Five practices for global brand success

A strong, scalable business model is a major advantage for multinational companies (MNCs).
In addition, these companies typically have:

• An extraordinary depth of management talent that allows them to out-think the competition and survive changes in leadership.
• The best advice from their global media, advertising and research agencies.
• Global Research and Development capabilities that provide a constant stream of innovation and can readily adapt existing products and services to meet new market needs.
• An understanding of what is likely to work in a new market based on experience elsewhere.
• Big marketing budgets with which to establish their brands. If their first attempt to enter a market fails, they have the resources to try again, using research to understand where they went wrong and how they might do better.

View successful campaigns mentioned in The Global Brand.
MNC brands can succeed at disrupting the status quo in a new market by following five steps:

1. Adapting products and services to meet local needs and tastes
2. Solving the local value equation through product and pricing strategies
3. Creating a strong presence and a distinctive identity
4. Adopting more aggressive point-of-purchase tactics
5. Getting as close to the local culture as is possible

The Global Brand discusses these steps in more detail before going on to consider general practices that will help grow a successful global brand.
One of the biggest challenges faced by global marketers is how best to communicate across countries and cultures.

Five brand success factors

An efficient and scalable business model combined with innovation is necessary to stay ahead of the competition. But individually these are not sufficient to make a successful global brand. Five further overlapping components are required:

1. A great brand experience

Brand experience is not limited to the product or service. Every contact with the brand counts.

2. A clear and consistent positioning

People need to know what a brand stands for. That's why an established and successful marketing campaign should not be abandoned simply for the sake of saying something new. When change is required, the challenge is to re-interpret the brand positioning in a way that is appropriate to the current time and culture.

3. A sense of dynamism

Innovation is key to brand success but it is not limited to the functional benefits of the brand. A brand that sets the trends rather than reacting to them is likely to be seen as different and more popular.

4. A sense of authenticity

Today consumers in developed countries have a finely tuned sense for what is true and authentic versus shallow and contrived. They are still drawn to brands with a strong heritage.

5. A strong corporate culture

Today people seek out brands that display their values by the actions they take. In industries with a strong customer-service component it is particularly important that everyone involved with the brand understands and embodies its values.
Which brand epitomizes these success factors? Apple. In the 2008 Millward Brown BrandZ™ Top 100 Most Powerful Brands ranking, Apple's brand value increased 128 percent as a result of strong business growth based on innovation and strong customer loyalty.

Golden Rules for Guided Innovation

How can corporate leaders guide innovation within their own organizations? According to Diane Beecher, The Brand Consultancy’s CEO and Senior Strategist, suggests the following Eight Golden Rules for Guided Innovation.

1. Understand the customer. Listen to your customer’s thoughts and ideas, in their own words. Don’t ask questions; let them respond to ideas.
2. The customer is the boss. The customer’s ideas should carry more weight than senior leadership teams or even the CEO. The Brand Consultancy’s process involves capturing the senior teams’ hypotheses and validating them with the marketplace. If a concept doesn’t fly, evolve the seed idea in a way that resonates with customers.
3. Listen to all organizational levels. Internal brainstorming should not come only from the R&D and senior teams. Solicit and consider the perspective of employees with customer touch points throughout the organization. A cross-functional support perspective is also valuable.
4. Include external ideas. Internal perspectives are valuable, but ideas generated internally may be created by those wearing industry or organizational blinders. Solicit ideas from a variety of external constituencies, including current, lost and prospective customers; vendors; creative panels; and any other relevant audience. Optimized idea selection should be limited to current and prospective customers.
5. Be practical. You must be open to all ideas, but practical in response. Feasibility filters (time, money, resources, and impact) and competitive perspective must be applied to the ideas selected by customers.
6. Create a replicable, scalable process. The innovation process should be replicable and scalable, to encourage and advance a culture of innovation within the organization.
7. Get leadership buy-in. As with any organizational change, leadership must embrace the process for it to be successful and generate tangible, measurable and profitable results.
8. Make a business case. The process must always include making the business case. If profit is not considered, then the process and the outcomes are not sustainable.