Brand Management has busted marketing myths

Blue Events, the company behind the Brand Management conference, invited two stars of the world of evidence-based marketing this year. Jenni Romaniuk, a researcher at Australia's Ehrenberg-Bass Institute who studies brand value, brand symbols, and mental availibility, and Les Binet, an advertising effectiveness expert at adam&eveDDB with more than 30 years of experience in campaign planning and measurement. In their contributions, they both opened the topic of evaluating the impact of marketing, both on brand value and sales results. They recalled the importance of activities aimed at the long-term growth of brands. At the same time, they emphasized the importance of quality data, the correctness of interpretation and the "calibration" of marketing measurement with respect to the size of the brand.

Les Binet's most quoted statement was an appeal to everyone present to always take the marketing budget as an investment, not a cost. It is this view that will help marketers to establish themselves better in companies and can lead to business growth. He compared advertising to an airplane engine, which also keeps it in the air, just as advertising must drive sales in the long run. "Everything you do in marketing, you have to do with future sales in mind," Jenni Romaniuk confirmed in the discussion that followed.

According to her, the frequently used "brand tracking", i.e. barometers of brand health, forget about the people who actually buy brands and have them stored in their memory. She also touched on the idea that their customers are loyal to brands, which is still attractive to many. The neglected emphasis on the so-called "light-buyers" segment, i.e. low-traffic customers in whom future profit lies, was also highlighted by Jakub Petřina, strategist at PPF Group, in the final panel discussion.

Marketers need to communicate not only externally, but also with other departments in the company. Daniel Bradáč, CEO of the Slovak agency Generation, spoke about this in the context of employer branding. Only those brands that their employees are proud of can be truly trusted by potential consumers. Behind the logical-sounding premise, however, there is a practice full of insufficient internal communication, pressure to perform, and a high turnover rate as a reflection of how employees view the company. Bradáč shared specific approaches that can be used to start employer branding.

The Underestimated Potential of the Subconscious

A sub-theme of the day-long program was also the untapped potential of the subconscious and working with symbols. Kristina Hanušová from the Confess research agency presented several case studies of domestic campaigns, where methods using neuroscience revealed discrepancies between declarations and subconscious consumer reactions. Using data from these surveys has helped brands like Hipp or Madeta achieve better sales. Martin Dulava, creative director and founder of LineArt, also showed on specific examples that the re-design of packaging, which collects international awards, can completely fail with customers. He summed up 30 years of experience in how to think and approach symbols when you want to reverse this failure.

Myriam Ruffo, Country Commercial Manager at IKEA for the Czech, Slovak and Hungarian markets, also focused on the brand symbols. IKEA struggled with the fact that it uses too many styles in its communication. The numbers showed that the recognizability of its ads and thus its penetration began to drop significantly. So she had to strictly follow the path of "less is more". After research and consultations with Jenni Romaniuk, IKEA decided to bet on its iconic blue bag, which has increased the number of people who unequivocally associate IKEA communication with this brand. Myriam Ruffo reminded the audience that every brand has something that can work like a FRAKTA bag, you just have to discover it. "You may well see it every day, as it did in our case," she added.

Rodney Collins, Global Head of Human Sciences at McCann Worldgroup, presented a light-hearted topic, albeit full of data. This anthropologist and semiotician presented the results of a study from 16 European markets and involving 27,000 respondents, which concerned the future of Europe in terms of quality of life, education, climate crisis, etc. According to the study, most Europeans believe that Europe's best era is behind it and that it lacks leaders. Collins described it as a "vacuum of leaders." Skepticism about technology and social media is growing. At the same time, fears of terrorism have been replaced by fears of inflation and growing economic inequalities.

Emotions, fear, optimism

When it comes to brands and their role in the context of society as a whole, 88 percent of respondents expect them to have a level of responsibility on the same level as political representation, according to Collins. An example of such an approach can be seen in the campaign based on fear as an evolutionarily encoded emotion, which was presented by Ivan Duškov from VZP. Duškov has long been involved in the topic of health prevention and the aim of the campaign was to bring the public closer to the fact that Czech healthcare is not free. As a market leader in health insurance companies, Duškov strives to raise awareness within the entire sphere of public health.

According to the above-cited pan-European survey, the biggest optimists are representatives of Generation Z. Eduard Krečmar, a strategist at Publicis, focused on the specifics of communication aimed at young people under 30. He showed listeners the potential of Generation Z and used several examples to demonstrate the possibilities of gaming as a promising communication platform with this consumer group, which is expected to be stronger in e-commerce than millennials within two years.

It's not just young people who are determining other ways of watching media today. Petr Houzar from Google researched campaigns on YouTube. It is clearly true that while TV advertising has been and needs to be adapted to digital formats, online functional spots can be easily shown on the TV screen. Petr Miláček, Prima Group's Director of Analysis, advised on how to deal with audience measurement at a time when viewers are radically changing their behaviour and watching content, including ads, on a delayed basis and on various platforms.

The final panel discussion, moderated by Miroslav Král, CEO of Marketup, revolved around the meaninglessness of terms such as "lovebrand", misunderstanding of short-term vs. long-term results, or blindness to innovation. "Evidence-based marketing" is mainly based on understanding how people behave in reality, reminded Štefan Sarvaš, an expert on market growth and consumer behavior from Mars. He urged the audience not to forget the so-called "core" products or services on which their brands are based and whose potential on the market in general is often still untapped. Tereza Dušková, Marketing Director of the Dr. Max pharmacy network,  agreed with him and confirmed on her own experience with unsatisfactory results of the promotion of news and e-commerce that it does not pay to turn away from the main mission, which in the case of pharmacies is primarily customer care in brick-and-mortar branches, and to fragment communication. Jakub Petřina advised those present not to be afraid to withdraw the advertisement, which will turn out to be mediocre in the first phase. Waiting for a miracle is a waste of time and money.

The Brand Management conference created by Blue Events was sold out again this year. Every year, it is visited by about five hundred senior managers, a third of whom are representatives of company management. For more than 20 years, its goal has been to help marketers better build brands and strengthen the role of marketing as a competency for the entire company.

Kateřina Paterová
PR&Media Specialist
+420 776 117 282
[email protected]
www.blueevents.eu

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