Home brands and marketing

For some years now, thoughtful marketers have been wondering about ‘home brands’.

We all know that, traditionally, retailers have not been strong in marketing. But you couldn’t help wondering about their strategy.

As the big two supermarkets in Australia have pursued a home brands policy and stated over and over that it’s the way to go, anyone with any respect for brands has had to wonder.

It’s hard to believe that proven and much-loved brands like Kraft or Kellogg’s will actually disappear.

But we kept hearing the spin. It was all about reducing inventory, improving margins and, we are told, offering the consumer a ‘better shopping experience’ (their words not mine).

Surely the best brands will always maintain their market share? Maybe the emergence of home brands makes building your brand even more important.

And then there’s the often forgotten question of the consumer. When the supermarket buyer in your household gets to the local store and finds the household’s favourite brand of breakfast cereal or jam or pasta is not available, what’s the next step?

The power of the big two supermarkets in Australia is such that, up to now at least, it seems that the consumer has been the last person considered.

Well, things may be changing.

The world’s biggest retailer has just done something against the home brands trend.

Yes, Walmart has just restored some 300 items to the shelves after a wave of consumer complaints. (Of course, that’s one area where Australian consumers are pathetic. We never complain. But in the US, consumers speak up. When you stand in a queue in the US, almost always you get invigorated when you hear a local sounding off, letting the attendant know what’s wrong!)

Walmart was obviously listening, for the decision makers there began realising that the culling actually ‘aggravated’ consumers. And so what is it doing? Restocking hundreds of brands and products eliminated or curtailed over the last twelve months, and also taking a new look at other categories where it has streamlined choice.

Of course, apart from listening to the consumer, you can probably guess what brought this on. During the last quarter of 2009 Walmart's traffic declined and sales actually fell for the first time in the retailer's history.

Walmart relies on low prices for branded products and a large assortment to differentiate itself. Sad to say, it lacks individual shopper figures that would show how decisions about store range have impacted its most-valued customers.

Social media - supporting your retention strategy

In so many situations, the soft option is to win loyalty by discounting.

Of course, we all know that retailers have trained Australians to look always for discounts and now they have to live with that. But for the rest of us, social media is here to stay and waiting for us to sweep up the opportunity.

But it’s certainly not a soft option. It’s not straightforward for most of us.

Probably no one knows where social media will play out, but the important thing right now is to get into the space. You’ll be a long way behind if you wait for a full answer to every question before you make your grand entrance into this all-embracing channel.

Relevance is the factor that drives customer loyalty today, and provides differentiation in a crowded market.

Many (maybe ‘most’) businesses are still struggling with how to engage customers in a social media-driven world. One viable solution is to use social media to change the marketing thought process. It can help you to think like a customer. For example, the growth of the internet has created a 'right now' society, so brands must recognise and respond to this change, both quickly and appropriately.

Customers demand easy access to information, whether you are Telstra or AXA or a boutique beer. When something is advertised, it's not acceptable to run out of stock or to have call centre representatives who don’t know about it. The correct, updated information has to be instantly available through any channel that the prospect chooses to use.

This process is all about convenience and adapting to customer desires to enhance their experience. Brands that are able to successfully answer questions and target the consumer in their time of need will be best positioned for growth and will be the most likely to maintain a loyal following.

Social media offers brands an excellent opportunity to connect with customers directly to handle complaints, as customers are actually much more likely to express their dissatisfaction online than in a store.

When problems arise, why not Tweet your way back into the hearts of customers? Although brands strive for positive feedback and customer recommendations, they must also be equipped to handle the bad exposure.

Participating in an online discussion to show customers that the brand is accessible and listens to what they are saying can reap tremendous benefits. A simple validation that customer suggestions are appreciated and acknowledged will earn their respect — and often their future business.

Adopting such tactics will also help to confirm that the brand really does aim to enhance the customer's experience.

Making personalisation more personal

In the olden days of direct marketing, maybe the 1980s, personalisation began and ended with putting a recipient’s name at the top of the letter and sprinkling it throughout.

There’s nothing wrong with that.

But today, personalisation must go much further. We have to take into consideration consumer behaviors and interests.The real key to personalisation is understanding your audience and providing relevant offers.

In fulfillment — whether it’s an e-commerce transaction or a request for event registration or a white paper download — the ability to use fulfillment to tease out the next level of interest is possible and it’s something we should all be aiming to do.

A truly personalised message contains relevant content for each individual recipient. Ideally, you take into account the recipient’s past interaction behaviours — whether that be pages browsed on a website, white papers downloaded, items purchased.

You should be able to leverage what a person’s online behaviour tells you. What the individual is interested in. Is it case studies, technical specifications, or something else?

Online behaviour gives you so much more insight than any sort of demographics. After all, it is based on actual movements.

Let’s use a security software company as an example, where a recipient has registered for an event.

Instead of just saying, “OK, here’s what you requested; call us if you’d like anything more”, the fulfillment registration information should give the registrant more offers.

Take the case of a person who registers for an event on ‘global security threats’. Here’s what you could do:

You could check the person’s web activity – maybe it indicates that he looked at information on how to encrypt the hard drive on a computer and also auditing employees for security.

Then, in fulfilment, you send this person the requested registration details. But you also send some teasers about the next webinars on encrypting hard drives and auditing employees for security.

In this way, you can tease out where that person is in the buying journey. Fulfillment becomes a vital link in the sales chain.