That a brand should establish and then consistently leverage its own unique hallmarks of recognition, called distinctive brand assets, is a lesson in marketing fundamentals. Robert Čížek, a strategist at the organizing agency Taste, took a closer look at working with them at the recent Brand Restart conference. He reminded us that they have the power to increase the effectiveness of creative and connect communication channels. And he showed a chart based on a recent study by Ipsos. It shows how often brands use individual visual or audio elements as distractors and how effective these elements are. It thus illustrates the overrated or, conversely, hidden and untapped potential of some of them.
Blue = percentage of ads using the brand symbol, orange = probability that the brand will attract strong attention; Source: from R. Čížek's presentation at Brand Restart, graph from the Ipsos study: The Power of YouA brand should have two to three differentiators. "One is too few, it will probably be problematic to get it into all the places where the customer encounters the brand. At the same time, there should be no more than five," Čížek said.
Tomas Pohl, CEO of Justmighty, also spoke about how to differentiate from other players in the category. "Look at the colours and visual identities of fintech platforms or craft breweries. Nobody wants to take that step aside and stand out more," he commented on the series of similar graphics from both of the aforementioned segments. He kept the audience guessing with the branding of a campaign graphic from one of the financial institutions, from which he removed the logo. Revolut was the most frequently heard from the audience, but it was George – Česká spořitelna's platform.
On the topic of differentiation, he added an example from his own agency: the genesis of the idea and subsequent execution of a campaign for TechniStone, a manufacturer of artificial stone designed for a foreign market. He compared the visual form of the campaigns and social networks used by competing brands, and described the goal of differentiation through the motif of "animated stone" and human bodies merging with the texture of the materials.
Video: Technistone's 2021 campaign; Source: Technistone
"Data doesn't tell you why anyone should love your brand. It tells us all, plus or minus, the same things, so constant optimization leads to brands becoming interchangeable. As Steve Jobs said, people don't know what they want until you show it to them. That's why, in short, not everything that has a chance to succeed can be read in the data," Pohl said at the end of his talk.
Nurses and developers
You can also differentiate yourself from the competition in HR and employer branding. Instead of customers, this will help you attract talent from a market that now shows an excess of supply over demand. Michaela Raková from content studio 52pages started her talk with telling data about university graduates: while in 2012 there were 94,000 of them and it was companies who could choose, ten years later there were only 63,000. And the ones who choose are more likely to be graduates, while companies lack people. So what do you reach for when you want CVs pouring in?
"Luring nurses or doctors by saying their work saves lives is nothing new. To get people to want to work for you and not your competitors, ask about what problems healthcare professionals most often solve. You can ask them, of course, but you can go deeper if you look in professional Facebook groups or use Google Search to find the most popular questions," Raková advised. She added that medical staff most often deal with the unpredictability of their jobs and appreciate a fixed shift schedule for a longer time ahead. So it makes sense to make this one of the main benefits.
"There's no point in telling developers in job adverts that they will be working with modern technology. These people are most annoyed when they have to spend half their working hours in meetings instead of actually developing something. Don't tell Generation Z to kick-start their careers with you. Rather, try communicating that seven out of ten graduates of your trainee programs get into leadership positions within two years," Rakova added.
She added an example from KPMG, where, as part of developing an employer branding strategy, she reached out to former employees who were moving into C-level positions after leaving the agency. They had their photos taken and the "We grew up at KPMG" campaign, which has been running for almost a decade, was created. The idea was born out of the realisation that graduates from economics and finance disciplines were most eager to become finance or executive directors, something they would probably not have been able to do if they had been with the same firm as part of their career progression.
Don't inform when you can entertain
"Don't confuse content marketing with advertising. Combine them. Because the value is no longer information, it's attention. That's why content marketing was created," advised Martin Vymětal and Tomáš Cibor from the Boomerang agency.
Using the example of the former Vodafone ČiliChili magazine or the HR magazine of the Alma Career platform, they demonstrated how to build your own media and not rely on commercial, paid media. "Alma Career has managed to monopolize the HR attention market in an unprecedented way and is followed by everyone in the industry. But when your content is good, algorithms and readers don't care how big your budget is. On the contrary, as a medium or smaller brand, you are freer and more agile," they added. They reminded that the newsletter, while it may seem an outdated medium, is still relevant today. It has the ability to generate conversions and, moreover, combine target audiences, which other media channels tend not to allow.
Their advice at the end of the day was to aspire to the kind of content that people would otherwise be willing to pay for, such as on Forendors, HeroHero or even OnlyFans. And at all costs, don't inform when you can entertain.
The aforementioned Tomas Pohl of Justmighty agency outlined that in the near future this will not be a choice but rather a necessity. This was when he was describing the algorithms of the new Andromeda tool that uses Meta to select the content to be displayed. "It's now clear that of the versions of ads you give Meta to test, the new algorithm will favour the creative that has the best chance of entertaining," Pohl explained. The information also suggests that Andromeda has the potential to fundamentally transform the principles that have worked in recent years, particularly those like micro-targeting based on detailed demographics and testing only unit versions of a single campaign. Conversely, in the future it may be desirable and effective to give Meta, say, ten or more diverse executions.
Source: mediaguru.cz