2016 brand communication trends

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Up and Onwards to a Year of Greatness! Strategic Brand & Communication Trends for 2016 Dear Friends, Clients & Partners, Happy New Year! Thank you to the many of you who have given a little bit of their valuable time to complete the short “Brand Impact 2016” survey over the festive season. Contributions ranged from Star Wars inspired insights (May the Force be with you – also in 2016!) to the primary challenges of tackling increasingly complex, digital and mobile brand ecosystems. I invite you to take a deliberate look past the operational implications of taking your brand digital, social and mobile however. Beyond the aspects of continuing to build Omni channel presence, organizational alignment and marketing effectiveness. We are all fully into these disciplines already – but what are the key tendencies to watch out for beyond what we already know? The common thread emerging from this curated synopsis is a clear tendency towards orchestrating brand, communication and marketing mechanics in a way that builds desire and loyalty based on deeply rooted value systems - from the inside out, so to speak. On the following pages you will find a short write up that unpacks this in more detail, outlines some of the driving forces and also proposes key areas to think about. I hope it provides an interesting read and stimulates your own thinking at the start of the New Year. Thank you, very best wishes - on and upwards to a year of Greatness! Markus Kramer Expert at Powering Brands & Partner at Brand Affairs

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ake a look past the operational implications of taking your brand digital, social and mobile. Beyond the aspects of continuing to build Omni channel mechanics, organizational alignment and marketing effectiveness. We are all fully into these disciplines already – but what are the key tendencies to watch out for beyond what we already know? Here is a short write up that unpacks the top three of the major strategic brand & communication trends identified for 2016. To access the full paper please download the PDF here, for the corresponding info graphic please see here. Content Curation (quality) will outperform Content Machines (quantity) The Internet of Things (IoT) is not the only area where intensifying interconnectivity will drive change. The speed by which information, channels and audiences are interrelated will continue to accelerate and converge. From the angle of content creation therefore, this represents a plethora of reasons why there will be even more noise and increasin

Transcript of 2016 brand communication trends

Page 1: 2016 brand communication trends

 

Up and Onwards to a Year of Greatness! Strategic Brand & Communication Trends for 2016 Dear Friends, Clients & Partners, Happy New Year! Thank you to the many of you who have given a little bit of their valuable time to complete the short “Brand Impact 2016” survey over the festive season. Contributions ranged from Star Wars inspired insights (May the Force be with you – also in 2016!) to the primary challenges of tackling increasingly complex, digital and mobile brand ecosystems. I invite you to take a deliberate look past the operational implications of taking your brand digital, social and mobile however. Beyond the aspects of continuing to build Omni channel presence, organizational alignment and marketing effectiveness. We are all fully into these disciplines already – but what are the key tendencies to watch out for beyond what we already know? The common thread emerging from this curated synopsis is a clear tendency towards orchestrating brand, communication and marketing mechanics in a way that builds desire and loyalty based on deeply rooted value systems - from the inside out, so to speak. On the following pages you will find a short write up that unpacks this in more detail, outlines some of the driving forces and also proposes key areas to think about. I hope it provides an interesting read and stimulates your own thinking at the start of the New Year. Thank you, very best wishes - on and upwards to a year of Greatness!

Markus Kramer Expert at Powering Brands & Partner at Brand Affairs

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Content Curation (quality) will outperform Content Machines (quantity) The Internet of Things (IoT) is not the only area where intensifying interconnectivity will drive change. The speed by which information, channels and audiences are interrelated will continue to accelerate and converge. From the angle of content creation therefore, this represents a plethora of reasons why there will be even more noise and increasing clutter in 2016. Aligned content quantity used to drive SEO – and it will continue doing so, but no longer at the cost of sacrificing quality. Google will step up the quality aspect of content- (and hence: search) evaluation. Or take a younger generation of digitally savvy audiences for instance: Millennials and Gen Z are significantly better at spotting the meaninglessness of ‘cheap’ content, recognizing a lack of purpose in your message within seconds and excluding you from their self-selected content consumption. Sharper positioning of your brand, the focus of your message, cutting through the clutter, condensed and more to-the-point content will become the key ingredient for brands in a world of accelerated complexity of communications. As the ancient Latin saying goes: Quam Bene non Quantum – Not how much, but how well you plan and curate your content will make the difference. But how to go about it? Connecting your inner value system holistically with your audience will increasingly provide guidance and direction for how you create your content. Authentic, engaging and from the inside out. Good practice of how to develop, organize and leverage qualitative content models can already be found within the luxury sector (i.e. Le quai de l'horloge by Breguet) or high-end educational institutions (i.e. The Harvard Business Review).

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Internalizing Personalization 3.0 The role of technology enabled, data driven behaviour intelligence will become more important in guiding marketing communications and the investments underpinning these – especially for SMEs. As consumers become faster and better at selecting their individual content consumption, brands will be stepping up their game on how to take personalization of their propositions and respective communications to the next level. According to Forrester research, 83% of marketers already say personalization is critical to their company’s success1. Illustrative examples within the digital world are of course Google, YouTube, Amazon and many more. Ever better algorithms make an engagement with these companies specific not just to segments of users, but also to single individuals. From a communications efficiency point of view, personalization will be even more important in 2016 because even a slightly irrelevant message will represent a waste of investment. It implies that companies looking to strengthen their brands will have to adopt more sophisticated tools to gain and leverage insights, and translate these into segmentation and communication models that work harder for them - even if this means looking at segments of one. For larger brands the perspectives on demographic segmentation, digital analytics and big data won’t be enough anymore. Weaving in behavioural economics, psychographics, life- and social- sciences will gain traction during 2016 to adjust communications even better. The technology for doing so is abundant, inexpensive and relatively fast to implement - but complex to internalize. Legacy systems, out-dated organizational models (i.e. who “owns” communication) and the lack of internal talent to master these domains are key challenges brands and their CMOs will have to start tackling more intensively this year.

                                                                                                               1  http://www.evergage.com/blog/personalization-­‐3-­‐0-­‐a-­‐digital-­‐marketing-­‐imperative/  

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Adopting Experientialism Consumers both in mature and in emerging markets are becoming increasingly conscious not only about what they (need or status based) buy but also why (purpose) and how (experience) they buy it. Creating great experiences will no longer remain in the realm of brands with physical products. 2016 is the year in which the elements related to designing an experience will be prioritized by conscious and meaningful brands. As Andrea Soriani, Director of Marketing at Maserati, North America, said: “Clients will always remember a negative experience no matter how many positive moments have been shared." Zappos remains a good case study of conscious customer service call centres. In the air travel industry, Singapore Airlines is exemplary of using experiential branding as a differentiator yielding great results2. Another fantastic example on how to combine both personalization and experientialism is Jumeirah’s “Stay Different” Philosophy3, beautifully expressed and implemented. Much learning can be had from these industries that already underwent value chain disruption and took on the challenge to step up service and client experience levels to regain competitive advantage. Adopting an experientialist mind-set will become vital for brands. Meaningless experiences will impact brands way beyond what Trip Advisor did for the travel industry. The rise of experientialism implies that most brands, especially those in non-service and hospitality sectors, will need to improve all of their touch points and employ a more ritualistic and spiritual understanding of what a meaningful brand experience represents for their clients. The level of ‘tailoring’ consumers are experiencing in the digital space will set the agenda for the expectations of interacting with non-digital brands, too.

                                                                                                               2  http://www.worldairlineawards.com/awards/world_airline_rating.html  3  http://www.jumeirah.com/en/jumeirah-­‐group/jobs-­‐with-­‐jumeirah/our-­‐philosophy/  

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Rethinking Relationship Marketing CRM is heavily commoditized – everyone does it. CRM has become a cold, dry and rigid (transactional) science. And most importantly, your customers see right through it. CRM is also and mostly a very inwardly way of looking at relationship management, yielding less and less cut-through in an ever more information-cluttered world. The consequence? What used to be a very personal business has taken on ‘mass-character’. If you are in that camp, and if you are really honest on the topic, then it is likely that CRM is no longer creating true incremental value for you, or for your customers - visibility and instrumentality are two very different pair of shoes. Companies small (in particular) and large, struggle to demonstrate a return on their CRM investments. For good practice on how relationship marketing works well, with a very consistent and high degree of integrity and a real humanistic approach to the ‘relationship’ aspects, take a look at the high-end luxury sector. Brands such as Aston Martin, Jaeger Le Coultre or Patek Philippe are mastering the process of genuinely bonding with customers. So does Apple (still) and Harley-Davidson, too. 2016 is the year that will require marketers to re-think relationship marketing. CRM is becoming a model of the past, CMR (Customer Managed Relationships) is the new paradigm. It means that we need to re-think customer journeys, starting with the customer and backwards re-engineer into these into our businesses, not the other way around. We must rework our segmentation models and the way we interact and communicate with our prospects and customers accordingly.

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Recognizing the Scarcity of Time As the competitive cycles keep getting tighter and complexity is on the rise, it becomes increasingly difficult for brands to cut through the clutter. One of the key success factors for companies will be the way they recognize the understanding of time. The way of perceiving, recognizing and indeed valuing time has changed fundamentally in the last few years, as civilized societies have started to democratize the notion of this very scarce resource. Today, everyone has very little time for anything. The saviour of course is technology, going hand-in hand with an increase in productivity. But is it not odd that so many of the tasks which used to take hours, days or even weeks now take seconds - and yet we seem to have less time in our daily lives? Brands with true purpose and deeper meaning will recognize this dynamic. The elimination of strategies (communication, or else) that waste a client’s time has the potential to become a competitive advantage. Customer Journeys need re-thinking, touch-points re-evaluation. Real time, relevant consumption of content will become the base line of expectations. If you want to see the mechanics of how this will pan out for companies and brands in the future, look no further than at Snapchat and the communication dynamic it creates.

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Humanizing The brand strategists, policy makers and entrepreneurs witnessing how small changes in adopting a more human approach to process design can make positive differences are still a minority. The tendency of crafting small psych hacks (and hooks), creative solutions and user-friendly interfaces will be even more important in 2016. Humanization also means smarter cities, reducing complexity, mature nations, innovation, technological tools that adapt to humans rather than the other way around etc. The same goes for clever brand positioning and communications. Very often, the success drivers inherent in ‘humanizing’ represent not one, but a multitude of well aligned values. It is easy to spot this dynamic in property or even country positioning. For instance, Japan and Switzerland invested in aligning their value drivers significantly, pushing both positioning and communications during 2014 – 2015, yielding excellent results (see also Future Brand’s Country Brand Index4 for more details). On the brand and product side, Apple and Bang & Olufsen are among the leaders on the humanization agenda. When products work without hassle, when they are simple, beautiful and reliable – consumers are willing to pay premium for this. Innovation that is not rationalized may survive but will not thrive. This means that brands should keep improving what they have innovated until it is also fully humanized. As the customers’ trust in businesses and their often over-promising brands has reached all time lows, humanizing everything related to your business will be among the key investments of time, effort and capital in 2016 to build and strengthen your brand for the future.

                                                                                                               4  http://www.futurebrand.com/news/futurebrand-­‐launches-­‐the-­‐country-­‐brand-­‐index-­‐2014-­‐15  

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Purpose & Real Values: Branding Inside Out Purpose driven brands are on the rise, and increasingly are able to demonstrate greater return. In terms of loyalty, repeat business and ultimately both financially and socially, too. Hava’s Meaningful Brand index 5 or EY’s 6 initiative of leveraging the transformational power of purpose are a demonstration of what this means. Appearance alone is superficial and will increasingly be recognized as such. 2016 will be a year in which the tendency to search for the exceedingly good beyond CSR will continue to make great inroads. So both the outside and the inside of brands will need to be meaningful and led by an overarching shared and aligned purpose. It means crafting better value systems for your brand that hold strong and tight in a radically transparent world. The current winners are clearly purpose-oriented brands such as Apple, Coursera, Tesla and Harley-Davidson for example. These will see even more growth on the back of strong value systems that drive strategy, innovation and culture. Forward-thinking brands that add meaning to their customers’ lives will conquer more territory in their consumers’ minds. This is especially true for upcoming and more meaning conscious generations (Millennials and Gen Z), transcending geographies and maturity of markets around the globe. Companies that are not guided by a deeper, inner purpose will experience loosing grip and traction over time. As the very fundamental nature of competition will continue to drive market dynamics, an approach to ‘branding inside out’ through purpose led transformation will become the silver magic bullet to gain competitive advantage for 2016 and beyond.

                                                                                                               5  http://www.meaningful-­‐brands.com/  6  http://www.ey.com/GL/en/Services/Advisory/EY-­‐purpose-­‐led-­‐transformation-­‐overview  

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About this Survey This summary represents the findings based on a short Brand Impact Survey (2016) conducted electronically between December 22nd 2015 and January 4th 2016, centred around the question of how brands will communicate in 2016. A total of 57 responses from senior brand, marketing and general management executives across various industries (main areas: automotive, finance, luxury and consulting) and geographic regions (main territories: Europe, US and Asia) were collected and synthesized. The paper outlines broader tendencies and is non-representative. Areas mentioned but not further evaluated included macroeconomic trends, digital marketing, social media (broad), mobile technologies (including NFC and iBeacon), predictive marketing, AI (artificial intelligence, robotics), location marketing, payment methods, insourcing, fluid branding and many more. The full info graphic as well as a PDF version of this paper can be downloaded at www.markuskramer.net/blog and www.brandaffairs.com About Markus Kramer

Markus Kramer is a Partner at Brand Affairs in Zurich and London, specializing in strategic growth and brand management. In his most recent undertakings Markus helped Aston Martin (Global Marketing Director) and Harley-Davidson (Marketing Director EMEA) build, scale and deliver their fascinating brands to more people in more places around the world. Current and past work includes many years of brand-, marketing- and retail- consulting assignments at numerous other marques, including Ferrari, Asset Managers, Government Institutions and private equity

backed luxury mobile phone maker VERTU (Chief Marketing Officer), covering the entire spectrum of brand management from mass to premium to luxury. A passionate business and brand builder, Markus is a recognized thought leader and facilitator in the fast paced world of cutting edge brand and marketing management. He is a Senior Visiting Fellow at CASS Business School in London and speaks regularly at select conferences and lecturing assignments around the world. Markus is Swiss at heart and holds degrees in Marketing & Brand Management, International Project Management from the University of California in Berkeley (USA) and an MBA from the SAID Business School at the University of Oxford (UK). Issued: January 5th 2016