A Day at Works

Back to brand development…. this afternoon we invite a team from an advertising agency simply to share what they make have done for previous weeks after our briefing. We aim for maintain loyalty of our customers by developing comunity events and since the customer base we have is customer with middle-low income level thus we think we would balance what we can give and what we demand from them. Simply we would make them loyal but also maintaining their expectation slightly higher than competitor only… loyal not because what we give, but loyalty which means they ready to sacrifice for the brand.

And the recommendation is very standard from marketing science perspective although wrap-up with sophisticated and foreign axioms, phrase, picture and so on: ensure we target the right customer by exploring segments might be available and their potencies – jump to what might be their needs – jump again to core value and position we should establish on the mind and heart of those customers.

The problem.. and this is very big and often is that they make a presentation just by introducing brand buzz word, and jumping from one concept to another without data basis. Since they are the creative people they perhaps ignoring the fact that imagination without ratioale is just another day dreaming….

Unfortunately books about brand also make similar approach, lack of scientific background… at least from behavioral science. From left brain dominance perspective, brand development should be justifiable by hard fact, any initiatives should able to answer following (minimum) questions:

1. Brand is a name, so what is a natural thought generally emerge when people see and experience the product? If we have a donout like bread, what’s pop out in the mind of people who see it? a donout, a tart, or what?? When we can understand the natural thought we can determine how far we can differ? Remember that very small difference make the name not even remembered, but to overwhelming such as naming a chinese little dumb face dog with “Mozart” also make an iritation.

2. If we develop the value behind the brand, is it raise expectation unnecessarily? Do we actually doing suicide by setting high expectation without preparing operations just because we want someday our operations be there? If this happen thus the end of brand development is not brand loyalty but just stuck in brand awareness and activation. .. people should remember again the matrix of Kano, or motivational theory from Herzberg.

3. Does the return on investment can satisfy us? Many brand becoming very popular but popular just for the unpotential market. What’s the benefit is a Mercedes popular to youngster of middle low income level? Preparing when they become tycon if the economy boom again? Remember the brand trust concept,… I’m being remembered again by fellow blogger on this case.

4, Is there any measure to navigate the company dealing with brand management? or we just have survey on attitude which probably never proven to be a behavior?

So I am waiting for a local brand or creative agency which not only creative but also rational. A marketing consultant which not only very conceptual but also have a ground breaking creativity….

Customer insight is a must for creating value and developing relationship. Without an understanding of what customer want, firm will face difficulty to meet customer expectation that result in problematic selling. More understanding we have about what customer want, greater our chance directed to produce what customer expected.

So how we get customer insight?
We can understand what customer’s want, based on what they buy. This is the most reliable source of information, generated from data mining activities toward internal records (sales records, customer records, inventory records, etc.). If customer buys a pair of Nike, this means our customer is interested in sports, and style. But this does not means if customer is interested in sport and style they will always buy Nike, so transaction is the result but “why” is beyond this information.

The “Why”
To answer this question we must collect information about what customer need, value at, lifestyle and attitude. Customer who value sport and comfort actually can choose Reeboks, Nike, Adidas, or others. But if s/he also value style and professionalism they will more considering Reeboks and Nike rather than others. Next, what is his/ her lifestyle? Reeboks and Nike have different lifestyle. Customer who buys Nike, should be agreed to Nike’s position in lifestyle, that is intuitive and free (remember the tag line ‘Just Do It’). The last is attitude, how customer evaluates product and services. Based on the value within the product and lifestyle s/he has, customer determine positive or negative evaluation attached to products or services. Customer chooses Nike because s/he thinks and feels that Nike is better.

Although customer agreed to benefit offered by Nike, agreed to Nike’s value, agreed Nike’s to lifestyle, and put higher mark on Nike, customer can actually buy other than Nike because externalities such as budget, school policy, stock availability in store, friends influence and so on. So our “Why” does not match to our “What”, our customer need, value, lifestyle and attitude different to what actually customer buy. So transactional data is not the ultimate although it is the reality (customer really spend money on the stuff). Data mining is important to understand “WHAT” but actual picture of customer will be completed by customer survey – the “WHY”, althought externalities will influence the linkage of the two.