Exploding Brand Valueat the Local Level

How a good local marketing plan can create exponential value for corporate investments in brand creation, positioning and messaging.

Distributed Marketing Leadership Series

Contents

Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3

1: Power of Brand in Local Buying Decisions . . . . . . . . . . . 5

2: How Community Changes the Brand at the Local Level. . 9

3: What Does It Mean to be Part of a Brand Community? . . 11

4: Who’s in the Driver’s Seat? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15

5: The Five C’s of a Win-Win Brand Strategy . . . . . . . . . 21

6: Taking Action-Synergy that Explodes Brand Value . . . 27

7: Equally Yoked . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29

8: Related Resources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31

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Introduction

Brand marketers invest billions of dollars every year to create an emotional connection between their brand and their prospective customers. As media fragments and customers increasingly engage with the brand in ways outside the direct control of the corporate marketer, control of brand positioning and messaging and the building of emotional connections with consumers becomes more challenging. When a distributed marketing network - those organizations whose success depends on franchise networks, VARs, dealers, agents or chain store marketers to carry the national brand message to the local level - is involved, even more challenges arise. But alongside those challenges is a large opportunity.

Unlike the marketer who has little or no help with brand messaging at the point of customer engagement, the marketer with a distributed network has an army of brand warriors ready, willing and able to help deliver and manage marketing messages. When trained, organized and mobilized, this army of local marketers can explode brand value at the

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local level, creating exponentially more value from corporate investments in brand creation, positioning and messaging.

This guide is designed to help you identify the impact of the local marketer on your brand, then understand how best to leverage the brand value given your business model and consumer interaction.

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Power of Brand in Local Buying Decisions

Brand matters more at the local market level than at the national or international level. That’s because it’s at the local level that brand messages become actions taken by customers and prospects. Actions in the form of product or service chosen. In money spent. In loyalty sustained or lost. Brand value must also often be shared at the local level. For some brands, such as a quick service restaurant, the brand message is consistently and singularly delivered throughout the very standardized interaction process at the counter or at the drive through window.

For many marketers, however, the environment is less controlled. Take an organization that sells through an authorized dealer network where the product or service brand must be shared with the name of the store or service provider. Instead of “York Heating and AC” as the primary brand, it’s “Dave’s Heating & AC” – which sells the York brand as part of its business. Dave needs York and York needs Dave; the brands

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must synergistically support each other. Both brands matter because many local purchase decisions are made on trust and the relationship to the brand.

If the customer relationship is with Dave’s Heating & AC because Dave is known to be honest and to stand behind his work, then consumers will accept Dave’s recommendation of a product brand. Yet, some of Dave’s good reputation is based on the York brand because of the positive experiences his repeat customers have had with York’s performance and quality. That being said, it was still Dave’s reputation - and his magnet on the refrigerator or sticker on the furnace - that reminded the consumer of where to call.

Conversely, if the consumer relationship is with York, Dave is just the conduit. The customer knows that when it is time for a new AC unit, then York is the right choice, and Dave is the source for that York AC unit.

Finally, there’s certainly the chance that the consumer had no clue who Dave was or what HVAC brand to use, but a friend, family member or co-worker recommended someone he or she trusts for HVAC work. Based on that recommendation, the consumer may pick Dave and ultimately end up a York customer by extension, despite their lack of brand opinion of either. That same story can be told a hundred different ways for a hundred different products or services. In any local buying decision, two things matter:

1) the brand of the product or service2) the relationship to the branded provider of the product or service

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When these two entities work together, brand value can absolutely explode at the local level. Even when the brand of the product or service and the brand of the local provider is the same, the important interaction of the two elements still applies.

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Who Owns My Brand?Full Brand OwnershipAll branding and brand experiencesoriginate from within the organization.If you own your brand from start tofinish with a customer, it is mucheasier to control your brand identityand explode its value in the localmarketplace.

Shared OwnershipAnother organization shares in thebranding and creation of brandexperiences. While your challenge isa bit tougher, your opportunities aregreater.

How Community Changes the Brand at

the Local LevelThe development of brand communities has fascinating implications for brand managers. The growing popularity of Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, blogs and other online communities connects people in more unique ways than ever before.

Most connections are ultimately driven by a desire for identity and belonging. People connect to high school friends they only casually care about. They label themselves as fans of a sports team for the purpose of identity. They connect to a peer group that matches their career expertise. And in coffee shops, pubs, churches, stadiums, clubs and more, people personally meet with others who also seek this community. Who a person is (or perhaps who someone wants to be) begins to emerge through the pattern of associations.

Interestingly, successful branding is also about identity and belonging. For years brand marketers have sought to create cults of dedicated followers who connect their personal identity with a sense of belonging to a brand. As an example, look at motorcycle brands. Harley Davidson has absolutely created a persona. BMW has too, but it’s an entirely different one. Ever try to get a Harley guy to ride a Honda Gold Wing? Or a

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BMW guy to switch to a Harley? Good luck with that. It’s not the product. It’s the identity they want.

Some brands have been able to develop community around their brand at a national or global level. Starbucks is an excellent example. Everyone knows someone who will drive five miles past 15 coffee shops to get to Starbucks. Part of the reason may be the coffee, but most of it is the desire to be part of the Starbucks’ identity and community.

Yet it’s important to note that not every brand can create a community around an identity. Take the earlier discussion about York, for example. It is unlikely that York could gain a mass following of brand converts. On the other hand, as an authorized York dealer, Dave’s Heating & Cooling could. The consumer can relate to Dave as the person who rushes over for a plumbing emergency and shows up on time to service heating and cooling systems. Maybe Dave provides value-added advice on how to lower costs. And, Dave is the one that offers preferred customer discounts on occassion.

Despite the fact that the brand is so dependent on product marketing at the local level, York shouldn’t give up promoting their brand name on a regional or national level. Rather, York’s marketers just need to focus their brand efforts to the correct consumer. If York will help Dave, Dave will eventually connect his customers to York. So while it’s Dave that the consumer wants a relationship with, the consumer feels good about the fact that the equipment Dave delivers comes from the reliable brand York has established.

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What Does It Mean To Be Part of a Brand

Community?In a global sense, anyone who has a brand preference is part of a brand community. Whether the relationship is active or passive, positive or negative, if it’s constant then the individual is part of the brand community. And by becoming part of the brand community in today’s environment, the person becomes part of the brand identity; like it or not, the corporate marketer just added a team member. The Dyson example below that was recently shared by a Saepio employee illustrates this point well.

Dyson Loyalty: A Brand Community at Work

Dyson recently added my wife to its brand marketing team. I’m not sure a single friend of hers does not know that she’s ecstatic about her new vacuum – including over 250 of her Facebook “friends” who have even had a chance to see pictures of how much disgusting grunge the Dyson pulled out of the carpet, that our previous (and pretty decent) vacuum had left behind.

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Undoubtedly, the next time these friends – who are located around the globe – need a vacuum, Dyson will surely be on their list. Not based only on my wife’s reports, but certainly reinforced by them. I know this to be true, because it is precisely how my wife came to choose Dyson in the first place.

When my wife posted on Facebook her frustration about her broken vacuum and the need for yet another repair, a strong Dyson brand advocate jumped in and others followed suit. What’s more, when the repair shop technician called with the estimate for fixing the old vacuum, the person asked, “Why don’t you move up to a Dyson instead? You’ll really like it.” The deal was immediately done. The brand community had already created the sale - without any direct brand marketing.

Every corporate marketer understands the importance of using new mediums like Facebook to bolster their team. In many ways, it’s just old fashioned word-of-mouth marketing on steroids. But now the corporate manager of a distributed marketing network can work in tandem with local marketers to enable and grow brand identity communities in ways never before imagined by simply creating brand identity communities where they naturally exist – among users.

For the corporate marketer whose business model enables control of the brand experience from start to finish, brand community should primarily be at the national brand level with limited local support. Quick-

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service restaurants (QSRs) are a good example of this. Most customers likely don’t care which Sonic location they visit, as long as they can get the cherry limeade they are craving. It would be frustrating if the only connection to that limeade was through a single Sonic.

For the corporate marketer who shares brand identity, like the York dealer example, how the brand identity community should be engaged depends on a couple of key factors:

First, the stronger the emotional connection with the brand, the more direct involvement the corporate marketer should have. BMW Motorcycles wants to engage the consumer directly because of the consumer’s strong connection to the brand.

Second, corporate marketers need to recognize when the local dealer has the stronger emotional connection. The York dealer is an example of this. In these instances, York will be most successful in their efforts if they focus on making it easy for Dave’s Heating & AC to become a community resource. Support from the corporate level makes it easier for Dave to succeed.

Finally, there are many cases where both corporate and local marketers will want to engage the consumer. BMW Motorcycles also provides a good example of this scenario. While BMW wants customers to stay connected to ensure repeat bike purchases, the local BMW dealer wants to be sure they capture that purchase. They can work to create a brand community for local riders to connect with other BMW brand

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advocates. In this case, BMW’s corporate marketers should look to both create a direct community and help the local dealer create his own community locally.

While corporate-level brand communities provide value through helping develop and leverage brand advocates, local communities have much greater potential to initiate engagement that leads to incremental sales.

Simply stated, developing and sustaining these local communities is critical to exploding brand value at the local level.

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Who’s in theDriver’s Seat?

A long-standing challenge for any manager of a distributed marketing network is who is in the driver’s seat. The brand may own the consumer’s mind, but the local marketer owns the customer.

In reality, both have a pretty firm grip on the steering wheel. Yet to maximize the brand impact in the local market, it’s important that both parties have a good understanding of the roles they should play to optimize effectiveness.

Often, the term “local marketing” has been used to group a lot of activities into a single collection. On closer examination, though, consumer interactions vary widely at different local marketing organizations and shouldn’t all be considered the same. Saepio has observed that similar characteristics exist between organizations which are not necessarily based on 1) the industry they are in, 2) whether they sell a service or product or 3) other traditional classifications. Rather, the similarities between organizations are based on how they engage customers.

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Take food service as an example. Two Saepio clients within this industry vertical are McDonald’s and Great Harvest Bread Company. Both seek to gain a share of their customers’ dining or food budgets, but each approaches marketing very differently. A local McDonald’s leans heavily on national branding and advertising as well as location to drive business. Great Harvest, on the other hand, seeks to create a loyal local customer community without the benefit of heavy corporate brand advertising.

While one could no doubt slice segmentations even further, review of client-use patterns confirm that six unique market segments exist within local or distributed marketing scenarios. As a result, very different interactions between corporate and local marketers are needed.

These segments are:

Loyalty – Frequent SegmentThe local marketer depends on the national brand but is largely responsible for developing a loyal customer community at the store level. Customers make purchases multiple times per year from the same location. A strong customer relationship may be developed between staff and customers.Saepio Client Brand Examples: Great Harvest Bread Company, Cartridge World, Curves Fitness

Loyalty – Infrequent Segment The local marketer depends on national brand exposure and strives to be part of building a cult customer following in association with that brand. Purchases typically happen once or less each year and loyalty must be maintained during the lulls.Saepio Client Brand Examples: BMW Motorcycles, H&R Block, HCA

Convenient Location Segment The local marketer depends heavily on the national brand. Customer loyalty is typically with the

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national brand rather than with the local store - although in some cases the same store may have many interactions each year with the customer. That being said, the customer would be just as satisfied receiving the service from another of the brand’s locations.Saepio Client Brand Examples: McDonalds, Carlson Hotels, Valvoline Instant Oil Change, Chevron

Retail Assist SegmentThe local marketer is not focused on the national brand but views it as a complement to its primary brand (the store or business) that generates the customer traffic and garners loyalty.Saepio Client Brand Examples: Burt’s Bees, HBO, Hill’s Pet Nutrition, GM ACDelco

Community Development SegmentThe local marketer is focused on building community around a brand concept or theme. There is often no product, per se, but human association or connection to an activity or cause.Saepio Client Brand Examples: Boy Scouts, Easter Seals, Salvation Army

Sales Assist SegmentThe local marketer needs to develop custom proposals to aid in sales activities.Saepio Client Brand Examples: Johnson & Johnson medical devices, Motorola

Understanding which of these different local marketing segmentations your organization fits within will go a long way toward creating the strong, logical engagement with local marketers that is needed to explode brand value at the local level. The worksheet on page 18 provides guidelines for identifying which segment your organization fits within and, based on that segment, what your approach to distributed marketing should be.

Identify Your SegmentConsider the following questions to identify whois in the driver’s seat and how best to buildor expand upon your brand’s community.

Q1. Where do customers purchase my product? a) company-branded outlet b) another company’s branded outlet

Q2. What is the purchase frequency? a) Several times per year or more b) Yearly or less

Q3. Is the customer relationship tied to a specific store location? a) Yes – customers feel a connection to a single location b) No – my locations are generally interchangable to customers

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If you answered “A” to all three questions, your organization likely fitsinto the “Loyalty Frequent” segment. A shared approach is neededsince the specific location is important to the consumer. Marketingshould allow for a greater amount of local customization. This issometimes more challenging than other segments, but there is muchroom for rewards.

If you answered “A” to Q1 and Q2, and “B” for Q3, your organizationlikely fits into the “Convenient Location”segment. You largely own yourown brand. Best results occur when messages are made relevant to thelocal market, but unified and consistent brand marketing between nationaland local marketers is key.

If you answered “B” to to Q1, but sell goods or services, yourorganization will likely fit into the “Retail Assist” segment. This segmentis most centered on the local marketer. Your brand can derive the mostvalue by providing easy-to-use, valuable tools that locations who sellyour products and services can use to promote your business – and theirs.

Most organizations will fit into one of the above models. If the abovedoesn’t apply, consider whether one of these may be more accurate for you:

Community Development A shared approach to branding will help create a community of individuals who believe in the national brand/cause, but at the local level. Localization is often critical to effectively share the impact within the local community.

Sales Assist Distributed marketers require a way to create sales proposals and other items. These often may include required regulatory information, so a database-driven approach can help ensure compliance. Tools need to be easy-to-use.

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The Five C’s of aWin-Win Brand Strategy

Managers of distributed marketing networks have long been challenged with keeping corporate and local marketing messages aligned and working together. At the root of the challenge is the fact that there are often legitimate reasons for a disconnect.

While corporate marketers are very brand focused, local marketers are all about driving traffic and making sales. These two perspectives can easily collide, with the result being less-than-effective marketing. But it doesn’t have to be that way. Employing five “C’s” to the distributed marketing process can go a long way towards making a brand hum at the local level.

Common ObjectivesWhile it may seem logical that one would begin any marketing effort with common objectives already established, Saepio client service managers too often observes the opposite.

Corporate marketers and local marketers simply think differently, each protecting their own turf. They do so for a good reason. The corporate marketer who manages the distributed marketing network is the keeper of the brand and brand messages for that network. S/he must constantly focus on corporate brand objectives and deliver those to –

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and then through – the local marketer. The local marketer is often not on that same page. Store traffic and a ringing register is paramount and, if the marketing message isn’t perceived as focused solely on generating sales, the local individual likely isn’t interested. They like the support but insist that it be relevant to their operation.

However, these different perspectives in no way preclude the formation of common objectives. They just require the corporate marketer to, as best-selling author Stephen Covey would say, “seek first to understand and then to be understood.” Listening to the needs of the local marketer and gleaning knowledge from the school of practical application via those on the front lines enables the corporate marketer to identify common objectives and create campaigns that truly support them.

Consistent MessagesUnderstanding the importance of delivering consistent messages across the entire distributed marketing network is easy for many marketers. Doing so is more challenging.

Consistent messaging to consumers begins with effective resources for local marketers. While a local marketer will often want to advertise using a national message, s/he also frequently wants to somehow alter the corporate message to make it more applicable for his or her local environment. It is key for the corporate marketer to provide resources that ensure consistent messaging but allow some local flexibility. Distributed marketing management systems that include marketing asset management technology are an excellent starting point. These solutions provide all of the marketing resources the local marketer needs in one, easy-to-

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access location. As long as the corporate marketer is diligent in keeping the library of resources current, messages across the distributed marketing network will stay consistent.

Coordinated Message DeliveryJust as consistent messaging is important, coordinated timing of delivery is also critical. When a local marketer’s messages are timed to coordinate with national messages, investments in marketing can be optimized.

At the heart of successful coordination is successful communication. And that means two-way communication. Often coordinated message delivery is dependent upon one-way communication and a great deal of hope. In this scenario, corporate develops a merchandizing kit containing marketing materials and sends it to the local market with the hope that it will be used properly, if at all.

Local marketers want to be successful and want the benefits of the resources the corporate marketer provides, but their worlds don’t revolve around what corporate marketing is doing. They are focused on what they can do to drive traffic and view their corporate partners as a helpful ingredient of that plan. When the marketing kit arrives for a coordinated campaign, it may or may not receive the priority the corporate marketer seeks. What happens is dependent upon how effective communication has been up to that point.

While it takes more work, engaging communication between corporate and local marketers is vital to coordinated message delivery. When local marketers know which message is recommended

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3How Well Have I

Implemented the 5 C’s?Consider the questions below.

Common Objectives:Can you clearly describe both perspectives and the reasonsfor these in your organization?

Corporate:______________________________________________Local:___________________________________________________

What are the common objectives for your organization’smarketing?

Consistency in Messaging:Why do my company’s distributed marketers want and needlocal brand messaging that is different than national messaging?________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

What systems and/or workflows are in place to encouragedistributed marketers to localize materials while retainingimportant brand messaging and other graphic elements?________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Coordinated Message Delivery:Do we have time-dependent campaigns that distributed marketers must implement? If so, have we made it easy for themto complete the tasks necessary? Have we been clear about howthe campaign and the precise timing can help local success?

Cooperative Customer ManagementWhat are the possible places where a unified customermanagement strategy is needed?

Communication:Have I taken the time to truly understand the local marketer in thecontext of their business rather than in terms of what corporatebelieves they should be doing? What does the local marketerneed from me in order to successfully complete the shared brandobjectives in a consistent and coordinated manner?

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and why; what’s in it for them; and what is expected as part of a campaign, coordinated messaging naturally follows.

Cooperative Customer ManagementBrands only hum when customers hum in harmony with them. The brand exists to create an emotional connection with the customer, to establish and to grow a relationship. That doesn’t happen without a corporate role and can’t be sustained without a local one.

For a brand to hum, the experience a customer or prospect has through national brand messages – coupled with the experience they have upon entering a local retail outlet or interacting with a branded product or service – must be completely harmonious. The local marketer is critical to this process. Store décor, in-store promotions, digital signage, merchandise bags and many other physical items all contribute to the brand experience. So, too, do the personal interactions that happen in the store.

While corporate marketers can’t always control customer management, they should always consider it when creating local options for national brand messaging. One cannot assume that a local marketer or local sales associate will be able to provide a continuous brand experience for the customer without being coached on how to do so. Often, adding this “last mile” of instruction adds little time to campaign development but can make a huge difference in the effectiveness of that campaign.

Communication, Communication, Communication

Any successful relationship starts with listening, including that between the corporate and the local marketer.

You simply can’t over communicate with a local marketer yet you most assuredly can over communicate to one. Remember, effective communication is a dialogue.

A nationally renowned speaker told 80,000 people who came to hear him talk about relationships that he really didn’t have anything to say, just one thing to show. With that he pulled out a giant ear and held it up. He didn’t need to say another word to make his point.

• Communicate what’s important to your brand by first listening to how it’s important to your local marketer.

• Communicate what you need them to do by first listening to what they need you to do.

• Communicate what resources you’ve made available to them by listening to what they need those resources to be.

There they are. The five C’s for making your brand hum at the local level. There’s nothing magical about them. We’d love to call them profound, but they’re simply applications of the sixth C … common sense. Yet too few apply them well, and as a result, too few see their brand really hum at the local level.

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Taking Action -Synergy that Explodes

Brand ValueA lot of factors combine to create an organization where brand value explodes at the local level. Many programs have been tried through the years. Carrots to entice compliance. Sticks to enforce it. These approaches seldom work.

The programs that do work are those developed by individuals who truly understand and foster a meaningful partnership between corporate and local marketers. A partnership where goals and messages align, where programs are logical and where each side fully participates in design and execution.

Distributed Marketing Management systems that enable these processes are the cornerstone to success. Often called Marketing Asset Management or Local Marketing Management technology, these platforms help organize and execute every aspect of a local marketing program. While it is possible to run a program that maximizes brand value without such a system, it is highly unlikely, exponentially more difficult and normally much more expensive. Look for a system that delivers much more than just ad builder functionality.

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While ad builder is a helpful tool, for full synergy and maximum value, seek instead a comprehensive platform such as Saepio’s Marketing Asset Manager that helps create a strong, logical synergy between you and your local marketers. These tools accomplish this by providing the marketing assets that distributed marketers really need in an easy-to-use and always updated environment, thereby removing the need for a carrot or stick.

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Equally YokedPerhaps the best illustration for the optimal relationship between corporate and local marketers comes from the world of pre-machinery agriculture. When oxen were used to plow the soil or pull a wagon, it was important to choose two beasts of similar strength. Too much pull from one versus the other and keeping a straight plow line was close to impossible.

Saepio encourages corporate and local marketers to seek a similar relationship to ensure peak performance. Too much corporate and the local marketer tunes out. Too much local and the corporate brand message is diluted. Don’t give up until you find the perfect balance for your organization.

Exploding brand value at the local level isn’t necessarily easy but it is absolutely possible. Saepio hopes this guidebook has provided insight that will help your organization join those whose local marketing programs are humming along.

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Related ResourcesVisit the Distributed Marketing Leadership Series site (http://info.saepio.com/distributed-marketing-leadership-series) for access to the following case study documents. Each example will outline how the company has utilized Saepio’s distributed marketing tools to explode the value of the brand.

• Loyalty – Frequent SegmentCartridge WorldCurves Fitness

• Loyalty – Infrequent Segment BMW Motorcycles

• Convenient Location Segment SONIC

• Retail Assist SegmentGM ACDelco

• Community Development Segment Easter Seals

Saepio makes it easy for corporate and local marketers to build and run effective and engaging all-channel marketing

campaigns.

Saepio’s powerful MarketPort marketing platform starts with easy …

•Easy to Build and Run a Cross-channel Campaign because everything – email, landing pages, social, mobile, digital

banner ads, signage, print ads, direct mail, and much more – is all managed in a single, integrated digital marketing platform.

•Easy to Maximize Brand Value at the Local Level because local and corporate marketers share a single platform but

experience the same platform differently based on their roles. Brand control, speed to market, and content localization is all easily accomplished whether messages are for local, national

or global audiences and corporate marketers can easily assign campaign tasks to local marketers.

•Easy to Engage Customers with personalized, relevant messages because corporate intelligence gleaned from CRM

data, customer analytics, consumer actions and more can determine what content is served when, where and how.•Easy to Automate Marketing Fulfillment because robust

workflow enables every cross channel customer touch point to happen automatically whether launched by corporate marketing, initiated by a local marketer or triggered by a

customer’s action.

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About Saepio

This robust yet simplified approach to today’s complex marketing challenges is in use at hundreds of leading companies and

organizations, including many of the world’s most powerful brands. It is transforming the way corporations focus and manage their marketing efforts in a world that introduces new channels, new competitors, new

regulations and new opportunities at every turn.

For more information, visitwww.saepio.com

or call +1 816-777-2100.