Tool Box
Issue No. 13 - October/November 2003
Brand Leadership — What Makes it Successful?
Understand More about Brand Issues
At the Australian Institute of Management’s Umanage 2003 conference earlier this year, marketing authority Penny Burke of Clemenger BBDO addressed the nature of brand leadership and discussed how to achieve that Holy Grail of consumer appeal.
Penny began with the premise that today, overproduction rather underproduction is the problem and commoditisation of goods and services, rather than differentiation, is the danger.
“The automobile truck industry can produce 80 million units and consumers only want 60 million units," she stated. “The 170 whitegoods factories in Europe produce over 200 brands of appliance. And real demand is for half that.
“The consumption of steel has now fallen to 721 million tonnes but production capacity continues at over 1 billion tonnes.”
The old SLAB theory of sales —Sit, Listen, Absorb, Buy—is no longer valid, Penny asserted. Extending your communications reach doesn’t generate sales automatically. We may be better able to project an invitation than ever before, but as analyst Allen Rosenshine puts it:
“Regardless of the category of goods or services or the new technologies that offer new levels of information and new models of distribution, consumers will still make choices based on how a product fits into their lives, both rationally and emotionally. That’s a pretty good definition of a brand.”
Penny also cited David Lewis, author of The Soul of the New Consumer, who states: “Today’s consumers are more likely to be time, attention and trust starved in contrast with yesterday’s consumers who were more constrained by cash, choice and the availability of goods.”
Penny believes “ideas that constantly refresh the relationship consumers have with the brand” are the key to brand building. They have to be strong ideas that capture the imagination and provoke a response, that transcend traditional communications channels and build the brand over the longer term.
