Consumer perceptions are key when it comes to boosting brand value. Doreen Wang, Global Head of BrandZ at Kantar Millward Brown, explains how to convey a positive impression.
You might think that your brand is creative. And it might even be creative. You might think that your brand and your business are disruptive and that too could be true. But neither quality will impact your brand value unless consumers also share these perceptions.
Our latest analysis demonstrates for the first time the powerful impact that perceptions of disruption and creativity can have, particularly when combined with great advertising.
The companies that get this right can grow brand value at an astonishing rate.
Disney, Apple, Netflix and Amazon are the global brands leading the way, collectively they’ve boosted their average brand value by 51% in the last two years.
The analysis breaks down the role that consumer perceptions of creativity, disruption and great advertising plays in building brand value over time by analysing BrandZ’s 3.6 million consumer interviews comparing perceptions of 122,000 brands in 51 markets over the last 12 years.
We’ve found that brands that consumers perceive as creative but not disruptive have grown their brand value by an average of 69% over that period; More impressively those brands that consumers perceive as disruptive – seen to be ‘shaking things up’ – but not creative have grown even more, boosting brand value by 123% over the same period;
But better results were secured when consumers perceive a brand to be both creative and disruptive, generating an average brand value growth of 154%.
For those brands that consumers perceive to combine creativity and disruption with great advertising, the results just keep getting better, boosting average brand values by 265%.
By contrast, average declines of 14% were found for brands that scored in the bottom third for perceptions of both disruption and creativity.
This data demonstrates that brands with disruptive creativity at the heart of their business can use it as an engine to fuel advantageous consumer perceptions.
I sat down with three brands that embody these qualities in Cannes last month to discuss their take on the best way to build consumer perceptions and ensure that they continue to be both creative and disruptive brands.
For Deliveroo, it’s about mindset combined with curiosity and ambition – “we want to feed people three times a day” said Emily Kraftman, the company’s head of marketing for UK and Ireland – as well as a single-minded obsession with food and making things as simple as possible.
Translating that into marketing has meant having a global TV ad that can be modified to feature local restaurants in every market in which it airs as well as a partnership with Spotify to create a dynamic programmatic ad that delivered 46,000 different hyper-local creatives.
Emily says the company sees the marketing well beyond traditional media, from the riders on the road, to the assets they can give restaurants and the things they can do to drive organic reach and PR, including recently a giant billboard made of burgers.
BYD is the world’s biggest producer of plug in electric cars but it’s achieved that by creating an ecosystem that’s sustainable; starting with solar panels that are affordable and can supply power to LED lighting systems, busses or cars.
For Micheal Austin, vice-president of BYD Americas, the core essential is to recreate how you are going to change the world every two years. “If you are not pushing and making mistakes, you’re not pushing hard enough. Innovation comes from making mistakes,” he says.
Finally, Vineet Mehra, CMO at Ancestry.com, said the key has been giving the brand a role in people’s lives. This means encouraging people to look at the past to help inspire their future. The brand has done that by tapping into local culture to make that part of the national debate. This has helped it not only hit the front pages in the UK but also become the No 1 product on Amazon on Black Friday and Cyber Monday.
What unites these views is the need for disruptive creativity to be at the heart of a business. It’s more than just product and R&D and runs through communications. The best way for brands to influence consumer perception is through effective communications, by experimenting with new formats and, most importantly, by delivering a great brand experience.
Most of all though creative disruption is something that has to evolve and be applied every day across the entire company. It needs to be experienced by the consumer across all touchpoints. The most innovative brands are constantly looking at how they can continue improving the life of the consumer.
