive

2008-08-12T17:33:00.001+10:00

Four recent safety incidents within 10 days have tested the strength of the Qantas brand, an airline that for many years has maintained a peerless safety record. The integrity of its brand has suffered by reports that essential servicing has been transferred overseas as part of a company-wide cost cutting exercise. The airline is now subject to a Civil Aviation Safety Authority investigation. This comes at a trying time for Qantas as it waves farewell to long standing chief Geoff Dixon, who tried to assure shareholders and passengers that there are no ‘systemic problems’ and reinforced that the vast majority of servicing is completed in Australia. Passengers belief systems need more than this from the lips of an outgoing chief, who was once heralded as the vision and voice of Qantas. Statements by engineering boss David Cox reported in the media that ‘some such incidents are just part of running a major airline’ have served to cast further doubt on the strength of the brand and the competency of its guardians. Sadly the damage seems to be done and Qantas must now try very hard to repair the damage and wait for a new chief with a new strategy to rescue the brand. This comes at a time when media articles question the brand’s ‘Australianism’ and diminishing emotional connection with Australians and particularly Australian travellers. For here is a brand that based its values on ‘safe flying’. Sadly its bottom line obsession at a time of high fuel costs has eroded employee commitment, damaged belief in the brand and diminished customer loyalty. The ‘perception of ‘high value service delivery’ has been lost to competitors such as Singapore Airlines who have seized the baton and are way ahead. Qantas now needs a lot more than the recently redrawn kangaroo and italicised lettering in its logo to regain brand altitude, recover its bottom line and respect for its brand. I strongly recommend that now is the time for Qantas to go back to its roots, redefine its Australian values, identify real differentiators, analyse its competitors’ brands and create a strategy that will win back the hearts and minds of its customers.

Tony Heywood is a Fellow of the Design Institute of Australia, founder of Heywood Innovation in Sydney Australia and joint founder of BrandSynergy in Singapore.

View some of Heywood’s work on www.heywood.com.au

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‘Country of Origin’ impacts on brand preferences

2008-07-16T11:19:00.005+10:00

A brand’s ‘country of origin’ can have a profound effect on the perception of a brand, particularly in the case of consumer products.

It can differentiate a brand and create strong and enduring relationships. ‘Made in Japan’ remains a strong guarantee of quality and innovation, harking back to the huge inroads made by the likes of Sony in the 1960s which helped put post-war Japan firmly on the map as a world leader in electronics, and Honda as it started to cripple the innovation-shy British motorcycle industry. It represented a firm stab in the back for the traditional qualities associated with ‘Made in England’ from the 1960s to the 1990s - the heyday of brands like Robertson, the epitome of British transistor radios, and so many British auto brands - Alvis, Austin, Hillman, Lagonda, Morris, Riley, Sunbeam, Wolseley and so many more.

Sadly like most product offerings ‘Made in Japan’ seems to now be increasingly replaced by ‘Made in China’, with automobile brands like Toyota, Honda and Mazda perhaps the only unbreakable aspect of Japanese automobile design, technology and manufacturing superiority... but for how long?

The ‘Made in Japan’ brand has very definite and very positive associations. ‘Made in England' (or is it 'Made in the United Kingdom'?) has no definite associations any more – perhaps it all got lost somewhere ‘midst the EEC confusion. Some brands however will always be strongly associated with England - Purdey shotguns, Barbour outdoor clothing, and Dunhill. They maintain an unbreakable and exclusive perception of tradition and quality, in the same way that Glenffidich will never be matched by any Japanese or Chinese whisky brand. I was going to include Jaguar but that now resides in Indian hands at Tata after a period of ownership with those gents at Ford in good old US of A, now in deep financial distress. So who knows what that has done for buyers’ perception of the once quintessentially English Jaguar brand!

‘Made in Germany’ symbolises precision and reliability. Products from German auto manufacturers Mercedes Benz, Audi, BMW and Porsche benefit from these positive perceptions. They seem unbreakable and have withstood the onslaught of the Japanese engineers, designers and technologists.

Having been born in England where the majority of the nation still seems to harbour some mistrust, bordering on dislike, for the French (something to do with Napoleon, Trafalgar and France’s inability to play decent football) I recollect no strong perceptions of ‘Made in France’. Brilliant Citroens DS19s and rubbish Renaults were the only products I remember from the 1960s until the introduction of fashionable and filthy smelling cigarettes and the bizarre suggestion that the French are good lovers! Not exactly cut through stuff. Even the wines are not that great (thank you Australian wine industry).

Brand Italy seems to score better. Luxury goods brands like Armani and Prada, sublime supercars like Ferrari and Maserati, ace soccer teams, designers and the beauty of Italian architecture and countryside conjure up very positive impressions of Italy, the Italian people and their enviable lifestyle. So, here’s a question. Does the country brand influence its product brands or vice versa? Was Italy such a great place until Enzo Ferrari and Giorgio Armani came along?

With the advent of global media, it can take only one incident to capture the minds of global audiences and reduce centuries of brand goodwill to nought. China’s recent exploits in Tibet are a PR nightmare. The lead paint on Chinese toys succeeded in crashing their exports and instilled a hard-to-shift perception of ‘cheap, nasty and dangerous’. The US interference in Iraq, aggravated by the global economic downturn, has severely dented perceptions of its standing as an economic power house and global peace keeper. Zimbabwe is no longer perceived as a viable holiday destination.

As ambassadors of their ‘country of origin’, airlines can gain very definite benefits by aligning their brand strategy with that of the nation. Good examples of this are Alitalia which just flew in the Pope to Australia, British Airways, Swiss Airlines etc. Airlines do not have to have the country of origin’s name present, as in Qantas which is undeniably the airline of Australia.

‘Country of origin’ can have a very definite impact on consumer perceptions and buying decisions. It should be considered however as only one component of a brand’s ability to achieve and sustain long term success.

Tony Heywood is a Fellow of the Design Institute of Australia, founder of Heywood Innovation in Sydney Australia and joint founder of BrandSynergy in Singapore.

View some of Heywood’s work on www.heywood.com.au

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Branding gets sexy and goes to the theatre

2008-06-10T13:28:00.003+10:00

Branding is becoming increasingly experiential. At its extreme it is co-ordinated theatre ie dramatic material rehearsed and performed to entertain an audience and provide them with an experience they will never forget – in the hope that they will think well of you and want more.

In the good old days of corporate identity, before branding and web sites came along, a designer's life was much simpler – clients were merely concerned with sourcing a nice looking logo and some colours to display on their stationery and brochures and on the side of a few white vans. Things have now changed in this brand centric world. New car launches for example are full-on theatre. Bright lights on chromed logos, video extravaganzas of ecstatic couples cruising the Great Ocean Road or the New Jersey Turnpike, or Brad Pitt lookalikes speeding around the Nurburgring circuit scoring admiring glances from classy debs in the pit lane. At the launch, lovely pouting Tokohama girls in body-hugging lycra hug the bodies of the latest Tokohama Nicra Turbo Largesse, with multi-coloured smoke swirling gently over the logo infested carpet, while the latest hit single by boy wonder group smelicat echoes around the silver foil wrapped warehouse that looks like a set from the latest Alien movie.

Algonquin Maynard the car designer, resplendent in designer suit and no tie, addresses the crowd and glorifies the curves and creases and titanium gear knob and their role in the branded look he has planned for the entire model range. All to build interest in the new car and its enhanced performance figures and new gizmos (not forgetting its frugality and new-found sympathies with the environment), but also to show the world what the brand is capable of achieving. How it can get inside the minds of new car buyers while they salivate at the prospect of ownership, thrill to the 200kph video and caress the fake wood and lycra. Podcasts extol the virtues, auto blogs spread like a virus with carefully placed articles. A new Turbo Largesse men's fragrance is seen in leading department stores. Ex racing car drivers with racing suits adorned with the maker's logo are shown easing themselves confidently into the driving seat.

The motoring press likewise are entertained at carefully selected eateries where CEOs proclaim how sensational the new model is, its prowess on the road, in the showroom, in company sales figures and its sensational fit with the company's brand values. Marquees appear in city centres and at shopping centres where models strut their stuff alongside cars resplendent in the latest designer shades of 'superstar mink' and 'generation yellow'. A limited addition all-black U2 model is offered at extra cost. Videos of the car performing amazing feats adorn the website. Direct mail saturates the nation. Top Gear features Jeremy Clarkson test driving one while towing a caravan across the Simpson Desert. He has high praise for the gear knob and waxes lyrical on the choice of seat fabric. Car sales momentarily halt while the viewing nation takes stock and brand values are questioned. Meanwhile online marketing jams our in-boxes. Buses sail past with car and models adorning their sides. TV ads slide in between repeat showings of Biggest Loser. Homer Simpson is seen driving a car that looks ever so much like a Tokohama Nicra Turbo Largesse. Double page newspaper ads eclipse articles warning of stock market collapses. Whole fleets are loaned to leading AFL and cricket teams. Tokohama dealerships go into overdrive with hot air balloons, sausage sizzles, Tokohama burgers and local celebrities. Obligation free test drives are everywhere, sadly without the models.

Competitors, galvanised into action, scurry around seeking pitches from brand communication companies (aka advertising agencies) to devise Tokohama-beating campaign extravaganzas, initiatives to further build brand value... and source even prettier models.

The car buying public has never had so many people working so hard to manipulate their perception of the car and the company behind it. Brand creators have a myriad opportunities at their fingertips to inspire and manipulate these perceptions. Exciting isn't it? Me, I'll just stick to the lycra.

Tony Heywood is a Fellow of the Design Institute of Australia, founder of Heywood Innovation in Sydney Australia and joint founder of BrandSynergy in Singapore.

View some of Heywood’s work on www.heywood.com.au

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Boosting Australian Creativity

2008-05-30T08:00:00.001+10:00

I believe government has a long way to go to actively and effectively promote design to industry. I remember well the heady days of Thatcherism in the UK and, despite considerable animosity, the influence she wielded in gaining acceptance and support for the concept that design and industry must be united. This resulted in a huge boost to industry and improved the perception of UK-based companies in Europe and indeed the world, and stimulated the UK design renaissance through the 80s and 90s. Australia has yet to witness such a boldly-delivered initiative.

Through a joint venture relationship Heywood Innovation has in Singapore, I have met with IE Singapore, the equivalent to Austrade in Australia, whose role is to build awareness and advise companies of the need for strong and appropriate branding particularly for export. The contrast with Austrade is remarkable. Underpinned by an active workshop series, Singapore-based companies are offered around a 50% offset for any brand development work carried out by qualified branding agencies. This is a huge incentive for emerging companies to think more seriously on the prospects of lifting their game and setting their sights on export achievements. Austrade leaves this task to individual companies with little or no active support or advice, ultimately costing them dearly when trying to penetrate overseas markets with weak and ill conceived brands inappropriate for the markets they have targeted. Many innovative ideas coming out of Australia have failed because of poor brand perception and communication, relying on feeble home-grown promotional efforts lacking professional input.

Government needs to consider educating business on the benefits of creativity particularly in digital media, which inspires many arguments for a more effective rollout of broadband. The recently introduced legislation that allows listed companies to provide their annual reports online is a great step in the right direction and an admirable cost saving and environmental gesture, which sadly did not even register on the green groups’ radar. This initiative however is not enforced for Government agencies who continue to focus on and produce printed documents.

Ultimate creativity does not necessarily guarantee a job or take up by industry. Creative courses in universities and colleges need to better align talent with business. Over a 20 year period the situation has not changed. There are fundamental flaws in the experience students have in these institutions which disadvantages them considerably from understanding the way business works and how their talents can be aligned with business needs. As an employer of talent I regularly witness educational institutions churning out students ill equipped to be employed in the creative industry, an industry where low salaries and low respect are rife as a consequence – the long road to being accepted as a serious profession. The inability for most design graduates to write a simple business letter or understand basic business principles flabbergasts me.

It would be good to see industry-sponsored design awards that are fit for purpose in industry not purely for the sake of creativity.

The value of good design and communication has dropped substantially in the last few years fuelled by continuous cost cutting that inevitably increases our clients’ performance bonuses and their belief that new technologies make creative work faster and easier and therefore less expensive. There is sadly too much emphasis on ‘honing the process’ than on promoting and having confidence in the commercial benefits of good design that can inspire and influence partnerships with industry. Educating companies - particularly SMEs - on the long term value of their brands is a hard one but an essential one.

Australia has a wealth of creative talent, much of which is under-utilised. Making a determined attempt to improve education, offer creative advice to industry, build respect and stimulate large corporates and SMEs to invest in design is achievable. It requires open debate and continuing communication... and an inspired government.

Tony Heywood is a Fellow of the Design Institute of Australia, founder of Heywood Innovation in Sydney Australia and joint founder of BrandSynergy in Singapore.

View some of Heywood’s work on www.heywood.com.au

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Are you a brand fanatic?

2008-05-16T09:07:00.003+10:00

What causes people to become so attached to brands? The answer lies in their ability to promote a lifestyle, a way of thinking, and the opportunity to be part of a like-minded community. Strong brands meet emotional needs as well as physical ones. Some people believe that a relationship with a brand can be as fulfilling as one with another person. But I'm not too sure about that. What do you think? Is your partner your No.1 brand?

What would the devotees of iPods, Harley Davidsons and mySpace think? iPod owners would not swap their beloved device for another MP3 player even if there was a significant price difference. iPods claimed this market with an incredibly strong brand which had very specific attributes. Other MP3 players may do the same, perhaps even more, but owning an iPod means something very special. An iPod is an iPod, where others are mere MP3 players. It owns the category. There is only one iPod, in the same way Hoover and Biro once owned their own categories.

You make a statement when you ride a Harley. You only have to sit on the saddle to immediately gain a sense of freedom and rebel-rouser status - you become taller, bigger and more capable as a person. You become one with the machine, a member of an elite group of like minded individuals - a brotherhood of followers. Followers who are so fanatical they tattoo the brand in their own flesh – the brand literally becomes a brand! There is no other motorcycle like a Harley. No riding experience is like that of a Harley. There may be several Japanese look-a-likes out there but they sure as hell don't ride like a Harley. So ownership delivers a unique riding experience while the 'mind trip' satisfies the emotional need to express your individualism and make a statement, while satisfying the need to connect with others who share the same beliefs and lifestyle desires. One of the major strengths of the Harley Davidson brand is its determination to involve all its stakeholders, from customers to employees, suppliers, and the community at large. Employee loyalty has added amazing strength to the Harley Davidson brand. Strength from the inside out, where each employee lives and breathes the brand and is a brand ambassador, in many cases for life.

MySpace satisfies that sense of community. The capacity in us to communicate and interact with other people and prove to ourselves that we are not alone in the world. The MySpace brand has immense value basically because of the traffic it has generated and its 'sticky' nature where members are unlikely to drift away to competitor sites. It has satisfied a desire.

What brand are you fanatical about, and why? What lengths would you go to to defend that brand and what it stands for?

Tony Heywood is a Fellow of the Design Institute of Australia, founder of Heywood Innovation in Sydney Australia and joint founder of BrandSynergy in Singapore.

View some of Heywood’s work on www.heywood.com.au

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Brand Leadership

2008-04-24T14:26:00.003+10:00

What you need to do to achieve it.
After nearly twenty years in the business, I’ve acquired a pretty good understanding of the requirements for a successful brand. Sadly there are many out there who still believe a design make-over will fix all their organisation’s problems, change any negative perceptions and bring untold wealth and success. This may happen in 5% of the cases, but for the other 95% in the real world here is some advice on getting the basics right.

As the owner of a successful Australian branding and communications business I’ve experienced many situations that constantly emphasise how essential a strong brand is to an organisation’s success. Thankfully we encounter many organisations who share this belief and are eager to further their understanding of what branding is and what it can achieve for them.
One of the more exciting aspects of the business I am in is the daily reinforcement that no two companies are alike and no two companies encounter exactly the same challenges and opportunities.

Discover the real you
The first stage in any branding project is to understand what your present brand is, what it is capable of becoming and what it can achieve. This differs significantly from organisation to organisation depending on whether it is an established corporate or new market entrant, its understanding and commitment to the brand, its history, whether is is B2B or B2C, its products etc etc. This requires determined research to gain information, statistics and insight on the organisation, its customers, employees, products and services, competitors and the markets in which it operates. This information is sourced from desk research and face-to-face meetings with key stakeholders and those who are influenced by the brand. Some years ago we introduced a custom-developed facilitated process called TeamPlan that we employ to enormous effect to focus group thinking, ‘cut through the clutter’, develop ideas and enable both teams to take ownership of the brand’s direction. All of this is complemented with an audit of the brand and the way the brand is communicated externally and internally.
Essentially this provides: accurate information on the organisation’s present situation, helps gain insight to what can be achieved and ensures the branding team head in the right direction.

Determine what you hope to become and to achieve
Essential to the success of a corporate brand is a powerful vision for the future. Some companies have a powerful leader with a powerful and motivating vision, others struggle along day-to-day with little understanding of where they are heading and why. Without a powerful vision there are no clear objectives for the brand to work towards and no identifiable goals to achieve. An essential early stage in brand development is to engage with company leaders to create, manage and implement long term vision for their brands. This vision then influences what the brand has to achieve and the methods to achieve it. The vision is then brought to life by visualising it and creating innovative ways of communicating it to your audiences.
Essentially this helps to: gain an understanding of how the organisation sees its future and its industry, identify opportunities and threats that might impair the vision, discover your organisation’s core assets and competencies and generate a powerful and passionate story that permeates the organisation.

The most important brand element – your name
A name is the one element in branding that you hope never to change. It is precious and must be protected. It must reflect the personality of the organisation and its core brand values. In a world inundated with names, they must be differentiated from competitors and be truly memorable. It is not easy to create new names and hope that they have not already been registered and that there will be a URL available. Many common names in the English language have already been taken and there are only so many Latin-based permutations left. The opening up of global markets means that the organisation’s name and those of products and services must transcend cultural and linguistic barriers. Many companies in Singapore with Chinese names for example are having to think hard about how to adapt or change their name in order for it to be understood, be readily accepted and able to trade successfully in other countries. Names should be registered as a trademark to protect your rights.
Essentially you should consider: making your name distinctive and different, ensuring it is easily pronounced and understood by your key audiences and has no negative connotations in other cultures and languages and registering it to protect your intellectual property rights.

Getting to the heart of your brand
Deep within every brand lies a quality, a belief, a differentiator that is central to its success, the one thing that drives your business forward, that competitors cannot match. Some call it ‘brand essence’. Why is it essential to identify this driver of the brand? To be successful a brand needs to be differentiated from all others and hold a perception in the minds of its audiences that it is the only one that can satisfy their needs. Ideally their perception should be based on one clear and endearing aspect of the brand that stands head and shoulders above those of all competitors.

Essentially you need to identify: one clear and endearing aspect of your brand to help differentiate the brand and build a positive perception of it in your audiences’ minds.

A long term investment with interest
Corporate branding doesn’t happen overnight. Expect a rebranding exercise to take anywhere from several months to several years. Organisations need to make themselves comfortable with the fact that they are unlikely to gain the total benefits of a new brand within 12 months. Look at it more as a minimum 2-3 year programme to establish the brand, ensure it addresses the objectives of the organisation’s future vision, nurture it, gain feedback, refine it and monitor its performance. Brands never stand still. They grow and must respond to ongoing external and internal forces. Adjustment and refinement are a necessity and must be built into any branding program. Put in place guidelines to ensure that the agreed direction is followed and the brand is consistently applied.
Essentially you need to be aware that results don’t happen overnight, that performance must be monitored and tested and that adjust and refinement are inevitable.

Branding begins on the inside
If the people on the inside don’t understand and respect your brand, how do you expect the people on the outside to? Employees, managers and executives all play a part in the creation of your brand. They must be consulted right from the start and made aware of the company’s vision and how the brand must be developed around it. It is crucial that they appreciate the very important role they play in its development and its success. They need to be excited, engaged and inspired to live the brand. Without their support and involvement the brand has little chance of success.

Essentially this means involving employees from start to finish, keeping them informed, getting them to live the brand and appointing brand champions.

Powerful and persuasive communications
Investment in a new brand will be compromised if you do not tell people about it. Obvious huh! Tell them what it means, the vision that it represents, what its values are and the promise that it makes to its employees and customers. Craft a consistent ‘look & feel’ for all communications that is distinctive and brings life to the brand. Create a distinctive language style and vocabulary that enhances and distinguishes all forms of communications – corporate, marketing, internal and investor. Consistency of newly branded communications is critical right from the start, to ensure that key messages create the same impression and tell the same story, regardless of the media employed. The task is to create the same perception of the organisation with all of audiences.

Essentially requirements are to create a distinctive, recognisable and consistently applied visual style supported by a unique brand language and a written style. Ensure the communications style can adapt to various audiences.

Express the brand
First impressions are important. Lasting ones even more so. To attract attention and influence its audiences a brand must look good, be differentiated from others and be consistently applied – from business cards, brochures, packaging, vehicle livery, recruitment advertising to your website. And everything in between. Remember however that brand applications are not all visual. If you own a health spa network for example, you want customers to be greeted by a distinctive fragrance, one they will savour and one they will remember regardless of location. Remember that people are affected not only by what they see, what they read, what they hear, what they smell, but also by what they touch. This is multi-sensory branding that takes into account all the senses.

Essential considerations are that first impressions count, consistency is important and you must appeal to more than just what people see and read

Measure and monitor your brand’s performance
Most things in life need ongoing care and attention. A new brand is no exception. Its performance must be regularly monitored and assessed against predetermined performance criteria. Once launched it needs ongoing attention, direction and refinement. You need to ensure it is performing and that you are receiving a return on your investment. Without measurement there is no accountability, and without accountability, brands, products, processes and people cannot be improved. Key aspects of the brand that need to be measure are the level of understanding and appreciation by your employees, how and to what extent it is influencing your audiences and its Influence on sales performance. And much more.

Essential considerations are that brands need constant refinement and that without measurement they are unlikely to improve.

Tony Heywood is a Fellow of the Design Institute of Australia, founder of Heywood Innovation in Sydney Australia and joint founder of BrandSynergy in Singapore.

View some of Heywood’s work on www.heywood.com.au

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What's in a Name?

2008-04-18T13:38:00.003+10:00

Where brands are concerned, the brand name is the single most important identifier. It is intimately linked with the company’s operations and, as business perceptions are built around it, it comes to embody many emotional aspects as well.

An organisation or product name fulfils a number of functions:
> identifies the organisation or product
> distinguishes it from its competitors
> positions the organisation or product in relation to others
> provides a ready means of identification
> provides a visible, coherent recognisable identity to which employees, customers and investors can relate
> suggests quality, authority and integrity
> functions as a legal property
> communicates the company’s philosophies, personality, culture and products

The selection of a new name, or revision of an existing one, needs to be rigorously challenged to determine its effectiveness and relevance to the company’s activities and target market.

A name must be:
> appealing to customers
> appropriate to the company’s products and services
> memorable
> distinctive
> pronounceable
> legally protectable

There are seven categories of names:
> descriptive
> people & places
> associative
> non-related
> coined/abstract
> abbreviated
> alpha/numeric

Brand names are often accompanied by a positioning statement.
The positioning statement delivers a quick, concise and meaningful message to a potential consumer which complements the brand name and visual identity and helps consumers to understand the personality of the brand. Positioning statements are generally drawn from one of five categories:
> what you are
> what you do
> how you do it
> who you are
> why you do it

There are 5 basic phases in developing a name:
1. Conduct a communications audit of the company’s overall business, branding and communications objectives.
2. Develop a full naming brief.
3. Explore directions and themes and undertake initial name generation.
4. Short-listing, legal searches, and detailed testing of preferred names including multi-language applications, if applicable.
5. Legal registration of the selected name.

Tony Heywood is a Fellow of the Design Institute of Australia, founder of Heywood Innovation in Sydney Australia and joint founder of BrandSynergy in Singapore.

View some of Heywood’s work on www.heywood.com.au

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More than just a Logo

2008-04-14T10:53:00.002+10:00

Integral to a company’s brand are its logo and corporate identity. But a brand is far more than just that.

A brand is the articulation of a company’s promise. It represents the sum of the associations, beliefs and experiences that a person holds in their mind about an organisation, product or service.

The brand image is determined by what people perceive, based on experience of the company’s activities, products, personnel and environment. It is affected by advertising, product quality, media, word of mouth and direct contact with the organisation.

“A brand is about heart, values, vision and mission. It is expressed by every person in the organisation and in every dealing employees, clients, customers, suppliers and others have with the organisation.”

Branding is not a new concept, however the process of growing, managing and exploiting a brand for commercial success is something which is still not well understood by many companies.

Today, a strong brand strategy and execution are recognised tools of business planning and are integral to successful marketing.

The power of a brand lies in its ability to influence purchasing behaviour. We live in a consumer-driven society where consumers find themselves having to choose between products and services that, in many cases, actually differ very little in terms of what they offer and how they are priced. Brands help make consumer’s choices easier. Consumers are increasingly choosing to buy from companies whose values are most consistent with their own. It is a known fact that people will pay a premium for a brand they relate to.

Effective branding pre-sells your product or service

“Marketing is branding. The essence of the marketing process is building brands in the minds of consumers.”

Branding must do more than identify. In an increasingly competitive marketplace it is essential to have a unique and distinctive brand to maximise communication and sales potential. The brand must strategically position and communicate your corporate purpose to distinguish your business, products or services in a market inundated by inappropriate, predictable, impersonal and poorly designed brands.

In recent years brands have become a key element of companies’ valuations with brand-related intangible assets accounting for up to 60% of a company’s value.

There are many reasons for an organisation to develop a new brand or re-develop an existing one. Several of the main influencers are:

Business has changed
> Technology changes
> Emerging trends
> New competitors
> New markets
> New legislation
> Change in business practice

The organisation has changed
> New leader
> New vision
> New corporate goals
> Restructuring
> Merger or takeover

A desire to change
> New business launch
> Move into new area of business
> Privatisation or deregulation

Tony Heywood is a Fellow of the Design Institute of Australia, founder of Heywood Innovation in Sydney Australia and joint founder of BrandSynergy in Singapore.
tony@heywood.com.au
www.heywood.com.au

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Taking Brands into New Markets

2008-04-04T10:45:00.000+11:00

Despite the spectre of recession rearing its ugly head in the US and beyond, this is unliklely to deter a huge number of companies around the world forging ahead with expansion plans into new markets. To boldly go where untold wealth and success is in the offering.

So what are the likely scenarios driving the desire to venture further afield?
Opening up a new office in another part of your country or further afield? Made the decision to take your products overseas? Increasing competition in your home market making it necessary to establish a presence further afield? Export agency telling you it’s the right time and the right place? Appointing new overseas representatives to open up new markets? New joint venture looking attractive?

All of a sudden your company is faced with new challenges and new opportunities. New business culture. New people culture. New sales techniques. New documentation. New language considerations. Local staff to recruit. New packaging laws. New trademark considerations. More accountants’ and lawyers’ fees. All very challenging but nothing you can’t cope with, providing you have the necessary resources at hand.

But how will your brand cope with this? Unfortunately all too many companies get caught up with the excitement, allocate a team to move the opportunity forward and pay scant regard to the ability of their brand to go the distance and meet the new challenges.

Ask yourself these questions
Is there a similar name to yours already operating in the new market? Will your name be understood? There are many unfortunate examples of names that didn’t translate too well outside their home market. Several Japanese car manufacturers in previous years didn’t do their homework on overseas market consumer tastes when introducing new models such as Town Cube, Bongo Friendee and Cedric.

How will new consumers perceive your brand? Your way of doing things? The colour of your logo? The business etiquette of your executives? The imagery on your packaging? The faces you feature in your advertising? The content of your website? It took you many years of careful trial and error to establish your brand in its home market – what makes you think it’s going to be an overnight success in new ones?

The further the distance your brand travels, the more consideration and flexibility it must have to adapt and succeed in new environments.

Most brands start small, driven by visionary entrepreneurs seeking to make their presence known in local markets. Once this is achieved, new plans for growth and diversity begin to influence the need for brand change. However, what made your brand a success in your first location may not necessarily guarantee a duplication of success in a second. Perhaps the innovation that made your brand a household name locally is now faced with equally innovative competition in the new markets. Perhaps you now need more than innovation to capture the minds and hearts of new consumers?

Too many emerging companies have been seduced by the view that ‘what works in one country will work in another’. I see too many cases of inflated advertising and marketing budgets cranking out new collateral in an attempt to force headway into the market when the brand is just not appropriate for that market. This is not the way to achieve results from your brand.

Venturing into new locations and new markets is high risk. Considerable investment in time, money and effort is at stake. You have the finance organised. Your sales team are primed with market intelligence. A road show has been organised. Meetings with distributors have been arranged. A new office has been secured. Stock control and product distribution has been arranged. An advertising agency has been commissioned. Additional back office processing is in place.

But has the brand been reviewed? Why take the risk that it will not support your new objectives?

Tony Heywood is a Fellow of the Design Institute of Australia, founder of Heywood Innovation in Sydney Australia and joint founder of BrandSynergy in Singapore.
tony@heywood.com.au
www.heywood.com.au

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Brand Blunders

2008-03-27T16:31:00.003+11:00

Having conducted many brand naming assignments over the years I understand the need to thoroughly research names and their intended application, particularly if they are to represent a company or its products and services beyond the market from which they originated. Here the name is at the mercy of different languages, customs, behaviours, superstitions and folklore. Sometimes it's just the absence of common sense. Sometimes it's a calculated gamble by the company to avoid paying what can be significant fees for naming and language research and trademark checks. It's one thing to avoid infringing someone else's copyright, it's another to prevent you and your products being ridiculed.

See what you think...

Listed below are selected brand-related blunders sourced from various websites...

The name Coca-Cola rendered phonetically in Chinese can sound like the words for 'bite the wax tadpole' or 'female horse stuffed with wax'.

Electrolux managed to successfully sell its vacuum cleaners in the UK with the advertising slogan 'Nothing sucks like an Electrolux'!

'Come alive with the Pepsi Generation' in Taiwan loosely translates as 'Pepsi brings your ancestors back from the grave'.

Car manufacturers seem to feature prominently in the blunder stakes...

Why did Honda name their small car Jazz? In Asian markets it was known as Fit which they were to release as the Fitta in European markets. Sadly 'fitta' is a crude reference to female genitalia in Swedish and Norwegian.

The Chevrolet Nova wouldn't sell too well in Latin America, probably because its name 'no va' in Spanish means 'won't go'. It was also alleged that the Ford Pinto in Brazil was soon renamed Corcel when it was discovered that 'pinto' translates as 'tiny male genitals'.

Daihatsu named one of their less successful models Town Cube,

Mazda Bongo Friendee Auto Free Top didn't make very many friends.

Honda has a StepWGN and a Comfortable Runabout Vehicle.

Isuzu Bighorn was rather suggestive.

The Rolls Royce Silver Shadow was almost named Silver Mist, which translates as 'organic fertiliser' in German.

And the car that has now achieved icon status in Australia, the Nissan Cedric (not far behind the Leyland P76).

Daihatsu's Opti Aerodown Beex was quite a mouthful.

But the award goes to... the Subaru Sambar Dias II Picnic-Car Astonish.

US brewer Coors lost out in Spain where its 'Turn it Loose' campaign came out as 'get diarrhea'.

There is a drink called SARS sold in New Zealand.

In Poland Osram translates as 'I'll shit (on something)'.

A Japanese top guitar band was named Thee Michelle Gun Elephant.

Standard Oil Company renamed itself Esso in the US and Enco everywhere else in the world, until its Japanese colleagues confided that 'enco' translates as 'stalled car'.

There is a chocolate bar in Germany called 'Zit'.

People of Spanish origin in Australia are quite amused by the Mitsubishi Pajero which translates as a vulgar term for a masturbating man.

On packaging for a Rowenta iron - 'Do not iron clothes on body'.

In Spanish speaking markets Parker Pen intended to use the slogan 'it won't stain your pocket and embarrass you'. This was translated as 'it won't stain your pocket and get you pregnant'.

Jolly Green Giant in Arabic means 'intimidating green ogre'.

The name Gerber, of baby food fame, means 'to vomit' in French.

There is a brand of cigarettes in Malawi called 'Life'.

A French soft drink is called Sic.

There is a Japanese sports drink called Pokari Sweat.

The US appetite-suppressant candy in the 70s/80s called Ayds.

A children's cough medicine from Boots had on its label 'Do not drive a car or operate machinery'.

In China the old Kentucky Fried Chicken slogan 'finger licking good' translates as 'eat your fingers off'.

Puffs tissues from the USA tried to sell its product in Germany only to be told that its name translates as whorehouse.

Schweppes Tonic water in Italy got translated as Schweppes Toilet Water.

When Sharwoods launched its cooking sauce brand 'Bundh' it didn't realise that 'bundh' in Punjabi has the English meaning 'arse'.

A famous drug company marketed a new remedy in the United Arab Emirates. To avoid any mistakes they used pictures. The first picture was of someone not looking too well, the next picture showed the person taking the medication and the last picture showed them looking well. Oh dear, what they forgot is that people in that part of the world read from right to left!

Bacardi concocted a fruity drink with the name 'Pavian' to suggest French chic ... but 'Pavian' means 'baboon' in German.

I guess this all points to having the good sense to thoroughly research industries, markets, countries, cultures and languages and to choose your naming consultants well. They have a big job to do. And it isn't getting any easier out there.

Happy naming.
Tony Heywood

Tony Heywood is a Fellow of the Design Institute of Australia, founder of Heywood Innovation in Sydney Australia and joint founder of BrandSynergy in Singapore.
tony@heywood.com.au
www.heywood.com.au

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Photos are a Brand's Best Friend

2008-03-25T17:45:00.005+11:00

Copy writers will have a fit. They'll choke on their toast and marmalade, spit chips, fall off the bus and miss their deadline. They won't like it but I'm going to say it anyway. In the 1 to 3 seconds a designer has available to capture the attention of a magazine reader, direct mail recipient or TV addict, a picture can create an impression on that person far faster and more comprehensively than words can. Extend that to 10 seconds and I may have to pay up on the $10 bet. Get the designer and copy writer to work together to combine a great photo with a great headline and you're on the road to success.

Let's talk about photographs. As far as photo libraries are concerned, the photos they offer tend to fall into two categories – predictable and inspired, mostly because they have to cater for a wide range of tastes and applications. Slowly but surely the typical 'americanised' shots from the big agencies are becoming more universal in their appeal. Photo libraries are big business. The impending sale price of Getty is rumoured to be $1.5 billion. Photo libraries got wise in the '90s to the fact that talented photographers see the opportunity to shoot for a photo library to be far easier and more secure financially than the heart breaking routine of touting portfolios around creative agencies hoping for the big shoot to appear.

When we talk about branding we're essentially talking about the ability to create an impression OR put another way, the ability to create within a person a positive perception of a product, service, individual or organisation. Photography plays a key role in achieving this. Branding is also about differentiation. Being able to make something or someone stand out in the crowd. Giving them an unfair advantage over competitors. To achieve this you have to appeal to one or more of the five senses - sight, hearing, smell, touch and taste. Although there are several creative agencies out there extolling the virtues of experiential branding and brand theatre, the two senses that brand communicators rely on are sight and hearing. Take websites for example. we look at them and read them, therefore graphics and words are vital. We also listen to them when audio files are played. Therefore the human voice and music can command our attention and influence our understanding and appreciation.

The visual sense is the most important. Static images, moving images and words. As far as moving images are concerned, broadband and the rise of sites like YouTube have revolutionised the way video is regarded and consumed online. Quality is an issue and will be until ultra high speed web access is achieved.

Photography is used quite differently. And here is where video directors will hate me, but I'm going to say it anyway. Video does not rely on getting every second's worth of tape perfect. Photographers however strive to get every single image as perfect as possible. Content, composition, lighting, colour balance, visual effects obtained later in Photoshop and more. Photography today integrates creative talent with technical mastery. Canon's latest top end professional SLR boasting 21.1 megapixels is not for the faint hearted.

So where's all this leading? As part of the brand development process, your brand consultant/designer will consider the creation of a portfolio of images in a recognisable and consistent style that you can 'own' as a key component of brand expression. When these photos are regularly featured in communications and marketing materials, audiences will begin to recognise their style and increasingly associate them with your brand.

Sporting goods manufacturers, automobile manufacturers and fashion houses for example devote huge attention to detail when commissioning photographs which exude the absolute essence of the sporting lifestyle, the SUV pounding across the desert or the stylish black suit on the catwalk model. As far as branding goes, we're not talking about the content so much as the recognisable style of the photo. If the name was covered up would you still recognise it as Nike, Toyota and Boss?

It is important therefore that you identify the brand values that the photos must project before the designer or art director embarks on a photo library search or prepares a brief for a photographer. Failure to do so will devalue your brand and make life difficult for your copy writer. And we don't want that now do we?

Photographing people is especially difficult, demanding a fine balance between creative talent, people skills and technical mastery. Few photographers have this balance. Check out Paul Simcock at www.paulsimcock.com – one of San Francisco's finest when it comes to delivering on tough brand building assignments. We show some of his fine photos here on this post.

Tony Heywood is a Fellow of the Design Institute of Australia, founder of Heywood Innovation in Sydney Australia and joint founder of BrandSynergy in Singapore.
tony@heywood.com.au
www.heywood.com.au

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How to Generate Effective New Names

2008-02-29T14:03:00.014+11:00

A name is probably the most important element of your brand. Change your company name and people want to know why. The change may suggest to customers that a major change has happened, that a new CEO has stimulated new corporate direction perhaps, or that a takeover has happened. They’ll want to know why, and you’d better have a good answer for them, even if it was only because your management team decided that the old name was just not working any longer.

People search for companies and products by name. Google has yet to perfect a means of searching for companies by their logo!

Important things to consider
Protect your name as a trademark. New names can be notoriously difficult and expensive to create. Once you have one, ensure that no-one else takes it away from you or tries to register a confusingly similar name. Remember that registering a name in more than one country can be a lengthy and involved exercise.

Invest in your name
All promotional and advertising activities ultimately add value to your name, helping audiences remember it and identify you in an increasingly crowded marketplace. In a name change situation, the sooner you inform people that your name has changed and the reasons why, the more likely they will accept it with no questions asked.

Unique and different
Ensure that your name is unique and sufficiently differentiated from your competitors. Why have a name that’s just like all others in your industry sector? While it is important to be unique, the name should reflect the personality, attitude and core values of your brand. Apple and Virgin are great examples of this.

Apple = a creative and user-friendly alternative to PCs.
Virgin = a reflection of the challenging and rebellious attitude of its founder Richard Branson.

How it looks
The visual manifestation of a name is also important. The name must be supported visually for viewing by its audiences. A name without a logo is not nearly as powerful or memorable, in the same way that people have difficulty remembering other people’s names but remember their face. People remember logo designs and colours and directly associate them with names.

Some companies do colour very well, to the point where their name becomes synonymous with product colouring. Take Cadbury for example. Its products own a very specific purple that appears on all its packs. And it knows how valuable this is to the Cadbury name. In order to protect its interests the company has become involved in several court cases where competitor products have adopted packaging colours similar to the Cadbury purple.

The telecommunications company Orange in the UK (with an orange coloured logo of course) by inference owns the colour orange in the minds of its customers. The name doesn’t immediately reflect any of the key values of the company, it is simply different, distinctive and memorable in this industry sector. The ‘essence’ of the brand is then built through communications, advertising, PR etc.

The golden rule here is to build a brand name that is strong enough to transcend any changes in brand identity.

Integrity of your name
The world is increasingly multicultural. There are more globally recognised and distributed names than ever before. The challenge for companies, even those operating on a local level, is to ensure their name is understood and appreciated by the majority of people in these communities. This requires from them a name that crosses linguistic and cultural barriers. People need to be able to pronounce the name and be comfortable that it has no negative connotations. As a general rule, the further the name travels, the more work you have to do to ensure it won’t confuse or upset people or even be subject to ridicule or even litigation. Choose your name consultants carefully!

Key requirements of a successful name
1/. It must be different to competitor names.
2/. It must be relevant to consumers that you are targeting. They must recognise in your name qualities and attributes consistent with their perception of a good company or product.
3/. Ensure the name is protected by copyright. The consequences of not doing so can be expensive and disastrous, particularly if you are venturing into overseas markets.
4/. The name must be memorable. If it isn’t, you’re faced with spending additional dollars to promote and advertise it.

There are examples of short names that are memorable and also long ones. LG is about as short as a name can be. Its acceptance globally was certainly helped by the addition of an attached statement ‘Life is Good’, that is intriguing and explains the meaning behind the two initials.

There are many instances of names that comprise sets of initials. The majority are not memorable. There are exceptions such as BMW which has a long history and products sold around the world supported by immense investment in advertising. This has helped create a level of awareness where there can be very few people on the planet who aren’t aware of the BMW name and what it stands for.

An example of a company with a long and memorable name is SuperCoffeeMix which has high recognition in the Singapore market after many years of trading and promotion. This name is interesting however in that it suffers from being a name that, when originally launched, admirably spelled out exactly what the company’s product focus was. Over the course of time however, with the company’s diversification into bottled water, tea and fruit drinks, the name has become confusing and potentially damaging. It is now faced with the need for a name change particularly for export markets where new customers will find the name misleading as it may suggest that there is coffee flavouring added to the beverage.

5/. Check the meaning of the name in different languages and cultures to ensure there is no possibility of negative connotations. We have all read of instances where the meaning of names changed in different languages and cultures. For example, the name of the popular Japanese 4WD that in Spain translates as bull’s testicles. Then there are the names that just sound strange in other cultures – for example the Spanish coffee named Bonka. Unfortunately there are many of them, suggesting that companies are not sufficiently diligent when checking and testing names prior to release in new markets.

Why change your name?
A corporate name change normally occurs as the result of a merger, acquisition, demerger, disposal, where a name is misleading or where it is inappropriate for new markets. Examples of changes due to mergers are:

The Sandoz merger with Ciba-Geigy that produced Novartis. A totally new name with no connection to those of the two merged entities, with a fresh and modern ‘feel’ has been well received. Certainly a more palatable solution than Sandoz Ciba-Geigy.

There have been instances however, where it is considered that each of the merger entities have such equity in their names that they don’t wish to relinquish them, leading to combined names such as that of the Australian steel and mining giant BHP Billiton. This naming approach however is inconsistent with the new logo that illustrates two elements merging into one.

Some names just don’t travel well
Companies in places like Singapore face the prospect of having to review their Chinese sounding company names and products when taking them into overseas markets where consumers have strong preferences for English names or ones that are indigenous to that market.

Testing before market release - don’t dismiss the unusual
Consumer testing plays an important role prior to a name being selected and registered. In my experience however, testing can be unsatisfactory for several reasons. Consumers in test conditions need to have an in-depth understanding of what the brand stands for and what it hopes to achieve. It is too easy for participants to rely on ‘gut feel’, then default to descriptive names and dismiss the more unusual ones. “Who’d name a computer after a fruit?” "Who'd name a car Ka or Quashqai?".

Generating a new name is not an easy process. Most obvious names in the English language are no longer available. This means that your naming resource must be creative and highly skilled in generating names that are different, distinctive and will be embraced and remembered by your audiences and consumers.

Tony Heywood is a Fellow of the Design Institute of Australia, founder of Heywood Innovation in Sydney Australia and joint founder of BrandSynergy in Singapore.

View some of Heywood’s work on www.heywood.com.au

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