What will it take to revive your brand?

At Axiom, we’re frequently approached by companies interested in reviving their brands.

Often, they’re vision is a new advertising, public relations or social campaign.  Sometimes they’re interested in a new marketing channel or expansion of existing channels. Others are looking to improve their ability to launch new products. Most of the time the process goes much deeper than that, much more strategic and far more fundamental.

Tim Calkins, clinical professor of marketing at The Kellogg School of Management, my alma mater, addresses this issue in a recent article entitled Reviving a Brand That’s Lost Its Luster. Calkins recommends three steps to prevent brand erosion:

• Maintain clarity about what the brand stands for
• Continuously monitor the brand’s health
• Align employee financial expectations and incentives to support brand health and stay accountable for the long term

Calkin’s article made me reflect on a recent client engagement. Last year, Axiom began working with a company that had pioneered an agricultural product during the mid ‘80s. The product was so innovative and so effective that it is now sold in 30+ countries throughout Europe, the Middle East, Latin America and South America.

Sounds like an ideal market position, right?  Not really.  Why?

• Unfortunately, multi-national competitors and private label brands offered by the company’s resellers were eroding market share and profit margins.
• The company’s product line had ballooned to include a number of me-too products that had been added based primarily on customer requests with little regard to competitive strategy.
• The company CEO was rightly concerned that his company differentiate and remain memorable to its customers and, ultimately, specifiers.

Obviously there were a number of strategic paths that we could have recommended.

Our strategy became evident after conducting several voice-of-customer and voice of specifier market research projects. Our analysis showed that the company would benefit from returning to the roots of its original market innovation and positioning around thought leadership in this area. Upon further analysis we discovered that the company’s most profitable products were actually based on the original innovation. Clearly, this was turf that the company could claim as its own — unlike multi-national competitors and private label reseller brands.

Sounds like a cakewalk, right? Not really. Why?

• Various factions within the company were concerned about how returning to the company’s roots might negatively impact growth. These factions had worked hard to broaden product lines and expand internationally. This approach appeared to be taking them backward.
• Those who questioned the recommended approach tended to define the company primarily on how it fulfilled the needs of its largest customers and on anecdotal feedback from these customers.
• Most were unwilling to admit that the company’s product lines ultimately traced back to its original innovation.

How did we address these issues?

• Rely on voice of the customer and voice of the specifier using ongoing market research — not anecdotal comments — to set strategy
• Create a compelling Market Position, Unique Selling Proposition, Elevator Speech and Message Points that rally and unify troops — internal and external — around the original innovation
• Develop marketing and sales materials to support the positioning and messaging
• Refocus the company’s enterprise, marketing/sales, and innovation strategy on its core innovation and reason for being
• Adopt a portfolio management strategy that provides clear management direction on new products and line extensions

If you’re interested in more information on brand revitalization, click on the following links:

Content strategy helps elevate MBA program.

Unique selling proposition propels growth.

For more information, contact Mike Reiber at mreiber@axiomcom.com.