Beruflich Dokumente
Kultur Dokumente
Brand Competition
Brilliantly Differentiated Brand
Summary & Framework:
Brands that are doing really well in their market are taking risks to differentiate themselves.
These brands are layered, sculpted, and tested. The article states that three things must align to
create a competition murdering brand:
1. Understand brands beliefs and communication
2. Understand your audience
3. Understand your competition & be different from them
Below, you will see how some brands kill their competition:
Give an experience
Do community events
Be concise
Find a niche
If you promote a certain lifestyle, make sure your store reflects that
Be funny
Brands:
1. GCI could utilize this framework as they are a little fish in a big ocean right now which is
what this article focused on.
2. Credit Unions, like Denali, can utilize this simple framework to differentiate themselves
from the big competition.
GCI:
GCI could absolutely benefit from the principles in this article. While the article did not pinpoint
one particular aspect of the firms that made them great, there were quite a few suggestions. The
article discussed T-Mobile as one of the best companies that is currently killing the competition.
T-Mobile even calls themselves the un-carrier and GCI has some lessons to learn from T-Mobile.
They should take a difference stance than the major competitors.
Below are suggestions for GCI based off of the main points in the article:
o As of right now, GCI does not have a cult following. However, it is important to
note that GCI has been one of the only carriers for Alaskans and this in and of
itself gives GCI an imbedded cult following. In class and in the articles thus far
we have not really talked about cult followings specifically but we did talk about
brand value. If GCI builds their brand value with a brand community, then they
could build a cult following.
Be simple, genuine, & selfless
o When it comes to mobile carriers, they are not very straightforward. Contracts are
long, arduous, and not user friendly. If GCI were to offer a straightforward contact
with very simple guidelines, that would be appreciated by the consumer.
Focus on quality, image, and community
o GCI has the most coverage across Alaska. Why is this not their biggest marketing
campaign? Additionally, GCI is an Alaskan company. They should absolutely be
doing more community events and working on their image throughout Alaska
through brand communities.
Have a solid, hashtagable* catch-phrase like #builttolast or #liveriveted
o GCI does not have a catch-phrase for their wireless sector. Their phrase should be
front and center of their webpages and advertisements but it does not exist.
Biggest State, Biggest Network could work.
Find a niche
o GCI is not in a niche market. Cell phone providers is not something that is new,
however, GCI could and should create a new edge to their wireless network. TMobile is already the Un-Carrier so GCI must come up with an idea that is as
innovative as it is memorable. Rather than focus on iPhones, maybe GCI should
focus on Samsung and give away Android phones with every contract. Maybe
GCI should totally do away with contracts. They need to do market research
before they decide a path and find a niche.
Make entering the business easy
o One of GCIs problems is that they pick all the wrong customers, GCI should
stray away from this bullet-point and reference the articles on how to pick the
right customers.
If you promote a certain lifestyle, make sure your store reflects that
o GCI stores should reflect life in Alaska. They could feature a rock-wall, local art
or anything Alaskan to reflect the lifestyle they are trying to portray.
There is an informal, powerful contract between the firm and its stakeholders called a
covenant. It is the expectations of the customers of a firms value.
o In a covenant, the corporate brand emerges over time.
Brand identity can exist totally separately from the actual owner of the brand. A great
example of this is Land Rover.
o Because of the brand covenant, consumers know what the brand stands for and
can readily appreciate the differences that the brand brings to the table.
Three imperatives to the strategic management of corporate brands:
o Custodianship
Corporate brand management is an ongoing senior management
responsibility
Management must guard the brand covenant
Executives must always be faithful to the brand
Realize that the firms value is really their emotional ownership to the
customers and stakeholders
o Credibility
Living and realizing the brand covenant
Organizational wide commitment to the covenant
Kaladi Brothers: since Kaladi Brothers needs to fight with Starbucks and
all the small independently owned shops in Anchorage, they should have
stronger brand management.
GCI:
GCI should build the necessary brand assets that create a strong corporate brand.
1. Reassurance Value:
a. GCI must clearly define a brand and work to grow said brand over time.
While GCI has been in business for a relatively long time, their brand
identity is weak and thus their reassurance value does not exist. GCI needs
a growth strategy that is aimed to make GCI credible and reputable to
Alaskans.
2. Emotional Value:
a. GCI could establish that the customers should have emotional ownership
over the brand. As Alaskas wireless network, Alaskans should feel a sense
of ownership to the brand. GCI must be socially responsible and ethical in
all decisions to achieve emotional value.
3. Financial Value:
a. GCI could and should consider selling their mobile customers to the
national brands if they are not committed to establishing a stronger brand.
They could still exist under the name GCI but be run by AT&T or Verizon.
As I have said in previous writings, GCI must get their entire company from marketing to
finance to sales under the same assumption. The senior management in all sectors of GCI
wireless must take on brand management as one of their key duties and responsibilities they
must be a custodian to the brand and through custodianship, GCI has a chance at creating
credibility. Finally, GCI must calibrate their strategic plan, which will be discussed below.
Calibration or AC4ID Framework implementation:
GCI needs to first establish a being and becoming framework prior to creating a bridging
framework. Without being a top level employee at GCI or in their wireless sector, I cannot state
to some of the critical concerns of the framework, such as the cultural corporal brand identity, the
ideal corporate identity and the desired corporate brand identity but the other pieces of the
framework could definitely use some refining so Im sure those probably do as well.
during the entire year? I want to just pay for the data we use. If a wireless
network offered me a plan in which I could only pay for the data that I used, I
would switch to them immediately.
o While I am not entirely sure what niche GCI should follow without doing market
research, I can say that the beginning of the process would be to analyze some soft data
on what customer must-haves are and what needs of wireless customers throughout the
country are not being met.