In this Period of Great Uncertainty – Is Your Offer Future Proof?
| Brand Development, Consumer and Cultural Insights, Design Strategy, Innovations Strategy, News
People cannot predict the future, but we are challenged to create products and brands that we hope will appeal to consumers for many years. Scenario planning—the process of learning about the future by studying the confluence of the most relevant trends in a contextual and meaningful way—can be a powerful tool for developing knowledge about the future. This knowledge can then be used to develop strategies for “future proof” offerings. Scenario planning is the process of creating a set of alternate plausible stories about the future to uncover cultural dynamics and customer needs, and create strategies that can succeed across a variety of potential future market states.
The RAND Corporation originally developed the “scenario learning” process in the 1950s as a contingency planning tool for the United States Air Force. Over the next two decades, General Electric and Shell Oil adopted the process to make key, long-term strategy decisions. Today, both large and small organizations use scenarios, predominately to resolve long-term strategic issues.
In The Art of the Long View, Peter Schwartz of Global Business Network, a pioneer and thought leader in the use of scenarios, describes several applications for scenarios. Schwartz explains how Royal Dutch Shell used the scenario process in making key decisions regarding the development of the North Sea oil fields. In 1971, Pierre Wack used scenario forecasting outside of academia and applied this methodology to practical usage for Royal Dutch Shell. It is due to this forward thinking and research that the company was prepared for the oil crisis a mere two years later.
Because we cannot predict the future, scenario planning uncovers multiple perspectives on the ways in which the world will pan out. This initiative is crucial to developing craft brand strategy, product specifications and business strategy to succeed in a variety of future environments.
The Scenario Planning Process Requires Five Essential Steps:
1) Frame the question: Define the key strategic questions that need to be answered to make your offer successful.
2) Build the Model: What trends and key market factors are relevant to impacting the questions in Step 1? – These trends are called driving forces.
3) Research and Refine: Research each driving force to understand how each may unfold. Some may be more predictable and certain, and others will be more uncertain. Scenario planning allows us to deal with these key uncertainties.
4) Develop a set of Scenarios: Because we cannot predict the future, we always develop multiple scenarios, each representing a plausible future. The scenarios are focused on the key strategic questions, allowing us to develop new products, brands and strategies based on research insight.
5) Implement and Deploy the Scenarios: Focus on each scenario in a workshop process to develop product and brand strategy and innovation opportunities. Scenarios can be used to war game competitive strategy, uncover threats and create new opportunities. Scenarios should be communicated broadly through the organization so managers are more aware of how daily decisions may impact the future.
Through our Future Scenario programs, our clients benefit in developing clear strategies for products and brands, as well as a contextual understanding of the future that improves decision making for years to come. We have used scenarios to create innovative new product offers, shape brand and marketing strategy, develop product features and benefits and make key decisions on high cost/impact programs, Our experts have conducted scenario related work for Royal Dutch Shell, BMW, Microsoft, Herman Miller, Johnson Controls and Agilent Technologies.
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Review of Consumer Emotion & Desire Presentation given by Mark Capper, President
| Communication, Consumer and Cultural Insights, News
Consumers can only juggle 7 things in their mind at any one time. There are way too many choices in the market for us to rationally navigate all the marketing & advertising “stuff” that bombards us all day long. So how do consumers navigate all this “stuff”? According to Neuroscientist Antonio Darmasio, a part of our brain the Orbitofrontal cortex integrates sensory, emotion and memory information. This integration happens mostly on the subconscious level. Some 80% of thought is sub-conscious, where we have limited access to it. The other 20% is the conscious mind, which is where most marketers aim. Our memories are tagged with emotion.
Each decision has a connection with an emotion/decision in our past. If we were deprived of this connection, we would find it nearly impossible to decide based on logic alone. We have no feeling of what is right to guide us. He showed a short video clip of “Marvin” who had brain damage to his Orbitofrontal cortex, and struggled with the simple task of deciding which greeting card to buy.
Every touch point is a chance for a marketer to create an emotional connection with the customer. Product image & emotion combined help the customer decide, “Is it right for me?” Mark suggested trying to find out what it is that the consumer is trying to compensate for. Where is the emotional/cultural deficit?
Since we can’t directly access the 80% of the customers thinking (the subconscious mind) how do we gain access to this level of thought? How do we find out what the brand character is? Mark explained that we have to use one on one interviews and indirect questioning methods. We need to be an Anthropologist, an learn how meaning is applied in that consumers culture. We look at how a “Need” is represented in that culture, and gather images that represent that need or needs. This allows us to decode the meaning of that image for that consumer.
The use of images, photos, drawings, etc. allows the subject to pick what best represents the image closest to the product in question. We can also ask what kind of person would buy – use this product. Describe what this person would look like; what other products would they use. This indirect approach does not trigger the rational mind. The images selected will tell us how the product fits into that consumer’s world. It will also give us clues on how to position the product. The images will tell us the story.
This was a great presentation on the fuzzy front end of product development, and the neuroscience behind it.
- Review by Phil Sallaway, – Product Manager, Marketing Professional concentrating on B2B, Industrial products: Instrumentation, Controllers, Sensors, and Industrial Automation, Marketing Industrial
This speech was given on June 15, 2011 at the Product Development Management Association – Los Angeles, CA.
Original source can be found on Phil’s blog - “Ideas, People, Technology, in that order”
POST COMMENTBrand Development with the Goal of Creating High Emotional Attachment
| Brand Development, Brand Experience, Consumer and Cultural Insights, News
In the action sports apparel space, brands live and die by creating strong and emotional connections with the identity of consumers. For example, Volcom captured the surf industry by connecting to the “core” of the surfer. Vans has a strong following across action sports through a strong connection to culture, developed in part through their creation of the Warped Tour, where they immersed the company in counter-culture by creating an annual traveling music festival for their customers. Brands in this space create the type of relationship we discussed in our blog “Consumer Brand Attachment Proven to Create Value.” But culture is constantly in a state of change, and brands come and go as they fall in and out of relevance with consumers.
We were fortunate when Casta, an up-and-coming label (www.castaliving.com), requested our support in helping them develop their brand. Casta came to us with a set of beliefs, attitudes and values; their own unique style they felt resonated with emerging trends in the coastal lifestyle apparel space.
At Kompas Strategy we approach “Brand Development” with the goal of creating “high brand attachment” with the identity of consumers using a process inspired by the enlightening book “How Brands Become Icons” by Doug Holt. Through this process we immerse ourselves deeply into the culture of the consumer and identify the most meaningful contradictions between the prevailing culture and the identity of the core consumer. We then develop these contradictions into visual and linguistic brand positioning.
This approach resonated with Casta, where the founders are deeply connected to the coastal culture. The founders of Casta already had intuitively identified an opportunity space and had preliminary designs they believed would resonate with their ideal consumers. Our role was to help them understand more about this space, and develop their intuition into a brand that would resonate with their core market.
We used in-depth insight along with semiotics informed image elicitation to evoke the meaning that resonated with the identity of the core consumers. We explored this significance to clarify and document the brand personality, tone, values and meaning. We evaluated proposed brand visual equities and design – not to see what would do well, but instead to understand how to visually communicate the nuances of the brand significance. We provided Casta with a “Brand Book” to help them convey manage and communicate the brand as they prepared for launch.
The Kompas Strategy team was there for Casta all along the way, from concept conception to the launch of their brand at Orlando’s Surf Expo last month. We were excited to see Casta receive a very strong reception at their debut, with several stores picking up the brand at the show. We noticed the retailers who connected most with the brand were those who saw what we saw – culture is shifting in the coastal lifestyle and surf market. “The times they are a changing.” – Bob Dylan.
- Check our friends from Casta at www.castaliving.com and let us know it makes you feel.
Emotional Design – Unconscious Desire
| Brand Experience, Communication, Consumer and Cultural Insights, Design Strategy, Innovations Strategy, News
When I finally was able to upgrade my mobile phone, the decision to buy an iPhone was very easy, in fact, I believe my unconscious mind made that decision for me long before it was time to enter the credit card number to close the sale on the shopping cart web page. The truth is that our unconscious mind has the majority of influence in purchasing decisions, and our poor conscious and rational mind is left to justify the decision so we can explain our actions rationally to our spouse and friends.
So what is our mysterious unconscious mind considering when it makes decisions?
There are at least two key questions that must be resolved in the unconscious mind as it navigates the decision process. The first question, and perhaps the most important one is related to personal image, “does this help me be who I want to be?” All day, from the time we wake up to the time we fall asleep, we are managing the impression we make on others. When we see an ad, a new product, a new store, web page, etc., we are always relating that new thing to our personal image. We are seeking those things that can help us project the image we unconsciously seek to display. When something very strongly resolves the image we are seeking to project, we have a strong desire to own that object.
Emotion is at the core of the second question. We sum up all the emotions we associate with that thing. We ask ourselves; “how we would feel if we owned that product?” To answer this question we sum up the emotions we have stored in our memory associated with that product, the brand it is associated with, and other things we relate to it in some way. So if you have had bad emotional memories associated with a specific brand, it may be hard for you to consider any product from that brand, even if it closely connects to your image. If the product is associated with primal, reptilian emotions such as those affiliated with sex, the appeal can be very strong.
For products to perform at a high level in the market, the product and the overall experience associated with that product must resolve these unconscious considerations. Therefore every aspect of the offer must be in tune with the image the consumer is seeking to convey, and evoking the emotions the consumer wants to feel. Understanding how consumers perceive products and brands in their unconscious mind is not easy.
Highly skilled researchers, designers and creatives can leverage these unconscious needs in the development of products and brands. To do so, they use methods that get to the unconscious drivers, and convert them to attributes to be designed into the offer. Skilled creative resources can utilize this insight to develop concept proposals. These proposals can then be carefully evaluated by consumers in a way that determines if these unconscious needs are being met. Through refinement and optimization, the offer can be crafted to strongly resonate with the consumer’s conscious and unconscious mind.
- Mark Capper
POST COMMENTEmotional Design – What is it?
| Brand Development, Communication, Consumer and Cultural Insights, Design Strategy, Innovations Strategy, News
Recently there has been a great focus on the role of design in evoking emotion and creating a strong connection to the consumer. But what is emotional design?
In reality, all design is emotional. Everything that we see evokes some kind of emotional response. There is an entire pallet of emotions, 64 according to the psychologist Plutchik. Love, fear, acceptance, sadness – these are all emotions, and each may be evoked by a designer, either intentionally or unintentionally in the design of a product or any form of media. Everything we see is interpreted emotionally in our unconscious mind. According to neuroscientist, Antonio Damasio, every memory has an emotion tied to it. When we need to determine a response to something, such as when we see an animal in the forest, or go to the market to purchase something, we recall those emotions associated with our memories related to it. The thing could be a product, brand, retail experience, website, person, etc. Our initial response to everything is emotional. We then know if we should fear it, or love it, be sad or laugh. It all happens in the unconscious mind within seconds. When we see something for the first time, we try to make associations to other things we have experienced in the past. We then recall those emotions associated with the familiar things. If it looks like a bear, we will run in fear before we properly identify it as a bear.
Therefore all design is emotional design. The task of the designer is to understand the emotions they wish to evoke, then understand how to evoke that emotion within the intended beholder of the object, the target consumer. The challenge is to understand what evokes the intended emotions for your target consumer (emotion is universal, but the triggers of emotions vary across cultures).
- Mark Capper
The Audi R8 is a visceral approach to evoking emotion through design.
Consumer Brand Attachment Proven to Create Value
| Brand Development, Brand Experience, Communication, Consumer and Cultural Insights, Innovations Strategy, News
We at Kompas Strategy are very excited about an article published in the Journal of Marketing titled “Brand Attachment and Brand Attitude Strength: Conceptual and Empirical Differentiation of Two Critical Brand Equity Drivers”. * This publication validates thorough academic research that “Brand Attachment” generates brand value for organizations.
Findings
The authors define “Brand Attachment” as “the strength of the bond connecting the brand with the self.” This is the brand “self-connection” consumers’ feel when the brand represents an element of their identity stimulating attachment, relationship and emotion. The authors indicate this is different and more powerful than “brand -prominence” which they define as the “ease” to which the brand comes to mind.”
Through their research, the authors show that “Brand Attachment” contributes significant value to the organization. The authors report the stronger the bond between consumers and the brand, the more they are willing to forsake personal resources to maintain an on-going relationship with the brand. Consumers are more willing to invest time, money, energy and reputation to maintain or deepen their relationship with the brand. In other words, they will pay a premium price, recommend the brand, and go out of their way to find it and defend it to others.
A perfect example of ideal brand attachment is the firm ground that supports Apple and its consumers. They are willing to wait for hours in long lines to get the latest products (time), will spend hundreds, if not thousands of dollars over other brands (money), read the latest publications for updates on their beloved products (energy), and in the most extreme cases, Apple lovers will go so far as putting the logo on their car (reputation). Have you ever seen an IBM or Dell sticker on a car that was not of an employee? Exactly…. Apple consumers are deeply attached and as a result, Apple is one of the largest companies in the world not only financially but also in terms of backing by loyal supporters.
Conclusion
This research comes with great enthusiasm from our team because “Brand Attachment” is at the core of our beliefs, and this article validates the value we create for our clients. From the start, we have believed that the best brands form almost “unbreakable” bonds with consumers that result in premium pricing, consumer loyalty and word of mouth. These bonds can be created through in-depth insight into the motivations of consumer, and crafting an offer that resonates with consumer identity in a meaningful way.
There is no denying that consumers envision brands as an extension of the self and are favored over competitors due to years of personal experience that no one else can replicate for the consumer. The bottom line here is that brands reinforce our identity, strengthen our confidence and most importantly: they make us happy. Now, it is up to the brands themselves to fulfill our needs.
- Mark Capper
* Whan Park, C., Deborah J. MacInnis, Joseph Priester, Andreas B. Eisingerich, and Dawn Iacobucci. “Brand Attachment and Brand Attitude Strength: Conceptual and Empirical Differentiation of Two Critical Brand Equity Drivers.” Journal of Marketing 74.6 (2010): 1-17. Print.
Let’s solve the Social Media Chaos problem!
| News
Everyday articles on Mashable, eMarketer Daily and other industry publications promise to illustrate the future of Social Media by profiling the new “promising” solutions for Social Media Integration. Regardless of what is the newest solution “on the block” we can all agree that we are living in a Social Virtual Chaos. With LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter and YouTube all offering to keep us a click away from all our best personal and professional friends, one must wonder why the Silicon Valley or any other garage genius has not developed a solution that integrates, and most importantly, filters all the social noise we love so much?
Solutions such as Hootsuite, MediaFunnel and TweetDeck can definitely help brands navigate the jungle out there. However, we at Kompas Strategy think we need more! Brands can no longer afford to just being “socially-media” connected with their target audience, or claiming the status of having an engaging Facebook page. Brands are now challenged with the task of working with at least 3 platforms, updating multiple feeds and organizing & segmenting new fan/follower relations on a daily basis to keep up with the Joneses.
In an effort to contribute to the noise reduction, and to avoid having brands fighting for the consumer’s share of post readership, we at Kompas Strategy believe we need 3 types of solutions:
A- Great Creative – For starters brands have to focus on creating content that will be more than just engaging. Content to remain “KING” it has to be viral, relevant, unique and targeted. Just like Old Spice Man – Brands need to create communication efforts that in the golden era, someone (software) that would organize people’s social media calendar so we don’t miss on important tweets and posts. It should also send happy B-day virtual cards/notes and remind us of that party we told our entire network we would attend. Just simply keep with our hectic social media life.
B- An Opt-in/Opt-out Content Filter – With the amount of noise out there, it would be great if we could check/uncheck all our incoming content based on subject, author, date/time, length of content, keyword relevancy and other granular filters. I don’t know about you, but I hate the “just having a burger” posts.
C- An Integrated Feeder – Let’s keep it simple and have everything coming and going through one single pipeline of content. Let’s substitute all the different mobile social media apps and one single user interface that allows us to read, reply and post all at a touch of 1 single button.
In the current complex era where we are more connected than ever, I believe we should look for simple and easy solutions rather than developing another sharing feature. On that note, we would love to hear what you would develop to save us from social media chaos?
Alex Nascimento
VP of Online Marketing
Kompas Strategy
Ten Brands that will disappear in 2012
| News
The results are in – 24/7 Wall St. has published their annual list of Ten Brands that will disappear for the year 2012.
These brands all have one major trait in common; they missed the mark on adapting their business model to best suit the customer. They have failed to connect on an emotional level with consumers wants and as a result neglected to cater to their needs. Ultimately all 10 brands listed have been outpaced by their competitors who could fill this void.
It is during times of a brand’s downturn that a company must refocus,”re-strategize,” and renew their energy in a brand to make it worth purchasing for a consumer.
Change is the one constant in the marketplace that cannot be overlooked. Without adapting and making the necessary adjustments to offer the customer a unique position over the competition, a brand will not last long.
Which 10 Brands might YOU miss? Read more: 24/7 Wall St. Ten Brands That Will Disappear In 2012 – 24/7 Wall St.
Emily Odenberg
Kompas Strategy
Video Game Consoles Loosing Ground to Mobile Devices? No News to Us Thanks to Future Scenarios!
| News
An article in the Los Angeles Times Business Section last Sunday (June 5, 2011) declared “Game Over? Consoles lose ground in video gaming as players turn to tablets, smartphones.” While this may be news to some, we had been expecting this for quite a while. We foresaw this trend back in 2002. Also in 2002, we predicted that gaming would become popular among families and females, and new game hardware and software would be developed to appeal to broader audiences. Several years later the Nintendo Wii appeared on the market.
How did we know these events would occur and that the video game market would change so drastically? In 2002 members of the Kompas Strategy team (at the time working for another consulting agency) developed Future Scenarios for Microsoft to aid in the product planning for the Xbox 360 console. Through this process, all of these key trends were uncovered, and recommendations were made to Microsoft to adjust strategy accordingly.
The Future Scenarios process is a powerful tool for planning strategy, technology, products and brands for the future. The process involves identifying key forces that will shape the business environment into the future, then creating multiple scenarios or stories that bring the future to life. These scenario and stories are used to develop strategy, fuel innovation and prepare an organization for the future. Royal Dutch Shell was among the first to use this process as a corporate strategy tool, and today, many organizations have become scenario learning organizations.
We are now excited to be working on our seventh major strategic program involving the Future Scenario methodology. Each of these programs has generated incredible insight as well as strategic implications that are highly actionable for our clients.
Mark Capper
President
Kompas Strategy
Who comes first, your Facebook or your Website?
| News
This question can be coined as the “Who came first, the chicken or the egg?” of our digital era. I want you to ask yourself which one needs more of your attention in our days, your static website or your disengaging Facebook page? I would advocate that at least your Facebook Brand Page has more potential than your website.
Think about the possibilities! Let’s start with the core of any successful brand, its advocates. What is more important to a Brand than its loyal customers? For the fraction of the cost of developing a social network within your website, you can evangelize your brand followers on Facebook. As Burberry attributes its online initiatives connecting with 6 Million loyal friends on Facebook to help achieve 27% growth in sales this past year, so can your brand benefit from a few extra friends.
Now let us think about the first rule of business… Sales! What if you could not only generate and track leads, but you could also sell on your Facebook Page. Would that be something you and your CMO might be interested in? Currently, low-cost apps such as Payvment (www.facebook.com/payvment) will add an ‘Ecommerce functionality’ tab directly to your page so your fans can shop and share to their heart’s content.
But we are all in the business of communicating with the target, and some may claim that the e-mail deliverability of their website is still a reason to keep those old html pages running statically. Given that Yahoo Mail’s 284 Million users and Gmail 220 Million’s users are now able to share and reply to their social updates without leaving their inboxes, I would suggest for us to rethink who comes first?
Alex Nascimento
VP of Online Marketing
Kompas Strategy
