You have just taken on a new role as a marketing manager for a new hospital in Ajo, Arizona.? There is one other hospital in town, but it is

Practitioner Perspectives with Moving Brands

Video Title: Practitioner Perspectives with Moving Brands

Originally Published: 2017

Publication Date: Jul. 22, 2017

Publishing Company: SAGE Publications, Ltd.

City: United Kingdom

ISBN: 9781526427908

DOI: https://dx.doi.org/10.4135/9781526427908

(c) SAGE Publications Ltd, 2017

[INSIDE MARKETING] [WITH PROF BEN VOYER, ESCP BUSINESS SCHOOL AND LONDON SCHOOL OF ECONOMICS] [PRACTITIONER PERSPECTIVES WITH MOVING BRANDS] [OLD ST. ROUNDABOUT, LONDON] [A HUB FOR CREATIVE, DIGITAL AND TECH COMPANIES]

[WORKING ACROSS SOCIAL MEDIA, AD, BRANDING AND MARKETING] [HOME TO THE LIKES OF GOOGLE AND AMAZON] [IT HAS BEEN NICKNAMED 'SILICON ROUNDABOUT'] [IN NEIGHBOURING SHOREDITCH] [A VIBRANT AREA FOR CREATIVITY AND DESIGN]

[WE'VE COME TO MEET GLOBAL EXPERTS] [OF BRANDS AND BRANDING] [MOVING BRANDS]

DR. BEN VOYER: Hi, viewers. [Dr. Ben Voyer, ESCP Business School, London School of Economics] Today, we're talking about brands and branding. We're here in Shoreditch, London to meet up with Moving Brands. It's a global creative agency, and they've been working with some of the most famous and creative brands in the world. When you think about it, everything is about brands and branding these days, so it's very important that marketers work closely with brands to create memorable branding

DR. BEN VOYER [continued]: experiences. So let's go inside and see what they have to say about it. [WHAT IS A BRAND?] What's a brand for you?

DARREN BOWLES: For some people, it's what it looks like. [Darren Bowles, Executive Creative Director] And for lots of people, that is all it will be. But I think from our perspective, it's more about a promise. It's a promise that you're making, so either you're making a promise about the performance of the product, the service of what it can do, or what it stands for. And I think what a brand isn't, or often is lost, is when that promise is broken.

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: So if you've said it can do something, if you said it represents something and it doesn't, then the brand has lost its tarnish, and then, perhaps, it needs a change. So, something like BP, for instance, suffers because it promises to be beyond petroleum. But a lot of what you see and what you have reactions to in the world are where the petroleum side is where it fails. So I think that's where, perhaps, a brand sometimes

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: breaks down.

HANNA LAIKKO: People are taking much more control about the brands and the products that they want to interact with. [Hanna Laikko, Chief Operating Officer] So there's much more ownership with the general public instead of the brand owner. So the brand is not actually truly owned by a company anymore. So you need to be able to kind of modulate between the truth, the story, the point of view of your company,

HANNA LAIKKO [continued]: and what the customers and consumers need. So being able to match between those things and continuously evolve and iterate the solutions is really important. [BRAND VS BRANDING?]

DR. BEN VOYER: What's the difference between a brand and branding, then?

DARREN BOWLES: The brand is a perception. I think it's what people have experienced. So I think you have to create amazing experiences, because people will make a judgment upon that. It used to be that you could project this is what you should think of us, but I think people are far more savvy. I think their understanding of brands are more about the experience in and around it.

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: So a brand lives in the mind of people, not in the mind of the business that's portraying it. They hope to live up to what the business represents, and they hope everybody else sees that perception. Branding, I think, is a terrible kind of verb, if you want, that

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people start to use where you force– I suppose, the physical nature of stamping of where branding originally came from,

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: or the terminology came from. I think there's still a behavior where people assume that you can force something to be something that it's not through a branding process. I think what we try to live out is that we make real experiences. We deliver upon things and create, hopefully, perception in the mind of others something that's truthful.

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: So I think the process that we go through is to try to bring those truths of the brands to life as they really do perform, rather than trying to force, or package, or wrap something that it isn't.

HANNA LAIKKO: So branding, I suppose, the origin of the word comes from burning, making a mark of ownership. Obviously, in today's context that's not really how we understand branding anymore. My understanding of the word brand would be that it's a total sum of the experiences that people have with an entity, whether it's a product,

HANNA LAIKKO [continued]: or service, or company. For example, I would say that it encapsulates a story and an identity of that product so that people can understand what to expect, what the brand is about, and what's different about it in relation to other products or services. I suppose, in relation to marketing or design,

HANNA LAIKKO [continued]: marketing often has the role of putting a promise or communicating the story in the marketplace. There has been design of the products or services and the experiences, then has to deliver on that promise. And I suppose from a more financial perspective as a business person, I see brand as an asset that has value.

HANNA LAIKKO [continued]: It can drive acquisition of customers, it can drive loyalty. It should be able to contribute to achieving price premium when you have similar products, and also employee engagement. So it should help you to get better people to work for your company. [WHAT SERVICES DO MOVING BRANDS OFFER?]

DR. BEN VOYER: Can you tell me a bit about the kind of services you offer to your clients?

DARREN BOWLES: As a studio, we're quite broad. So within our name, Moving Brands, so many might come to us as a brand creative business, so the creation of brands or the transformation of brands. But I think as far as what we do and the services we offer, it's far broader. So we think that the brand is a total experience that you make.

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: So whether that might be a physical interaction, so a product that you make– a digital product, a physical product. Or whether it be an experience of an environment or an interaction that you make or a piece of information to be digested– a booklet, a trade event, whatever it might be– all right the way through to film, and the story, and the narrative of that.

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: So it's quite broad. So on top of the creation of the brand itself, it's every which way that brand will then live in the world, and then be experienced by people. And we've built a studio that's able to consider that on-going relationship a person will have with the brand, and the experience as it evolves as well. So some might come to us and ask for–

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: specifically forgetting the upfront part, the creation of the brand, or the transformation of the brand, or perhaps the strategy, if you want, of what that brand will do– and might go straight to the endpoint and say, we just want the experience. And we work in that area, and we sometimes have a relationship which is only that. And other times, where it's the entire journey, where its everything. Or perhaps, its just the up front, and we

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: want to understand the strategic objective, and how do we define

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that for the brand. We have this is how the corporation or the business wants to perform and execute itself, and we've set ourselves this vision– how can our brand help us to live or create that? And that might be the singular piece that we will work with our client for. So I suppose, for us, its very different

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: that we would try to have this offer that are more like blocks. You might want all of those blocks that join together, or you might want an isolated one. Where we're successful, and where we really add most value is when we can make the connection between these parts. It's not an isolated piece, it's where we can see how that piece has an effect or has repercussions in other areas.

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: And we can start to bring that journey to life for them. [WHAT'S THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN BRANDING AND MARKETING?] For me, I think they serve a symbiotic relationship. They're not two different things, and they shouldn't be perceived as necessarily contrasting parts or pieces that need to be treated differently.

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: I think, as I said, I think a brand is a promise that you make. And I think that marketing is delivering on that promise, it needs to convey what it's trying to achieve. As opposed to announcing to the world, this is the promise, this is what we represent. I think sometimes where, perhaps, brand and marketing come in competition to one another is where, perhaps, you market something that the brand can't deliver upon,

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: or what the service can't deliver upon. And I think that's where, perhaps, people have real problems, or they have an objection to a brand. Because it is perceived, or it's trying to make you perceive it in a different way, so I think that relationship– there's what we do, and what we say we can do– need to work together. I think, otherwise, it feels more like spin,

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: we're all used to political spin. I think in terms of marketing and brand, we can see when something has being spun as a line to a person and not necessarily delivered upon. So they need to work together, and I think they need to come from that singular source where there's an objective of the business that sets the scope of what it's trying to say to the world. That's the point where these things join,

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: and they're both trying to achieve that aim.

HANNA LAIKKO: I would say that brand or branding, in general, is bigger than marketing. It's bigger than design, as well. If we discuss about brand as the combination of the story, the identity, the promise, the differentiation, and the set of expectations the customer can have, but then also the product and the delivery

HANNA LAIKKO [continued]: of those expectations. Because if you don't match those two things, over time, you will lose. [WORKING WITH GLOBAL BRANDS E.G. SONY AND NOKIA] We work with a lot of the best global brands. There's quite a few technology brands in there so, of course, you need to take the context where these brands operate

HANNA LAIKKO [continued]: into an account. So looking at their competitors, looking at their customers and consumers– how they behave, what they actually need from them. I suppose one of the key things– what's part of our belief is that it's an interplay between the aspirational ambition that the brand has, and the real truths that

HANNA LAIKKO [continued]: exist in the company. So, obviously, it needs to look into the future of where the brand or the company wants to be, what is the vision, what do the consumers or customers want– but also, what's true in the company. So in that sense, it doesn't really matter that we work with some of the competing companies in the world as well, because inherently, all

HANNA LAIKKO [continued]: of the creative out within all of the design that we deliver is based on

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that truth. So it should, ultimately, be theirs, it needs to be ownable and unique for them, instead of their competition. But in that similar kind of consideration, it's really important to look and understand what makes a difference, and therefore

HANNA LAIKKO [continued]: drive all the work to focus and bring those differences to the front. The clients that you mentioned, Sony and Nokia, obviously had very different situations when we started to work with them, and very different needs. One of them was more about actually transforming the overall experience of their brand,

HANNA LAIKKO [continued]: looking at how the brand, not only the product, can actually deliver value to the company. There is the other one was very creative, a product-oriented, production- oriented piece of work. [LONG TERM RELATIONSHIPS WITH CLIENTS: SWISSCOM]

DR. BEN VOYER: How do you work with a client over the long term?

DARREN BOWLES: With Swisscom, it's been now a seven to eight year engagement. Traditionally, I suppose, for branding, they want agencies. They work in cycles. So you do a cycle and you've hopefully completed your work, you've set their objective. And perhaps your engagement tails off, because the brand has been created and others will be working with that. So there's always other agencies in and around an engagement

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: and around the client. So the client will be commissioning you to be [INAUDIBLE] in this part, but they have a number of other executional [INAUDIBLE], perhaps, as part of it. The difference with the Swisscom engagement that we work on with them is to work in partnership with the client. So from very, very early on, we've been quite collaborative with them. So we've always been a very open studio, and that's how we pride ourselves in our work.

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: We like that transparency with clients. And we talk about co-creation a great deal. We do extract a lot of information and knowledge directly from the clients. So the kind of engagement that we have, and that helps us with our creative response. And so in the seven year engagement with Swisscom, it's an ongoing conversation, if you want. So a lot of the time, we'll be discussing

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: about the status of their objectives, perhaps the health of that brand– you know, is it being successful, what is the perception? And I think it's become more iterative, so along that way. So rather than a cycle of a brand being created, then perhaps needing to be rebranded in five, six, seven, eight years–

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: you maintain that health. We created the Swisscom brand to be dynamic and to be responsive. And the behavior with the client is to keep that kind of dynamic and the agility, I suppose. More like in a software development, you put something into the world. You try to see how it works– it is working, it isn't working– we react, and we change. So a lot of that seven year engagement

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: has been that maintenance, if you want, making sure that everything is working. If it's not working, what can we create? So much new technology has come in in seven years. There certainly wasn't iPhones, certainly wasn't smartphones when it was created, and that's made a vast amount of difference to the business that they operate and, I suppose, the landscape they need to work within. So a lot of that work has been making them fit and ready

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: for those transitions and those new technologies so they can best take advantage of them. So we'll work on smaller and more strategic projects. Sometimes very large, new initiatives where the business has looked to, perhaps, enter into a new vertical. So for instance, with Swisscom, they've moved more towards an offer within energy, for instance,

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: or they've moved more towards the creation of something within

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health. And we're working with the client to see what these things could be. So there's different points of industries that they move in. And we work with Swisscom, and the team, and the branding that we work with to make sure that the decisions made along that seven year process are still

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: keeping that vision alive. And sometimes we'll have isolated projects which are just pure design and expression pieces, and other times we're just there to steer other agencies and just help making sure that those things are working with intent that they were made. [HAVE THE BRAND NEEDS OF SWISSCOM CHANGED OVER TIME?]

DR. BEN VOYER: Have the client's needs changed over time?

DARREN BOWLES: Absolutely. I mean, within that time, I suppose from the outside looking in, they seem quite small. But technology offers far more diversity in what they're able to achieve, and they look to maximize, I suppose, the relationship they can have with their customers in the services that they can provide. So a lot of the transformation that we've been assisting

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: is that in the engagement they have with their customers. And sometimes that's through visual, of course, because the way that it's experienced and the way that it's interacted with. So the kind of overall feeling, if you want, of that brand. Or the emotionality of that brand. But also, take an experience and really creating

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: something that feels progressive and contemporary. And I suppose, at the forefront of what technology and what the media of the time is able to achieve as well. So we try not to create that kind of time capsule brand– it fits for that period, and then over a period needs to be updated. We and the team, working together,

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: are looking to make sure that that carries on in its progression and delivering. [CHALLENGES OF WORKING WITH A BRAND OVER TIME?] I suppose some of the challenges that might be is that, of course, within a delivery team, if you want, or from our side– perhaps the experience of that team progresses and new people might come into that engagement.

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: So, for us, its the onboarding of new people into that. And also, I think the freshness of perspective. So it's to make sure that we challenge ourselves because, of course, as a team and as a leader within that team, for instance, you've set a vision, you've set a response to perhaps a trouble at a time,

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: or perhaps an obstacle at a time, and you've given a resolution to that. Perhaps that might change in time, so there's a new one. Do you respond in the same way, or do you challenge it in a different way? So I think what we do is to cycle people and experience and different skills within the team to make sure that we have a new and fresh perspective. So we're all constantly challenging ourselves

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: so that we can be getting the best response, I think, with the client. So that's one of the challenges. I think you could keep it to exactly the same personnel, but perhaps you are not responding accurately enough, or well enough, to make sure that it's really giving them the best possible advantage.

LEGACY: FIAT 500 / NORTON SONS]

DR. BEN VOYER: How do you approach working for an iconic brand? How do you take into account the brand's legacy? What kind of advice would you give people working with these types of brands?

DARREN BOWLES: I think the diligence and research. There's the brief that you're given that a client has constructed. And of course, they sometimes have been very immersed in their business, and I think there's often a belief that perhaps you're as knowledged on the brand as they are. And I think what we often do is to assume that we

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DARREN BOWLES [continued]: know nothing about that brand. We have a perception and we will come and say, we see this of you, and this is a response of what we see. What we'd like to know is the real truths behind this– why it was created, how you operate, what you intend to do. And I think that process of really trying to understand– so a lot like yourselves in an interview and trying to get that discourse,

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: we want to have that relationship that we can try to get those truths and those strange nuances. Those quirky little things that happen behind that really are the manifestation of that brand. It's really why that is different, why Fiat might be different to a Volkswagen and why a Norton + Sons will be different to a Gieves and Hawkes, for instance. What is that thing that they do that's different?

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: Part of that might be the history, that might the heritage, that might be something within their process. Or it could be something within that personality of the people that run it. There's something of it that we need to uncover– that we can create a brand, and an experience that brings that to life. And sometimes you delve right into something that hasn't really been fully recognized by the client.

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: You know, ah, actually, that is true. I've never really thought that about ourselves, like, that's the thing. That's the thing that makes you different to the other. So when everything else around you is changing, and you're creating new and different pieces each time, there's something about you that is a constant. And we like to work and try to unpick what that thing would be, because there's a truthfulness to it.

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: I think people are savvy. As we all know, we can really sniff that out. If you think that actually, yeah, I can believe that, that's really good. And that's, I think, where we like to let the clients uncover that part of it. Not, perhaps, how they would like to be seen. [THE BRIEF FROM BRANDS TO THE CONSULTANCY] Often, the brief is that first kind

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: of entry point start and that first discussion that you have. Because, of course, it's a response to something. So the client has made it in response to perhaps an imminent need– they need to change their business and the success of the business. To have the business a new offer, for instance. So they've constructed something, this is an encapsulation. I think what we go back to with our experience is the chance

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: to make sure that that was that, the objective, was that the singular problem, the obstacle, that you fear? Or is there something else that is a challenge? Is there an opportunity that this presents elsewhere? So we like to go back to that very heart. And again, having that discourse to understand what is this in response to– so you present this to me as a solution, and I could give you

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: a solution to what you've asked, but that may not be what you require. And that's not a point of farming, that's not trying to make a project bigger– that's trying to get the right solution, because that's what we pride ourselves in. The work that we do sells the work that we hopefully do in the future. We want to make sure that we make

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: a difference for that client and for that objective. So if we can go back to and then pick what really is this in response to, what has been that trouble, what has been that need? And then we can work from there, and then help with the client to construct more of a holistic briefing, I suppose. So more context, perhaps, is needed.

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: Or perhaps, more vision of what is intended to be within it, as much as there is the state of play today. So we might work with them to create that. So it's the agreement at the end that you sign together. And it's important that you share that objective, that we both share that yes, this is the answer. We both signed to it, yes, let's work with that.

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DARREN BOWLES [continued]: And so it becomes that agreement that you have as a party, so it's very important. But it's important to make sure that it is accurate, and right, and fit for purpose. [INTERNAL BRANDING VS EXTERNAL CONSULTANCY]

DR. BEN VOYER: What would you say are the advantages and, perhaps, disadvantages of coming to work with Moving Brands and outsourcing the work to a creative agency?

DARREN BOWLES: I think there's been, certainly, more of an appetite over the last few years, I think, for in-house agencies to be made. And there's lots of very successful examples you can probably point at. So probably the likes of Apple, which would be one of the largest, most successful agencies, if you want, in the world, really, as an internal team.

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: And I think the successes that we've witnessed within that area are perhaps encouraging more brands to build their own internal teams. I think where there's an advantage at, of course, there's cost and efficiencies in this process, because everybody is under the same understanding. You work for the same business, there's perhaps not a knowledge gap, there's direct references because you're

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: all part of that same business. You can see how it works daily, you know the nuances inside, and therefore you can create with them. I think that's definitely an advantage and the efficiencies, perhaps, that comes with. I think the advantage of using an external agency is a fresh perspective, because there's also all those things that you just forget. It's like, well, it's this because– and you have a legacy, and people

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: have followed that legacy– we don't do that because, actually, it was a project five months ago. When you work with an external agency, you can challenge that. And you can say, well, that might have been the case, but have you thought of this? So I think that clear distance is an advantage, because you have more context. And I think, also, as agencies work with different clients

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: and have different experiences and different knowledge, they can give you an insight to a behavior that perhaps they've not considered. Because they have a fresh perspective, a fresh take, and can progress that for the client and bring them into new engagements. So that, I think, is an advantage. I think, also, the breadth of talent, as well, that an agency can represent. It's very difficult for an internal agency

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: to create the dynamic or the breadth of experience and the skills that perhaps an agency can bring to it. So you have a wealth of experience of an agency where people have worked in other areas, worked for other brands, worked for other teams, and that amalgamation of all of those different experiences become what our clients can combine.

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: When you working with an internal team, it's a bit more fixed. Of course, you can match that, and it's more of a challenge, I'm sure, to do that. But with an agency, that's what they and we pride ourselves on. And I suppose that constant challenge and constant delivery gives us a fresh and more challenging approach as well. [INDUSTRY TRENDS AND FUTURE DEVELOPMENTS]

DR. BEN VOYER: Where do you see your industry going?

DARREN BOWLES: I think there has been, certainly, more of a trend towards the integration of agency and client. So working far closer together, so that the relationships between the two– although, there needs to be a very definitive line between who is delivering– so who is responsible for the creation and delivery of something. I think the journey and the solving,

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: I think, of our work around that time, I think that collaboration is really important. We were noticing more of a behavior around sprint. So the kind of behavior that

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you've probably seen within software and technology developments where you try something in a very short amount of time. Does it work? Yeah, that works, let's build in it. What can we do now? Let's test it. It failed, OK, let's start again. So the kind of cyclical type of approach.

DARREN BOWLES [continued]: I think in design, perhaps, in the past we&

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