From the age of about five years and upwards watching TV adverts promoting the services and products of big brands always fascinated me. I would imagine how the beginning, middle and end of the advert could have been re-written and filmed differently. In those days the naive young armchair critic in me would never have appreciated the tough challenges in simply getting those ads on air back then, never mind challenging their content and form. I also always admired those clever copywriters and art directors that came up with those now famous slogans like ‘a Mars a day helps you work, rest and play’, ‘When you feel a little p-peckish, p-p-p-pick up a Penguin!” and BT’s claim that ‘it’s good to talk’.
So then fast forward to Guerilla in 2017, where we have been lucky enough to work with some of the best known brands around and have helped them with their challenges and strategies. What’s interesting is that once you have worked with brands (globally, locally, established, challenger and start up brands across any sector) it’s the people who work for and represent those brands that make or break the brands integrity and success, it’s not necessarily the smartest proposition line that cuts it even though it obviously helps.
Undoubtedly automation and artificial intelligence will see the largest industrial sea change possibly since the industrial revolution so it’s perhaps worth remembering that it’s still human beings that create and deliver the brand essence and promise, and this will be the story for sometime to come yet. To add to the notion that ‘people are at the heart of the brand and are a massive part of how your brand is perceived’ it would be a very interesting exercise to see (an honest ratio) of how much money businesses are spending on internal brand communications compared to external communications strategies?
So do internal brand communications become less important for purely online business, which generally has more limited face-to-face dealings with the customer? Obviously we think the same emphasis applies and in fact that you are working in an online business should make no difference to the employees knowledge and understanding of the brand. That said what’s strange about the online business offering and the money that they spend on controlling their brand perception is that the only consumer face-to face engagement with their brand is likely be a very busy and stressed out delivery person who works for a sub-contracted firm and just wants to get on with the next delivery on his schedule?
One of our biggest ‘brand’ highlights since we started in 2002 was winning the ‘Global Brand Strategy of the Year’ Drum Marketing Award for the PHOENIX Group. We are now looking to the future and hope that with utilising new technologies, media channels and content opportunities we will continue to play our part in building dynamic and innovative brands for our clients. Please click the link to get a flavour of the brands we have worked with since we opened our doors back in 2002.
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