Brands Last. Recessions Don’t

By Shelly Roberts, FireBrand

Being successful in good times is easy. Being successful in crisis is opportunity!

If you are an Investor, CEO, CMO, GM, Managing or Marketing Director you’re probably sick of hearing agencies scream “Spend! Now!" figuring they are like every down-revenue crew desperately trying to boost their own income. I’m not dumb enough to say that isn’t true. But it isn’t the only truth.

Your agencies are begging you to “Spend!” “Now!” because they are absolutely right. “Crisis central” is your best opportunity to make a company’s success spectacular!

Let’s start with some hard numbers. Not mine. McGraw Hill research’s.

U.S. companies that maintained or increased advertising budgets during the 1981-82 recession averaged Significantly Higher Sales growth, both during the recession and for the following three years, than those that eliminated or decreased advertising.

Impressive. It gets better.

By 1985, sales of companies that were Aggressive Recession Advertisers and Branders climbed 256% over those that didn't keep up.

Need more? Meldrum & Fewsmith research showed conclusively that “Advertising Aggressively during Recessions not only boosted sales, but also increased profits and overall market share.”

This is a foreign concept in a country that grew its retail success by just having a product and a shelf to put it on. In times like these, the bad news is that that isn’t enough any more.

But if you, unlike your competitors, pump up the volume and quality of your messages instead of hiding the money under the company mattress till times get good, you can set the foundation for being the category standard in recovery.

In hard times, people want to know who they can trust. Your branding tells them that it’s your company. Of course they want bargains, but they’ve learned quality, and they want to stay as close to it as they can afford to.

They want reassurance that they aren’t getting cheated or cheapened. That’s your branding’s job. If you stop reassuring them, they’ll forget you, or learn to trust someone who is using their branding to tell the right story.

Where’s the money going to come from? Where it always does. Do these three steps first to bankroll your branding:

1. Find the waste in your factory and cut it. Be brutal. You’ll be much more efficient later anyway. It’s a good excuse to refine your process.

2. Lose your loser product lines Let line expansions go. Go back to basics.

3. Concentrate on your core business which is where most of the profit is anyway.

And then

4. Let your market know that you’re committed to delivering quality. through your branding.

There is a famous US candy bar maker that chose a unique way to survive a downturn. Rather than cheapen ingredients and cut prices, they made the same quality bar smaller. They used their advertising to reinforce their brand value by telling customers what they were doing. They told people who loved their quality they wouldn’t offer an inferior product at a cheaper price. They were brilliantly honest with their market. They showed that the company wasn’t going to compromise. They stayed true to their brand, communicated the brand position loudly and often. They survived that recession, and Hershey is still the best loved chocolate bar in the US.

In coming columns I’ll help you end the Price vs Brand war, put a brand message into every communication, suggest things to ask for from media, suggest places you never thought to use to brand, tell you what you’ve been doing wrong, and generally discuss savvy ways to climb out of the crisis.

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Shelly Roberts is the Founding Partner and Managing Director of FireBrand, branding consultancy helping companies refine their marketing processes for maximum effect. She is a former Executive Creative Director for D’Arcy Advertising, Romania and ECD for Saatchi &Saatchi US.

Let's start at the very beginning. This is FireBrand's first blog entry, so we'll offer you some very basic but critically important information about how to dig your company out of the "crisis" and thrive in the aftermath recovery.

-Shelly Roberts

Managing Director - FireBrand

www.firebrandro.com

FiREBRAND's 10 MOST EFFECTIVE

RULES FOR BRANDING

IN ANY ECOMONY

1. CREATE ONE MESSAGE

It’s hard enough to get one brand message to stay in consumers’ minds, much less two or three if you change your mind, are unsure of your position, or just get bored with what you’ve heard over and over from your agencies. Stay with the same message for a year.

2. SPEAK PLAIN AND BE UNDERSTOOD

There is no guarantee that the jargon in your industry is understood by everyone. What they do understand is good, plain conversational language. Jargon changes but branding messages are meant to last. Complicated, “sophisticated” language may not be understood by your market.

3. STRIVE FOR HUMAN-NESS

Great brands achieve a high level of human-ness. They speak to you and your needs as an individual, not as a part of a market.

4. HELP YOUR MARKET CREATE YOUR BRAND

Your market has already made some decisions about you. Use the strongest part of what people already believe about you to underline their good feelings. It’s more powerful. And it’s cheaper.

5. SELL PRICE AND BRAND AT THE SAME TIME

Everyone is trying to make a profit now. That only breeds price-driven customers who will desert you when they find better prices. Include brand/value concepts in every price-driven communication to keep them loyal.

6. EXAMINE THE BOUNCE-BACK

You know what messages you send. But what counts in branding is what your customers and potential customers receive. Ask them. Learn and make necessary adjustments. Get the research done before you waste even one branding dollar.

7. INCLUDE A HEALTHY PR COMPONENT

Brands are built on what people are saying about you. Not just about what you are saying about yourself. While PR often seems like an extra to use only when you have big budgets, correctly guided PR can create the buzz that creates the belief.

8. CASCADE THE MESSAGE THROUGH YOUR ORGANIZATION

Start with your Board of Directors and work down to the lowest paid employee. If they understand the message, so will your market. In addition, they will become ambassadors under the flag you want the company to be flying

9. GREAT BRANDING WILL KILL A BAD PRODUCT

QUICKER THAN A COMPANY SCANDAL OR A TAMPERED PRODUCT.

Calling attention to an imperfect product will just let more people know they don’t want to buy it again, much faster. Balance your branding with your highest quality product or service. Customers aren’t easily fooled.

10. WAITING UNTIL THINGS GET BETTER

WILL ONLY MAKE THINGS WORSE!

Your company can’t survive without doing some marketing. The sooner you get back into the game, the better your chances of winning. It doesn’t cost any more to keep your message On Brand. But if you wait too long, competitors can take the advantage.

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FireBrand is set up to assist mid- to-large sized companies in honing their marketing/communications/branding processes for maximum effectiveness.

FireBrand is not an ad or branding agency. Rather, it guides companies through the communications process. We teach marketing departments how better to create and execute effective plans, how to select the most ideal partner agencies, how to put Simple-To-Understand “Best Practices” into place long after FireBrand is gone. And, most importantly now, how to keep the branding alive when so much focus has to be on creating profit.