BRAND STRATEGY 101 WITH NICOLE ANTIN
In 2019, RoC Skincare relaunched its Retinol Eye Cream and was able to deliver over 777 million media impressions, increased ad awareness by 83%, and make their product the number one fastest growing eye SKU (Stock Keeping Unit).
How is a brand able to achieve such great success on a product that had previously been on the market?
This is called brand strategy. In January of 2019, Nicole Antin assisted a new client to Horizon Media, RoC Skincare, to plan effective ways to relaunch their eye cream using brand strategy.
The basic definition of strategy is that is it is a decision on how to get from point A to point B. For someone like Antin, in order to use strategy in marketing, there are key things about the client that one must know. The industry, the brand, their goal, their target audience, what that audience wants, the brand’s competitors, and their strategies are important to understand.
Here are some key questions that the strategists would ask themselves:
How can the brand grow?
Does it want to reach more people? Get people to switch over? Expand the market?
What is the brand’s current situation?
How do consumers purchase the category and your brand?
Antin describes the brand strategy process as follows:
The client provides a brief.
It is the agency’s job to understand the key questions or problems from a business perspective that need to be answered from a marketing perspective
Understand the purchase journey and category.
The agency audits the consumer purchase journey and identifies key audiences for growth. They develop a knowledge bank of competitive analysis and media landscape insights to inform strategic decisions.
Develop a cohesive strategy to achieve key business goals.
Then, the agency uses the data from step two, in addition to historical performance insights, to develop a strategy with a budget/channel allocation
Media Tactical Planning.
This stage is where the agency translates its strategy into a communications plan including and deciding what partners within each channel make the most sense and are in line with their strategy and will deliver on performance metrics.
The agency also keeps in mind the purchase funnel, which is how to get people interested in a product.
First, someone is aware that the product exists and knows what it is. Next, they consider whether they should purchase the product. Then, they buy the product over competitors. Loyalty is the stage when customers consistently choose that product over others. Advocacy is once the customer starts recommending the product to others and vouchers for it. With each step, there may be fewer people for that group, but the ties between the customer and the product strengthen.
Most recently, Antin has been promoted to manager at Wavemaker, a Group M media agency, where she works on the Ikea account. Her most recent project was the Ikea Tiny Home Project, where they advertised Ikea’s sustainability.
—— March 6, 2021. Written by Amy Ellis. 