Liberating Creativity From Process
- 1. FEATURE RICHARD BATES Free spirit Liberating creativity from process can result in maximum impact for brand positioning 28 www.pmlive.com/europe www.pmlive.com/europe P h a rr m a c e u tt ii c a ll M a rr k e tt ii n g E u rr o p e M a r c h / A p r ii ll 2 0 1 0 Pha maceu ca Ma ke ng Eu ope March/Apr 2010
- 2. FEATURE A re better brands really created through the product and therefore not sufficiently adopting best practice and bringing a substantive to make a difference. more professional approach to brand Consequently, the greatest opportunity to positioning? Some in the pharmaceutical create a clearly differentiated, defendable brand industry would argue that, in many cases, and gain competitive advantage is to focus on despite spending considerable time and money patients’ and/or physicians’ emotional needs. on improving their marketing capabilities and Defining these needs in any given treatment learning how to create ‘world-class brands’, situation is complex. They cannot be elicited from pharmaceutical marketers still struggle to research in the same definitive, linear way as develop truly differentiated brand ideas. functional needs. They need to be derived from Pharmaceutical marketers have long recognised multiple sources; from reading between the lines the benefit of brand marketing to help support and drawing connections between disparate facts. their product’s value proposition and gain sales by differentiating them clearly in the marketplace. To their credit, many pharmaceutical companies “To bring together these have been open to learning as much as they can from outside their sector, looking to brand insights … requires a more powerhouses like Diageo and Unilever to define best practice. This has led many to focus their creative, problem-solving efforts on developing their own ‘best-in-class’ brand development processes. Such processes do mindset” provide a useful framework for building brands and sit well with the predominant scientific, To bring together these insights to define rational, cultures within these organisations. a brand’s emotional space, and then create However, the unfortunate truth is that many a brand idea to express how the product fills of these ‘best in class’ processes are more it, requires a more creative, problem-solving orientated towards delivering against internal mindset. This cannot be achieved by carefully governance goals and procedures. This means following a process and working hard to find the marketers do more but think less, resulting in best ideas to fill each template, however good. them developing less engaging brand ideas. It requires a different mindset, in the same way The reality, even for the likes of Diageo and that, while a logical, deductive approach will Unilever, is that process can never provide solve a Sudoku puzzle, it will not help with a more than a foundation for the development cryptic crossword. But how do you achieve this? of a great brand. Great brand ideas are not Based on the experience of over 60 created through diligent process compliance pharmaceutical branding projects, those teams or being an ever more professional marketer. that are better able to detach themselves from Diageo and Unilever have developed some their company’s process and templates are great market-leading brands, such as Johnnie able to create more successful and engaging Walker, Guinness, Dove and Axe, but so, too, brand ideas. These teams have avoided have many organisations that take a far less developing ‘box blindness’: relying on process ‘professional’ approach to brand development. to steer them through brand creation and The common factor is that the successes are using boxes on the required brand templates all generated by marketers with more creative to guide their thinking. Instead they have, minds and aptitudes. Arguably, it is brains, quite literally, been able to think outside the not processes, that create great brands. box, and focus on what really matters when developing a brand, ensuring their idea is as differentiating and compelling as possible. “At its most basic level, a A stronger idea starts with a clear definition of the problem. What is required is an emotional brand is a navigational tool, need that the brand can be perceived to fulfil better than any other product. It must be a designed to help customers need important enough to the customers that if a brand presents a compelling proposition make choices” (ie supported by a credible functional rationale), they will change their behaviour At its most basic level, a brand is a and choose your brand over others. navigational tool, designed to help customerss In order to identify and clearly articulate such make choices and lead them to identify one needs, more time and effort must be focused on brand as best able to meet their needs. understanding potential customers and less on However, in pharmaceutical markets, as the perceived benefits of the product. What drives in most sectors, it is increasingly hard to customers, both rationally and emotionally? find clear functional differentiation between What are their needs, frustrations and fears? brands. If it does exist, it is often short- Understand what choices customers have lived, or limited to a very specific aspect of by getting to know your competitors as well Pharmaceutical Marketing Europe March/April 2010 www.pmlive.com/europe 29
- 3. FEATURE RICHARD BATES for most new pharmaceutical brands An insightful mind looks to discover: is that they are entering markets with Misconceptions – things that customers believe no substantial product differentiation. are true but which are not true at all They are also trying to convince customers of their value derived from a host of complex data Contradictions – things that customers say or believe comparisons and mode of action explanations. which contradict their actual behaviour or vice versa In this environment, they need a brand idea and brand executions that are capable of Tensions and Frustrations – things that do not work or are simply and powerfully conveying their value missing and are unmet rational or emotional needs in a way that stands out to, and resonates with, their chosen target customers. This is Loves and passions – things that your customers best achieved by encouraging brand teams really love about a market or a brand to be brave, and giving them the freedom to do less, think more and be more creative. Make shifting – solutions that customers patch together because there This article is not suggesting in any way that all is no product or service that gives them exactly what they want processes should be ignored. Having a framework is useful, particularly in explaining the process to Compromises – identifying the compromises or non-marketers in the organisation. The danger trade-offs that customers regularly make lies in believing that the process is the answer. As the functional differentiation between products Total turnaround – something that reverses an existing view of the gets narrower and regulatory cost reduction market or situation completely, destroying myths or preconceptions pressure on the sector increases, brand teams will have to become more inventive to differentiate as they know themselves. This encompasses their products and justify their value propositions. not just their data, but what needs they are Processes do not engender inventiveness. trying to own in the therapy area, how they are communicating them and foreseeing how their approach may change over time. “Enable marketers to All of this amounts to having a deep market insight; insight that can inspire the development understand what insights of the brand idea by better defining what the brand will resolve for customers. This clear look like and give them the focus is best achieved by treating insight as a permanent state of mind and not a freedom to pursue them” stage in the process, and by using market research to inspire and inform thinking, rather To be more creative, marketers are going to than relying on it to define the answer. need freedom from, and the skills to become less However, insight on its own is not reliant on, the templates and procedures that enough. Many brands have the insight, they come with ‘world-class’ brand building processes. understand the market dynamics and their The payback will be twofold; more compelling, competitors, but they fail to make choices. better-differentiated brand ideas capable of Which customers, insights and needs are delivering greater competitive advantage and important and which can be left alone? A sales from a given marketing spend, and a brand needs a single, clearly defined target. reduction in the cost of brand development. Instead of expecting marketers to understand CHALLENGE CUSTOMERS what comprises a good insight and a good brand Once they have identified their target, brand idea, simply through diligently following each teams are typically tasked with developing and every process stage, huge efficiencies a brand positioning idea that is ‘unique, can be made by enabling them to understand differentiating and credible’. All too often, what these insights look like and then giving this leads to ideas that simply present the them the freedom to pursue them. brand as ‘better than’ or ‘new’. What they No two brand-development projects are the need are brand ideas that challenge and same. Therefore, unnecessary steps can be disrupt customers’ thinking, through what skipped, and the scale and scope of those that they stand for, or how they are executed, or remain can be tailored to deliver exactly what both. Brand teams need to be braver, and is required to move the thinking forward. to recognise that it is only by challenging a Pharmaceutical companies must identify who in customer’s thinking that a brand can create their marketing organisations have the right skills an imperative for them to act differently. and aptitudes to bring the most out of their brand Challenger brands are not a new idea. However, processes, and then use them as specialists to they are often seen as the exception rather than lead their brand development processes forward. the rule, in the preserve of brands trying to compete with a well-established, dominant market The Author leader, like Avastin, for example. Yet the reality Richard Bates is European pharmaceutical lead at Clear. 30 www.pmlive.com/europe Pharmaceutical Marketing Europe March/April 2010