2020 has challenged many people and brands throughout the lows and false highs of serving customers through a pandemic. It has forced upon us resiliency and adaptability but perhaps at the expense of planning and structure. We discuss how to get mid-term planning back on track for your brand.
For many people, 2020 will be a milestone where collectively, as a society we dealt with a pandemic; and came out pretty much bloodied but ready to handle the rollout and application of the vaccine throughout countries.
For those of us managing brands, a career milestone was achieved. We helped keep our brands remembered and even preferred by customers as they grappled with changing lifestyles, rules and behaviour changes. Brand teams worked together with product and operations counterparts throughout a vastly different, and unprepared for 2020.
Some businesses did not survive. Others adapted and changed what they provided. Yet others dug in, and found means to keep the lights on.
The last scenario often required changes to previously established norms.
When the ship is taking on water, it doesn’t help to keep to guidelines established pre-emergency right?
Rules were thrown out, new decentralised systems were made, some eyes had to close, other areas previously not deemed critical became a lifesaver.
Moving into 2021 with somewhat calmer waters, we are more optimistic as we recognise respective Governments are learning how to better deal with both pandemic and population, as well as the availability of multiple vaccines on the horizon, brand teams can start to look beyond 3 months and think about the rest of the year.
This is a good moment as we prepare for either calendar or financial year 2021 to think about how to start removing the band aids (or any other support) we used for 2020 and to relook at where and how to help our brands grow.
Some teams would have already started and even completed their marketing plan and calendar for 2021. The marketing plan is as good a place to start when it comes to evaluating brand health and strength; and to add on a brand strategy for 2021.
A brand strategy differs from a marketing plan. The strategy helps a brand reach a point where it is able to demonstrate differentiation from competitors and other adjacent industry/sector partners. Differentiation comes in different flavours, and either helps a brand provide a different value or provide the same value but in a very different manner from competitors. Either approach will contribute to the brand becoming or being more identifiable from a competitor.
A strong, recognisable brand provides a boost to the business in the form of emotional alignment with the customer, as well as the preference a customer provides to your business.
Here are three tips to consider when putting together your brand strategy for 2021.
Look at the marketplace you operate in
· Differentiating from competitors means you cannot operation in isolation.
· Re-look at your competitor list, and determine if they are still the right ones to benchmark against in 2021.
· Start by looking at what these competitors are doing, where they are succeeding and having positive customer interactions and where they are facing challenge.
· Review each competitor in terms of their strengths and weaknesses. We suggest using a SWOT analysis, followed by a SWOT alignment and finally a Competitive Strength analysis. (We are Brand Utility can help you with these analyses as part of our Strategic Communications approach – drop us an email!)
· Determine which of their strengths align with your brand values and that you can replicate – reducing their advantage with customers. Identify which weaknesses your brand is stronger in to reinforce and emphasise – influencing customers to consider your brand instead.
Start refreshing your brand from the fundamentals
· Set-up or refresh the strategic communications master plan and align it with the marketing plan
· It should include objectives and outcomes and incorporate insights from the questions and research in order to build consistent, long-term approaches; supported by tactical execution. However, remember this is long-term planning so it does not ALL need to be completed within 12 months.
Consider whether your positioning statement is remains valid for 2021
· Connect with customers that you enjoy a good relationship with. Ask them whether your positioning statement resonates with them and remains as their “best buy for this type of situation” preference.
· Adapt the positioning statement from what it was in 2020 if your business is choosing to re-focus on core or niche areas in an approach towards leadership. Brand teams can be key support for such direction changes.
We are Brand Utility is a business consultancy. We work with brands in the corporate, professional services, retail, travel and technology spaces.
Our principal founder is a registered management consultant, certified and recognised by the Institute of Management Consultants Singapore.
We offer strategy and tactics to support growth outcomes - revenue, scale, regional expansion and market entry – for our clients.
Areas of support include:
· Strategic communications: Approach to market, brand concept and map, positioning, messaging, story and narrative, thought leadership
· Marketing: Campaign/programme planning, story-based marketing execution, digital marketing, community amplification, content planning and production, go-to-market execution
· Lead generation: Digital advertising, social media advertising, social commerce, e-commerce
· Integration of marketing with business operations: We plan and execute as a seconded marketing and/or PR lead for your brand
Discover more about our services at our website or book an exploratory consultation through this link.
Photo by Danil Aksenov on Unsplash
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