Developing a Brand Marketing Plan
Question - What is the number one critical issue in developing a brand
marketing plan?
Answer - Persuading the day-to-day implementers inside and outside your
organization to execute it effectively. We, therefore, strongly recommend that
you:
1. "bullet-proof" your plan to ensure wholehearted implementer buy-in. For
more details,
2. encapsulate the action plan in a balanced scorecard or Plan Review
Format that is treated as a contract to deliver specified results
Key action points
The fastest moving companies today plan on a continuous basis rather than on
an annual one, and use business scorecards to map their performance in each
area of the action plan from total business to individual performance level.
Traditional elements of a brand marketing plan would include:
• Brand vision (long term)
• Brand mission (mid term)
• market definition
• situation analysis
1. market size and forecasts
2. market dynamics and trends
3. market structure and share of trade at supplier, intermediary, and
end customer level segmentation
4. brandscape (own and competitor brand architectures and
performance, brand definitions, comparative brand strategies,
brand competencies)
5. market attraction vs. brand competency chart
• alternative scenarios for the next 2-5 years
• key programs and their goals
• brand objectives
• change analysis (what will have to be done differently)
• brand action plan
• Component plans (new brand development, new product development,
customer relationship management, channel plan etc.)
In more detail……
1. Brand Planning
Key issues for brand planning include:
o how to make it a continuous, rather than an annual process
o how to involve everyone in the development of the plan
o how to implement the plan
o how to communicate performance against the plan
Making it continuous
The classic scenario for any brand plan is that it rapidly becomes out of date in
fast moving markets.
Most companies recognize that they should be planning on a continuous basis,
some actually do. In order to achieve this you have to:
o build a climate of ongoing change – companies that fail to do this tend
to generate the BOHICA (bend over, here it comes again!) reflex
o Free up management time for strategy discussions – most managers
have a preference for discussing tactics over strategy. Fast moving
companies have to free up their time and bias them towards strategic
planning, usually by building regular strategy planning days into their
diaries
o Have processes that deliver timely information, including the reporting
of weak opportunity/threat signals – plans need to change either when
they are not working, or when the brand environment changes. In both
cases, knowledge/insight flows are needed to support this
o develop procedures for rapid breakthrough planning – as new
situations arise, they need to be quickly assessed and reacted to,
probably within at least a 6 month time frame. Providing managers with
strategic consultancy tools, so as to effectively turn them into brand
consultants, is a powerful way of doing this
o have standard formats for communicating brand plans and changes –
this is where business scorecards are very effective
o have strong implementation processes – activities have to be de-
resourced as well as resourced, and reward and recognition schemes
must be adapted
Involving everyone in the planning
One of the main reasons why brand plans fail is that only a clique of people were
involved in generating them in the first place.
Involvement motivates commitment. In the electronic age, there are some
excellent tools which can quickly impart and solicit information across even the
largest companies.
How to implement and communicate the plan
Business scorecards work on the principle of “what gets measured gets done”.
They are often also supported by performance assessment procedures, and
reward and recognition plans. If people know and understand the plan, can see it
is being used to run the business, and are rewarded according to the results,
things are likely to happen.
If you do not wish to go to the considerable investment of putting a formal
balanced scorecard in place, the tool we use to turn an action plan into a contract
is the "Route Planner" Brand Marketing Plan Review Format.
2. The Brand Marketing Plan
The brand vision
The brand vision is usually a high aspiration/stretch statement about where the
managers want the brand to end up. They usually involve taking over the world,
or at least a decent size chunk of it (“We are not in yoghurts, but in the human
health and happiness business”).
The brand mission
Mission statements classically should be the 4Ms:
o meaningful (credible)
o motivating
o measurable
o memorable
When did you last remember your mission statement? One of the great mission
statements of all time was “Get the Cat”, when Komatsu targeted the company
on beating Caterpillar in the heavy earth-moving market.
Market definition
It is possible to define a market in any way at all. The trick is to keep the
definition constant until you deliberately decide to change it.
The GE rule is that when you reach 40% market share, you need to redefine your
market so that you now only have 10% - a recipe for aggressive market share
growth.
Situation analysis
o market size and forecasts
o market dynamics and trends
o market structure and share of trade at supplier, intermediary, and end
customer level segmentation
o brandscape (own and competitor brand architectures and
performance, brand definitions, comparative brand strategies, brand
competencies)
o market attraction vs. brand competency chart
The first three are probably relatively self-explanatory and commonly used.
End-customer segmentation: this should be defined in terms of demographics,
behavior, situation and needs/values.
The brandscape: is developed to understand in depth the role of each
competing brand. This might well culminate in a “conversion chart” which depicts
each brand’s customer base by segment, and the extent to which their customers
are committed, satisfied or vulnerable.
Market attraction vs. competency chart: this is the classic McKinsey porfolio
planning chart which shows the attraction of each market segment to your brand
and your brand power within each segment, with the size of each bubble
depicting the size of each opportunity in sales, profits or lifetime value.
Alternative scenarios
Most markets will not be operating in quite the same way in 2 years’ time,
especially with the growth of e-marketplaces and Internet-based competition.
Scenario planning can help identify potential futures that will at least test your
current market model.
Key programs and their goals
What activities are you betting the success of the brand on this year, and how will
you know if they are successful?
Increasingly, brands require focused larger-scale investments to maintain and
build their competitive position. Picking out two or three critical programs tells the
rest of the organisation where the focus is.
Brand objectives and change analysis
Objectives should be measurable. The reason for the change analysis is to
highlight what has to be done differently.
Brand action plan and component plans
The action plan provides the detailed activities that need to take place. The
component plans provide more detailed information on specific areas within the
brand plan, such as the new product development program, the contribution of e-
CRM activities or the advertising plan.
Next, I’ll present a basic approach of what should be thought of and done to plan
strategically for a brand:
(I advise, however, the reader to analyze and modify it to better suite its’ own
needs)
1. VISION: Long term idea or wish of where the brand should be in the years to
come.
2. MISSION: Statement of the brands’ function in the market.
3. OBJECTIVES: Measurable, real, quantitative goals set for the brand to
accomplish during a specified period of time.
4. TACTICS & ACTION: Very specific actions that will be taken throughout a
specific time period that will get the brand to carry out its objectives.
5. COMPANY VALUES: All of the components above must be ‘in sync’ with the
values the company cherishes.
Now, to better understand this we must
comprehend how the main 4 components work
and interact. In my opinion they do so as a
pyramid (visual1). The lowest (4th) component
supports the 3rd, while the 3rd supports the
2nd, etc., all the way up. If one of these
components fails to do its job, a failure of the
vision of the brand is likely to happen.
Meanwhile, like I’ve already mentioned, all of
the components must be supported by the values of the company, otherwise they
won’t lead to productive practices and activities.
