FutureBrand news, views & insights: December 2022
‘Sliding doors’
Last week I flew to Singapore and, as always, I had a to-do list for the flight.
Top of the list was to write this intro for this month’s newsletter. I must have written half a dozen different versions before I called it quits. Nothing like writing for an hour or two only to delete every word.
Two days later and this intro had written itself.
We had won the ultimate prize at the Transform Awards Asia – the Grand Prix – for our work with the Asian Football Confederation. The morning after, I took a walk around town and passed by some of my old haunts, and it made me think back over all those ‘sliding doors’ moments that had led to this one.
Not least of all the moment I received an email out of the blue from a sports marketing company I’d never heard of via an ad agency executive I’d never met.
It was an email chain that could have easily broken before the first conversation about Asian football had even began.
It was also a pitch that we won, only to have to re-pitch for a second time – and so it was that we made the decision to pitch in, rather than pull out.
And so many more make-or-break moments that led us, working hand-in-hand with our clients at both the Asian Football Confederation and Football Marketing Asia, through every twist and turn.
For once, as I mulled over the ins and outs, ups and downs, there was no grand insight that came to mind. I just felt lucky.
It’s a good feeling to have after the end of another long year, and I feel equally lucky to be celebrating it with the FutureBrand team today over a very long lunch.
All the best to you and yours for the holidays – and, of course, good luck in 2023 ;)
A whole new world of fun!
As you may know, one of our 'habits' at FutureBrand Australia is this.
We regularly try-buy-use our clients' brands, products & services.
By immersing ourselves in the customer and employee experience, we're able to understand the brand in its various contexts and uncover the insights required to guide the brand strategy, brand architecture and brand identity – and ultimately, the brand experience.
It’s also lots of fun.
Especially when your brand name is Funlab and you own and operate a range of experience brands that includes Strike, Holey Moley, Hijinx Hotel, La Di Darts, Archie Brothers and more.
These are places where people create and experience all kinds of fun-filled moments, from the weird to the wonderful. And, these were the inspiration for the Funlab group brand to reimagine the formula for creating fun.
You can read all about it in the case study.
How the reimagined Funlab brand now provides the business with a clear and compelling employer brand to attract team members with the mindset to become ‘Motherfunners’.
And, how it connects the portfolio in ways that facilitate customer cross-shop and loyalty, from one guest experience to the next.
Plus, there’s this little extra bit of background info that I thought I might share here, something that isn’t in the case study: this quick snapshot of the conceptual thinking behind the design of the brand and how the exclamation mark came to be…
Hear now. And always
In case you didn’t know, that sub-headline is also Cochlear’s tagline.
For me, it’s the perfect description of Cochlear’s commitment to our world and an important element of the brand that had been lost in the mix as a result of its inconsistent marketing efforts.
In the words of Kirsten Impey, Cochlear’s Global Director, Corporate Communications, Awareness & Brand:
“We knew that we lacked consistency in the market and, in some cases, we were actually diluting our brand efforts. For us that meant wasted time and dollars reinventing the look and feel of all our marketing around the world. For the customer, it meant a different brand experience every time they opened a new brochure.”
So it was that we began work with Kirsten and the team to evolve and align this iconic healthcare brand with its new vision for the future.
In case you missed it, I recently interviewed Kirsten so that she could take us on a deeper dive and share her perspective on rebranding Cochlear – here’s the link to the Q&A.
From the pub to a podcast
Over the years, I’ve had the opportunity to be a guest on a variety of podcasts, but never have they been recorded in a pub in front of a live audience.
But then Tim Burrowes – founder of Mumbrella and now Unmade – is known for doing things a little bit differently and this was no exception. Feel free to grab yourself a beer and listen here to the podcast episode.
On brand, on board
If you had taken predictions of the future at face value, all of us would have been replaced in the workforce by robots by now.
As it turns out, the demand for people only seems to be growing and talent acquisition feels more challenging than ever. So much so that we seem to have reached a strange peak – or nadir – if this LinkedIn post is anything to go by.
I’d like to think that story is an outlier, but there is indeed more that organisations could be doing to use their brand to attract, engage and retain their people. In fact, this data we gathered when attendees RSVP’d for the webinar is a good case in point.
If your organisation doesn’t have an Employee Value Proposition, then you’re likely leaving your people strategy to chance. What’s more, if you’re not using the brand to inform and inspire your EVP, then you’re also losing the very thing that ought to offer competitive advantage.
If you’d like to watch a video recording of the webinar, please feel free to email me – the presentation draws on data and insights from this year's FutureBrand Index and covers the role of brand to drive talent acquisition, the ABC of EVP, and the end-to-end experience from acquisition to alumni.
Mental health comes first
Last but most definitely not least, I’m very happy to say that we did score some more wins at the Transform Awards, this time the ANZ edition.
As well as the Gold for Best Visual Identity in the healthcare & pharmaceutical sector, we were also awarded with a Bronze for Best Brand Evolution.
Not only did we help build the Innowell brand, we also continue to use the platform to support our own mental fitness here at FutureBrand Australia – which makes this win all the more important to us.
That’s it for another month! – and another year. Hope you enjoy reading and find some useful insights for your own businesses and brands. As ever, I’m be happy to hear all and any feedback, so please do comment, subscribe and share, and I look forward to seeing you in the new year.