Strong brands can weather the storm of controversy

Strong brands are a valuable asset: they are often able to withstand significant challenges thrust upon them and retain (or at least regain) the loyalty of customers. There has been much debate over the past few months regarding how the Qantas brand will fare after the myriad of controversies it has faced of late. Almost daily, news regarding industrial disputes between the airline and a number of employee groups, culminating in the infamous grounding of the entire Qantas fleet late…

Dimensions of Strategy Implementation

Strategy is defined as the design and execution of plans in order to attain a particular goal. Strategy is considered successful if it shows adaptability given that forces interact and often conflict (Heuser, 2010, p 27). For a business it is the careful calculation of how you will achieve your business goals. Businesses often spend a lot of time deciding on what their business goals are. Businesses also thereby spend a lot of time and resources in deciding how to achieve their…

Internal Branding – the Key to reconnecting your Customers and Employees

Customers drive sales and profitability. So how do your employees interact with and engage customers? How would your customers describe their experience? Do your customers have an expectation on how your employee will represent your brand?   

So how does an organisation manage its customer experience to ensure its people, processes and culture are reinforcing customer expectations? A key foundation of customer experience management is internal branding.

Internal branding in…

Brand is Image and Image is Brand….

For those that believe brand and image are separate and in no way linked may need to rethink their position. In the media recently have been two prime examples of how brand and image are closely interrelated, albeit almost the same thing. Brand in its simplest context are those attributes that makes one product or company stand apart from another. Image is how products and companies present themselves, through logos, colours and artefacts.

The definition of brand needs to go one…

Attraction and Retention – Navigating the Perfect Storm

The recently released HAYS Salary Guide points to a “perfect storm” on the horizon for employers. The survey highlights 3 factors which will contribute to the storm. These are:

Positive Hiring Intentions – most employers are planning on hiring more people

Widening gap between candidate and employer salary intentions – most candidates expect more than employers are prepared to pay

Skills shortages – 54% of employers in Australia are experiencing difficulty in filling critical…

Is the Qantas brand still well-liked?

Well, does it matter? Do we have a real choice? After all, the latest IBISWorld report indicates that Qantas (along with its subsidiary Jetstar) is the clear leader with a 74% market share of domestic passenger travel. Virgin Blue’s shift away from the ‘No-Frills’ image and business model is still in transition: its point of differentiation does not command the price premium that Qantas does, while its price (and cost structure) is similar to that of Jetstar, a rising star to whom it…

Consumer-celebrity attachment: The key to brand endorsement success?

A common feature of marketing strategy is celebrity endorsement, with brands leveraging a celebrities’ popularity to boost their own. The influence of such endorsements is undeniable, with a plethora of market research supporting the notion that sales, stock returns, company image and awareness, amongst other things, are boosted by having a celebrity on board. An obvious indication of the sheer power these endorsements have in the marketplace is the speed at which brands seek to…

Getting Paid NOT to use a Brand!

Creative agencies have long used “personification” as a technique to develop and describe a brand. Describing inanimate products as people allows consumers to understand and relate more closely with the product.

Taking this further many organisations appoint brand ambassadors or spokespeople that represent the attributes that they would like consumers to associate with their product or organisation. A good example of this was Gillette who associated themselves with the world’s best…

How much is Your Reputation worth?

As a shareholder in News Corporation I have followed the News of the World phone hacking scandal with much interest. Many analysts would argue that News of the World represents less than 1 % of the News Corporations profits and that what happens in this small part of the Murdoch empire should have minimal (if any impact) on the overall performance of the organisation.

These analysts are wrong; the share price of the Organisation has fallen by almost 20% since the scandal started…

When Brands get Branded

The difference between having a brand and being branded is an issue that has arisen in the news recently. The plight of Tiger Airways and The News of the World are examples where a company has lost the brand reputation and, as a consequence, have now been branded by the public. A quote from billionaire businessman Warren Buffett comes to mind and managers at the top and middle ranks of the two companies could have heeded its warning. Buffett was quoted as saying, “It takes 20 years…