This article first appeared in the 30/09/2011 edition of The Malaysian Reserve Over the years, companies have invested phenomenal amounts of money in marketing and advertising activities such as sales calls, direct mail, TV, outdoor, indoor, print and other advertising, brochures, leaflets and more. Indeed, according to Nick Wreden in his book Profit brand, How … Continue reading »
Tagged with Retention …
Is Positioning still relevant today? Part two
Recently I wrote a blog post questioning the relevance of positioning today. You can read the full post here. A fellow blogger called Pepita responded with some well thought out and pertinent comments. Below are her comments, taken from the comments section and re posted here together with my responses embedded within the questions. Pepita: … Continue reading »
Build a brand with the basics
Right near my office at Phileo Damansara in Petaling Jaya, a luxury German auto manufacturer has two billboards advertising its top of the range luxury autos. One is a saloon and the other is an SUV. I like this particular SUV so much that if I was still putting posters up on my bedroom wall, … Continue reading »
Branding requires you to get to know your customers
This is the start of an ad hoc series of personal experiences I have with brands and some recommendations to help improve the experience. Running a small retail business is tough, particularly in today’s climate. It’s even tougher in the competitive retail wine business in a small muslim country with high taxes on alcohol. Key … Continue reading »
A solid brand is built from the inside out
The chances are that you have discussed branding, what it is and whether it is important. You’ve probably agreed to ‘look into it’ and assigned someone from marketing to research brand consultants. Marketing will probably google something like ‘brand consultants’ or ‘how to build a brand’ or ask friends or associates if they can recommend … Continue reading »
Luxury branding in developing markets requires a different approach
Patek Philippe, the eponymous luxury Swiss watch, or should I say, timepiece brand is known for running the same advertising campaign for years. Although the images may have changed, the tagline “You never actually own a Patek Philippe. You merely look after it for the next generation.” has remained consistent, usually along with a jaw … Continue reading »
Asian companies need to stop following the herd
I’ve said it before, but I feel the need to say it again, according to Ernst & Young, up to 90% of products fail to become brands, despite US$1.5 trillion spent on marketing every year. Despite massive marketing budgets, global brands with extensive reach and high brand recall, numerous brands have died a painful and … Continue reading »
Personalisation
Companies have to stop trying to sell stuff to prospects and customers and start coordinating all the resources it has to supplying or satisfying specific customers specific requirements for value. Consumers don’t want products (or services) they want the products/services they like immediately and personalised. But personalisation in its present form is primitive because of … Continue reading »
A is for Advertising
This is a good place to start a compendium of branding terms because unfortunately, it is where many companies start their brand building. And that’s a shame, no tragedy because it is an expensive exercise in futility to try and build a brand using advertising alone. Advertising can be traced back to around the late … Continue reading »
Acquisition versus retention
The image below is a rather amusing yet fairly typical example of the importance most companies place on retaining customers. FusionBrand anecdotal research suggests that companies invest 85 – 95% of their marketing resources into the acquisition process and only 5 – 15% into the retention process. Can anyone explain why? After all, according to … Continue reading »
