Your Brand lives in the Middle-of-the-Funnel

Building a brand is an eclectic process. A label is launched and it takes a lot of curation in the minds of consumers for that label to become a brand. Brand Custodians have always played this game of moulding  brands and getting consumers to rally around them. Because, ultimately it's the brand that is wanted and it is the brand that consumers pay (premium) for.

But, as the 'concept of time' has changed - the time that a business allows for a brand to be built or the time that a consumer gives to a brand to stay in his or her life - both have reduced considerably. This has certainly made the life of CMOs and Brand Managers so much more complicated and has had a huge impact on what we see brands doing in Media.

If, I were to simplistically breakup the typical brand Funnel into Top, Middle and Bottom: 

• at the Top, we see a lot of broad advertising in Mass Media aimed at creating awareness for the brand; 
• in the middle is where we typically measure brand metrics such as 'consideration', 'preference', 'affinity', etc;
• at the Bottom, we see hard-core sales efforts which, in the digital world today take the form of Performance Advertising measured on Conversions to "Sales Metrics"

Each stage of the brand funnel is important, its never abut one over the other - but, it is about the balance between all stages of the consumer journey. 

While. the "Heritage" brands (those than have been there for long) are often accused of too much "Top Funnel" focus often referred to as 'spray & pray' - but, its to do with their distribution structure and the "distance" between the advertising stimulus and the opportunity to purchase or the point of purchase.  Of Course! we see a shift happening towards a more 'performance' mindset.  

On the other hand, the new age D2C Brands start with a huge "bottom-funnel" focus and as they grow, they steer towards sporadic but, high intensity & bold out-bursts on the top-funnel. Cant say, if it is right or wrong as the actions are defined basis the 'end-game' that the promoters have in mind. 

In both the scenarios, the Brand lives in the Middle-of-the-Funnel. Its what the brand does in the middle that defines sustainable success. The Top & Bottom are often the easiest to deploy as they are very tangible. 

The Top-Funnel is easily measured on the basis of media deliverables - reach/ grps, impressions, contacts, etc and also costed for the media deliverables. However, it is very distant from "end-sales'  and its effectiveness is often a mystery - best measured basis awareness measures or using complicated and long-term market-mix models to derive the actual ROI of such investments. Not to say that these investments are futile but, while media delivery measures are easy; effectiveness measures are difficult.

At the bottom of the funnel, usually sales or conversions is the last mile metric and is easy to measure. The measures are usually the amount of media deployed and the sales, transactions, conversions generated, The measures though easy, are often "mis-leading" as conversion measures just tell you 'the percentage of the consumers that crossed a stage' and not, the causality of the media investments or the effectiveness of the media investments. These measures have a lot of misattribution and unless brands managers are prudent - money gets spent on media that has a low ROI.

So, Top Funnel & Bottom Funnel measures and KPIs apparently are very tangible and hence, its an easy (not best) decision to spend on these. But, the Brand building happens in the Middle of the Funnel and that is the toughest space to manage. Brand Love/ Brand Preference/ Brand Image/ etc are intangibles and its also very difficult to assess what media placements will affect what aspects of the brand.

Irrespective of the 'Time-frame' Brand Building is essential. If there is a clear Brand Value which is what the consumers buy the brand for - then, the Top Funnel only Amplifies this Brand Identity to attract larger audiences to the Brand; and the Bottom-Funnel only monetises this Brand Asset by generating transactions for the Brand. Without a strong middle - both, Top Funnel as well as Bottom Funnel become unsustainable and fail to spur growth for the brand.

There is a continued debate in the market about the balance between "Performance" and "Brand" investments and rightly so - Feed the middle of the funnel else, the "Label" will never turn into a strong "Brand".  

Client Delight to Consumer Delight

The purpose of a brand is to add value to the life of a consumer. Anything and everything that a brand does should work towards this purpose. And, in return for this value addition to one’s life in a manner better than what other brands do; consumers patronize the brand resulting in increased market share and hence higher value for the stakeholders in the brand/ company.

But then, this is the ideal cycle of value exchange between the consumers and the stakeholders. The connection between these two ends – consumer on one end and stakeholder on the other, is not direct and simplistic. The various players between these two have their own agenda, priorities and compulsions which often vitiate this value exchange.

Nor is the consumer very discerning in the short term to really choose the brand that is the best in value addition. Most of the times, there is not much differentiation in the brand alternatives and hence the choice between brands is based on some very superficial parameters. In such a scenario, either the brand custodians work on re-engineering the brand to build better value than competitors or at least in the short term resort to tactics to enhance their brand choice over the others. It is these latter methods that brands use which often become insensitive to the brand code of “adding value” and drive brand preference even at the risk of irritating, annoying or alienating the consumers. The tragedy is that many a times, in the short term these tactics at the aggregate level do result in value addition for the stakeholders thus encouraging this behavior more and more.

Here, in this note we shall have a closer look at the manifestation of these short term tactics in the realm of advertising and communication.

In the Indian context, the structure of trade favours brands that are "more visible" than their competitors. To a large extent, the consumers also attribute a higher value to brands that are more conspicuous in their advertising. Advertising on certain media or properties does undeniably add more credibility to brands otherwise lesser known. In short, driving brand awareness in itself at times is enough to drive brand preference.

There is no harm in a brand trying to drive awareness; it is the manner of doing so which needs to be reviewed.

Not many of us have been spared of the discomfort caused by brand advertising across media. A newspaper ‘Jacket’ which is a delight for the Clients is the most irritating thing that a reader encounters early in the morning. The ‘half-jacket’ is even more irritating. Yes, these “innovations” are impossible to miss but are also often just taken off and kept away from the main newspaper. The increasing clutter in newspapers has often made us flip pages just because there are too many advertisements on the page. Of course! It is now customary behavior to shake off and drop out all loose inserts from newspapers and magazines before one settles down to read. The ‘text-pushers’, the ‘island ads’, the ‘full page ads’ are all very noticeable but all cause a disruption, an interruption and irritation for the consumer. Could each of these brand interventions have in some way added delight for the consumer instead of irritation?

The situation is not very different in other media. Flipping channels on TV to avoid advertisements is our natural response and a way of saying that “I don’t appreciate your interruption of my television viewing”. Don’t we all hate the ‘aston bands’ and ‘advertising tickers’ or ‘screen pop-ups’ that intrude while we are in the midst of watching our favourite programs?  Verbose and irritating RJs on Radio, the extremely annoying intrusions on websites, the hordes of marketing mailers, EDMs, SMSes, etc are all examples of daily brand intrusions that consumers hate but are a delight for the brand custodians at the Client side.

The sad part is that we, at the communication agencies are party to this state of affairs. During, our studies we are taught of the principle of a ‘Marketing Organization’ and imbibe the merits of ‘Consumer-Delight’ but, in practice succumb to ‘Client-Delight’ instead. Of Course! The Agency and Client, all have valid justifications and compulsions that lead them to the said behavior but, the consumer does not need excuses.. the consumer just wants value addition to his/ her life.

It is critical that Agencies focus on Consumer Delight and develop tools and techniques now to convince Clients of the merit of communication solutions that work towards the brand purpose in a manner that delights the consumer. It is important that all our brand initiatives deliver Brand-Good instead of just focusing on Brand-Speak.

Brand Experience encapsulates each and every facet of the interactions that a brand creates with its consumers. Product consumption is only one of these interactions. The interactions that brands create in media are critical parts of the brand experience and in some categories even more important than the final consumption. If we accept this role that media plays in building brand experiences, only then we will start looking at ‘media as an ingredient’ and not an  add-on used just for short-term promotion of the brand.

It is also critical for us to understand that awareness has a high decay if it is built using just superficial brand exposure but remains un-eroded if it is inculcated by building memorable and pleasant experiences for the consumers. Hence, marketers need to focus on Brand Engagements and achieve a healthy balance between plain brand exposure and value adding brand experiences. 

The onus is on all Brand Custodians to shift the focus from “Client Delight” to “Consumer Delight” and the results will show growth for the brands that do this consistently.

Sponsorships should deliver much more than brand exposure.

Sponsorships have a very respected place amongst the various advertising formats available to brands across media. As a tool, Sponsorships are excellent but ultimaltely it is the manner of application that determines its success. Many brands have used sponsorships very effectively to strengthen their relationship with consumers. However, not all instances of sponosrships that we see around us are as effective. Let us delve a little deeper into what one should expect from a sponsorship. But, first we must understand the state of regular advertising today.

 

The most common format is what we all know as an 'advertisement'. This is the spot in a commercial break either in Television, Cinema, Radio or a ad-space in Newspapers, Magazines, Website, etc. These ads are a very rude interjection by a brand into the media consumption experience of the consumer. However, as these are a means of funding for the content - the consumers express their gratitude to them by way of their attention.

 

These ads are content-agnostic. At its best, this advertising format only delivers the encoded brand message independent of the message or leave-behind of the content that they are riding. As long as the content does not grossly violate any serious brand directive and is acceptable to their consumer segments - ads can be placed along with such content. Brands use the content either to reach specific target groups or as as a context and brands that are related to this context are expected to have a better return on their investments than those that are not related to the content in any way.

 

This advertising format is over-used, abused and as a virus has started eating into content itself. Often TV programs loose their viewers during the commercial breaks; Newspaper pages with a high clutter are often skipped. Of Course! only those ads which are very high in either their information quotient or entertainment quotient get some attention while the others are punished with Ad-Avoidance. Getting noticed in such clutter is quite a challenge for brands today.

 

In this scenario, generally speaking - Sponsorships are used more as a means of standing-out in this extreme advertising clutter. Using such a wonderful tool as a sponsorship only to be "seen" is gross under-utilization of its capabilities. Given the premium at which sponsorships are available these days, one must really think hard before taking on sponsorships only for driving premium exposure.

 

Brands serve a purpose in the life of their target consumers and add value to their experiences. We often term this as the brand-benefit. The sponsorship too, must add value to the experince of the consumer and this "value" ideally should be in tandem with the benefit that the consumer expects from the brand itsef.

 

A sponsorhip as a visible entity is only a "brand logo" and hence does not have a tangible brand message attached to it. The brand message is a take-out by the consumer of the experience that the consumer gets interacting with the property. The message that a Sponsorships expresses is a function of the choice of the property being sponsored and the manner of association of the brand with the sponsored property.

 

One should consider multiple factors in deciding on a sponsorship but, the strength of association of the brand with the property is the most critical to ensure success. At the minimum, the brand provides the funding for the property and gets a sponsorship tag or logo presence. The extent of branding depends on the amount of funding. Whether a brand is a title sponsor, associate sponsor it really does not matter to the consumer. Whether the program is :"brought to you by" or "powered by" really does not interest the consumer. These are only jargons that allow media sellers to excite brand managers and enhance their own revenue. What matters is if the brand is just present as a logo or is the brand involved in delivering the experience. The higher the involvment of the brand in delivering this experience, the stronger the association and hence better the chances of the sponosrship being a valuable asset for the brand.

 

What should be this experience that the sponsorship delivers to the consumer is a million dollar question. I have seen many sponsorship executions where the connection between the experience delivered and the desired brand objective is so remote and convoluted that only the brand manager understands the connection while the execution does not deliver any brand-benefit to the consumer. The brand custodians involved in the decision need to clearly understand the communicatoin task for the brand and hence select, design and execute the property to then deliver the desired experience which can easily be associated by the consumer  - with the brand.

 

Do not use sponsorship only for brand exposure. If you only need brand exposure - regular advertising with a well crafted message and a well-designed media plan is the optimal way forward. But, if you want to go beyond brand-exposure and brand-talk and let the consumer himself taste the brand benefit in some form, then Sponsorships is the way ahead. Self-realization of the brand benefit by the consumer is far more powerful than a score of ads trying to tell him what the brand stands for.

 

Sponsorships must provide a tangible value to the desired consumer segment so that the brand gains their solidarity in return.

Time to move on....No more "Spray & Pray",

I was inducted into media planning in 2002.

 

The media environment in India was just beginning to evolve into the era of new media. Digital as a media was negligible; Out-of-Home media was limited and traditional; Private FM Radio was just getting liberalized. Cable & Satellite TV was still growing and Print had started expanding by extending into new geographies and segments by way of new editions and supplements.

 

Advertising on TV was the success mantra given the extensive reach that TV offered at a very low cost compared to any other alternative.

FMCGs needed new consumers and repeat purchasers while most other categories were in a growth stage. Driving 'Presence' of the brand was the key objective and media planning science driven by the FMCG juggernauts was all about efficiency. In such a situation, the high-reach-cheap-cost nature of TV suited advertisers and brands were happy spraying their advertisements all over as long as the demographic (Gender, Age, SEC) was as per requirement. And, with a 'good' creative, I must say that most brands did very well for themselves.

 

Since, then a decade has passed by. Consumers have changed. Their needs and aspirations have evolved. In response to that the market has changed with the launch of many more brands and variants to appeal to the the new consumer nuances. The media landscape has changed too, giving much more control and information to the consumers.

 

The rising menace of advertisements and increasing control to the consumers led to Ad-avoidance reaching extreme heights, In such an environment, the effectiveness or results delivered by TV per rupee spent gradually but certainly deteriorated. And, I suppose this is what led to the now cliched term "Spray & Pray".

 

"Reaching" consumers used to be a challenge then but now excepting the hinterlands, I think one can safely say that these days given the high reach of various media.. reaching consumers is not really an issue. The issue is to 'Get Noticed' and to 'Endear' consumers.

 

Some brands have taken the path of "Getting Noticed" too seriously without worrying too much about the "Endear" part and are continuing on their tirade of "Even More Spray & Pray". It is this that is leading them to target higher and higher SOV (share of voice). This beahviour is a dis-service to the brands themselves and to the industry as a whole. It is this beahviour that I have already talked of in my post "Green Advertising is Responsible Advertising".

 

This "Spray & Pray" philosophy requires a focus on rates and CPRPs while, in today's scenario, it is the efficacy of advertising that is far more critical than its efficiency. Even more so when most efficiency parameters are based on 'limited research'.

 

We require a more acute focus on "endearing' consumers which requires one to answer questions related to the manner of advertising communication before we start talking of how much and at what cost. And, this manner of advertising needs us to understand the consumer in far more depth than just knowing the demographic. It requires an assessment of what role each media plays in the life of consumer and how each media can be used in tandem to create positive experiences for the consumer.

 

 

Nothing expresses this thought better than this video which I saw many years ago but, find it still very very relevant.  The Consumer has moved on.. it is time for advertisers also to move on...

 

No more "Spray & Pray".

Embedding Brand-Good into Media Plans

This is not a critique nor a judgement on any one. It is only some loud thinking on how the advertising/ media industry could become more effective in fulfilling their ultimate objective of doing good for their client brand.

Of course! there are hundreds of dimensions to the above thought but, in this article today I am only zooming in on "Focus on the Brand" in the context of traditional media planning.

A media plan is a optimistic mix of advertising space on various media/ vehicles to expose the provided creative to the desired (usually, demographically defined) target audience made with the primary objective of getting the mix at the cheapest.

As, those in the industry read through - it may be very easy to say we are not like that or we don't do this, etc but, the tougher and right thing would be to get out of denial mode and look to further improvement.

I am not saying, at all that the media plans today are not delivering on brand-good but, the point is are they delivering enough and can this be optimized further. Now, don't take the word "optimized" which I just used and say that for our plan we have already used an optimizer. The said optimizer is for arriving at the cheapest way to deliver the most exposure while, again I am talking of optimizing brand-good.

All media planners out there are doing a fabulous job delivering exposure. They are stuck between the advertiser/client who have their own visions of what their plan should be like (often based on past experience with as much subjectivity as exists in marketing) and most importantly at what cost that vision should be delivered and with the Media House/ Auditor/ Agency Seniors on the other side bringing in all kinds of "expectations" to vitiate the ideal planning process. The job of media planning for the person at the front becomes more of managing expectations rather than of delivering the right media plan. In such a scenario, it is often very likely that the media planner does not embed enough of the brand-good into the plan since he is playing the balancing act between the various actors sitting around the desk to approve the media plan.

Making a media plan is a process and in the process the Brand-Good has to form an important element. We have to make sure that during every stage of the planning process there is a barometer which checks if the brand-good has been maintained from the point we started making the plan right through to the end. And, this is all possible. The only thing that vitiates it is the distraction by various other short-sighted expectations some justified/ some totally unreasonable.

While, one - as a media planner can keep saying that it is all these distractions that spoil a media plan; it is the responsibility of media planners to first put their house in order. Before, one starts making a media plan how much thought is given to what is the brand-good that we are trying to deliver other than brand exposure? How much consideration is given to brand-good in selecting various elements of the plan or do we just choose media vehicles basis the exposure-cost analysis? Once when a plan is made does one really put a metric to the amount of brand-good that has been embedded into the plan? Finally, after the execution of the plan how much analytics is done to assess the brand-good delivered?

Here, I want to introduce the concept of Brand-Fidelity of media plans. A media plan that has low brand fidelity would have minimal or no brand-good embedded within it; while a media plan with high brand-fidelity would be totally focussed on delivering what the brand intended to achieve through the media plan.

Now, what is the brand-good that we need to deliver and how do we quantify and measure it are further challenges but, not impossibles to derive. A focused team, intent on building higg-fidelity media plans will surely find means and ways to idetntify, embedd and measure brand-good.

This is an urge to the industry to re-invent media planning in a way that at the end we have an applause and not questions about the relevance of advertising, Focus on Brand-Good in a way that cant be compromised for any other expectation.