Managing Global Brands

Vignesh DN

I truly believe that Branding is everything. Companies live or die on the strength of their brand. Take for the instance of Coca Cola which has been in existence since 1887, even today despite of being in the already mature market, Coca holds a substantial market share hugely due to the fact that Coco Cola’s brand name and its brand equity has never been compromised despite the gazillion allegations that are thrown around at the company across the 7 oceans. Coca Cola has been able to retain and build its strength because of efficiently managing its brand globally which is a tedious job considering the fact that every country has a culture of its own based on which the brand as well as the product name has to be managed respectively. 

Thus there would be quite a lot of variation in how a brand manager in one continent runs his operations when compared to the other. On the same note, an example of how the strength of a brand could be the reason for its pitfall would be Nestle, Maggie noodles had come under lot of fire where in the Indian government had asked Nestle to completely withdraw the product as a result of which Nestle’s share price went for a toss.

Managing brands today is a complex practice, whether in large multinational or small family run companies. It requires dedication, meticulousness, teamwork, organization, planning, perseverance and a great deal of passion. At the same time, it requires to count on rather business, design or communications perspectives, while knowing well enough about the product it offers and the industry it participates in.

Effective branding has always been an important part of business, from the unique marks used by potters in ancient Greece and Rome to the multi-channel marketing strategies of today’s global corporations. Branding is (and has always been) an important component of the customer experience, a reflection of each company’s promise and commitment.

When reviewing that every touch-point of the brand meets the values it stands for and accomplishes the corporate identity guidelines, it can be combined with other major universal objectives: to update and align the marketing message across every touch point.Truly successful brands represent a commonly understood, relevantly differentiating idea that transcends cultures and geographies.

Managing brands in today’s inter-connected and complex business environment is challenging. Brands are affected by heightened competition, regulations, supply chain and distribution issues and manufacturing costs, while requiring constant advocacy and reputation management.

According to Kapferer, the following mantras can be used in managing brands at a global level while exhibiting the following characteristics:

Being responsive to change:

Brand management is not about rigid enforcement of frameworks, rules and practices. Successful global brands are managed by balancing ‘consistent brand guardrails’ with the ‘freedom to adapt to leverage local growth opportunities’. Constantly evaluating a brand’s strategy against its guardrails, vision and core mission ensures consistency in the global brand promise across countries and regions. Philips, for example, made a big impact in China, where its local business developed a soy milk maker to the delight of consumers worried about food safety.

Exploiting technology:

The emergence of technology-enabled solutions has fundamentally changed the practice of brand management. Forward-thinking organizations have identified the benefits and scalability of technology in brand management and have quickly adopted solutions. Unilever, for example, has used the marketing software company Percolate to support its global brand management practices.

Efficient Top Management:

Ensuring consistency in brand identity, strategy, marketing and activation should be the core role and responsibility of at least one individual in an organization. These people are the brand custodians and their job is not to act like a cruel enforcer of rules but to be a strategic guide and mentor who can advise local brand marketing teams on strategic issues such as managing brand guidelines, ensuring consistency in brand positioning, adapting or localizing brand communications, integrating local marketing strategies into the global brand strategy and facilitating the exchange of knowledge and best practices between local and global brand teams.

Align organizational structures:

People can only work to their fullest capacity when organizational structures are designed and aligned to ensure this. Global, regional and local brand management functions should be seamlessly integrated in an organization. The global versus local issue of local push-and-pull over strategic issues is well documented and observed in management practices. The same tension can completely damage the execution of the most effective brand management. Roles and responsibilities in brand management structures should be clearly defined and overlaps reduced to reduce sophistication in execution of strategies.

Being proactive

Global brand management needs to be a proactive discipline rather than a reactive one. The evolution of technology, social media, next generation customer relationship management tools, social listening platforms, cultural and trend analysis, co-creation, crowd-funding and disruptive innovation techniques have made it easier for brand marketers to stay close to the consumer and become more accurate in spotting, predicting and leveraging trends. Brand management practices need to be aligned to these new and emerging tools and techniques and should be able to integrate them in key phases of the function.

But above all I truly believe that in the many years to come, Community Development and Brand Advocacy are going to the front-runners as the core functions of Customer-Brand relationships at a global level.