Secrets from an Expert
Having a good product is not enough. Today like in past times, it turns out to be insufficient. Brand is what holds the genuine value of a business. It is imperative to build, develop and launch it to the world and it must be done in an intelligent, efficient and convenient way for all.
With the importance of brand building and its value, Rodolfo Rubio, marketing and communications expert, moved and convinced the participants of the XVIII ALAFAVE Congress held at Atlanta, USA. He invited them to see beyond the product, logo and publicity with which we advertise candles, in order to place our strategies in a brand, as an intangible asset that dwells in people’s minds and hearts. That explains why the positioning rarely relays on the product; it is in our mind and heart. As Steve Jobs once said, a brand is not about rational arguments but about the way it emotionally connects with people.
A global study shows that the majority of consumers wouldn’t care if two thirds of the brands that currently exist were to disappear. Therefore we should question ourselves what is that makes that single third part valued by the market. We will surely find a strong, timely and efficient marketing.
Along with the interesting vision and vast experience developed over time, part of it obtained at Procter & Gamble (that’s landed on the centerfold of this Punto de Fusión edition), Rodolfo Rubio, partner associate at Lime Consulting, explained that brands face many challenges but none as important as differentiation. It is imperative to stand out from competition in the middle of a market that’s saturated with products and services. It is so because experience has proven that it is better to be different than to be better.
Differentiation should be based on the superiority that comes from unique qualities and innovative capability; on the factors that impact favorably on the price such as techology development, the use of unique materials or mass scale production among others like customer service, experience, distribution and drive of the brand.
In the process of brand development we must also develop specific skills such as using the proper means, conveying the right message, trust development and performance rating. Proposals not only require originality but they must also be feasible, convincing and irresistible just as Apple, Disney, Google, Victoria’s Secret, Samsung and Red Bull have managed.
For a long time, marketing of a brand was based on traditional media. Marketing dynamics focused on announcing a product and then extending the message for as long as possible but nowadays, in a globalized world characterized by a continuous bombing of messages and an impressive channel network, interphases, connections and interconnections, dynamics are not so simple. Now we have to approach it as a creativity, drive and disposition issue, all properly channeled.
Today, media remains to be allies with marketing, though only those that are understood and managed as hyper directed contact points and that work as a platform to consolidate what’s now known as engagement.
And so, we will have to encourage communication that’s entertaining, useful, surprising, attainable, practical and timely. It might seem complicated but Rodolfo Rubio revealed a formula as simple as it is effective: we must tell stories that are touching, moving, entertaining, awakening, and inspirational and above all, stories that make us think. In a few words: stories that leave something for us to reflect upon.
One of the conditions to achieve it is by developing modular platforms of brand content. Internet is ideal, but the messages shouldn’t reach out in an improvised or random way. On the contrary, we should really get to know our means, its ways, websites and optimal schedules. For example, we should take into consideration that advertisement is most striking on social networks (71 %), Internet browsers (37 %), email (35 %) and websites (28 %). We should also take into consideration other useful data such as the fact that attention to the conveyed messages begins its rise at 14:00 hrs. and reaches its peak between 18:00 and 22:00 hrs.
As our expert pointed out at the ALAFAVE Congress, within marketing’s world, a message is the king and the platforms are its kingdom. And for everything to work as expected, the grounds of marketing should be built on trust; hence new brand values are: transparency and authenticity. Translated into what we believe to be optimal performance, we must achieve being noticed and trusted.
Truth always comes to light, our grandparents used to tell us but today precisely at this time, it comes to us sooner and whole. For this, Rodolfo Rubio states that a negative experience that’s ignored or an attempt to deceive are the worst enemies for a brand’s value, up to the point of threatening its survival.
Brands that are achieving something relevant or that have managed to impact the hearts and minds of consumers have a common formula:
- They’re establishing tighter bonds with consumers
- They’re looking to improve people and society’s lifestyles
- They’re trying to transcend the product’s market
Members of ALAFAVE were invited to develop and convey an irresistible multisensory experience that is avant-garde marketing, and we should all work at our industry to reach it for the years to come.
