SA Blook, Chapter 8: Building brand South Africa

To be successful a brand requires strong leadership, well-defined values and benefits and a credible communication strategy. Brand evangelists exist and the most well loved brands have become beacons of hope for many. Brand South Africa may not have all of the above but it has the key ingredients for success and an opportunity to create a most believable communication strategy.

All brands experience extreme highs and lows during a typical lifecycle, at its worst the end result of an extreme low is usually a loss of customer confidence. Yet the most successful brands have demonstrated staying power and an ability to bounce back; they’ve regained customer confidence, rebuilt what was lost and in most cases have surpassed all previous expectations.

South Africa is a brand, a brand that has experienced severe highs and lows throughout its history. Over the past few weeks however our most treasured brand has plummeted to what many would agree is a very severe low. During this critical run up to 2010 the current low levels of customer confidence are forcing us to take a proactive look at the future. (In my opinion that is. Some may choose to leave, others to ignore…I choose to stay and have chosen to take part in the creation of the ‘SA Blook – a constructive look at our present, our future and the opportunities that we have.’ )

In considering the future and ‘Building Brand South Africa’ I feel it’s necessary to take a look at some basic marketing and branding principles to establish an objective, sensible viewpoint and to encourage a new way of assessing our situation. These concepts also underpin the fact that South Africa is indeed a brand – the fact that it may lack a certain tangibility only makes the quest for marketing success more challenging, add to that the fact that Brand South Africa’s customers can also be viewed as the brand custodians and it becomes slightly complex.

A brand’s customers (call them consumers or clients if you wish) are its foundation, they are the life-force. A brand is not a fancy corporate identity or cool logo, a brand is a collection of stories, emotions and experiences as shared by its customers. Customers create brands.

With this in mind we need to acknowledge that the relationship between brands and customers has changed. Most marketers would agree that a large part of this shift is attributable to the online developments we’ve experienced. Think about how e-mail allowed for easier, quicker, ‘safer’ customer service contact. Fast forward a few years and web developments have created social media channels with the ability to facilitate genuine 2-way conversations between brands and customers.

There can be no doubt that there is a need to re-think ‘old school’ traditional marketing principles. It’s likely that the basic 4 P’s of marketing; Product, Price, Place, Promotion will always be relevant, however developments in social media and online customer interaction have introduced new considerations to the way that brands and customers interact.

The following two aspects are also important for ongoing branding success; Personalisation (or customisation) – as a loyal and valued customer I want exactly what I like, when I like. Give me the option to get my hands on something unique. For example Amazon’s personal recommendation based on shopping habits was probably one of the first steps towards customer personalisation. Most major sports shoe manufacturers allow web customers to create their own shoes, Perfume Lab develops fragrances based on customers’ preferences, Musicovery plays music based on your moods and iGoogle allows you to customise your homepage.

Participation: I’ve said before that I believe that any modern branding strategy requires a transparent ‘non-clingy’ attitude. Maintain a sense of openness and acknowledge the fact that customers have access to information about your brand, with this in mind involve them in branding decisions – do not underestimate the power of the collective customer, welcome it and handle it as ‘managed disruption.’

If we relate the concept of personalisation to South Africa one could take the philosophical view that change and growth is only possible through visualisation and belief. Perhaps the personalisation each South African seeks is the right to believe in the South Africa they see in the future – this encourages a sense of belonging and participation. I, for example am positive and confident in Brand South Africa’s ability to bounce back. As a result I look forward and am committed to a brighter, successful future. I acknowledge the factors that have damaged our brand equity but I choose to spend my energy on the brighter future that I want to be part of.

In a more obvious way the principle of participation is evident in relation to brand South Africa now more than ever. Online developments allow everyone to be a publisher and user-generated content is driving and shaping the World Wide Web now more than ever. Social media is driven by a collective intelligence or the ‘wisdom of crowds’. Wikipedia, Facebook and YouTube are a few of the most successful websites; they are driven by the people for the people.

Brand South Africa is currently experiencing a crisis. Customer confidence is at an all time low, investors are pulling out, tourism is suffering, residents are leaving and there’s a pervasive sense of anger and uncertainty. Amid this despair however there is a growing sense of pride, optimism and a determined will to succeed. In particular the current xenophobia crisis has driven the online community to group together in an attempt to restore a sense of normality and dignity. The power of the ‘collective customer’ is evident and their energy is being channelled through specific online vehicles. This basic principle of social media marketing gives people a place to voice their opinions and show their support.

Internet marketing company Quirk created the United for Africa portal that uses Google Earth and Google Maps to monitor the wave of xenophobic violence that has swept the country, incidents are reported and mapped in real time on the site, a Facebook page also supports the portal.

In another effort to provide real time information local blog aggregator Afrigator created a South African xenophobia crisis page that aggregates everything that is being said about the crisis in South Africa. Pages are split up into Blog posts, news coverage, podcasts and Videos uploaded to YouTube. These initiatives give South Africans (the customer) a place to share their opinion and collectively exchange ideas and ways of combating the atrocities and negativity that threaten to destroy the future of the South African brand.

What would a typical brand custodian or guardian do in times of trouble? Any successful brand manager believes in their product or service, at times this may be tested but there is a sense of determination and realistic optimism that prevails. When crisis hits, many business and marketing leaders will go back to the basics and construct a plan of action.

Brand South Africa

There will always be questions about our brand’s leadership but as loyal ‘customers’ and part ‘custodians’ we have an individual responsibility to commit to the success of brand South Africa.

The primary objective is to rebuild the loss of confidence amongst various stakeholder groups; success here will renew the collective faith and energy to achieve future targets (2010, Gautrain etc.)

Go back to the basics; consider a basic Strengths Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats (SWOT) analysis – If I consider the natural beauty of our country, our collective strength of character, the determination of our people, our history, our brilliant business acumen, our diversity, our wildlife, our talent, our climate vs. the well publicised evils and threats, my grid still looks fairly achievable. In dark times it’s easier to forget the positives and the reasons you choose to ‘support’ a certain brand in the first place.

Harness the collective energy of positive South Africans – use the brand evangelists to speak the message and spread the word. The same principles apply; no one is really convinced or even interested in what the ‘marketing manager’ has to say, they want to hear the brand values and benefits from someone ‘just like me’, the most trusted spokesperson.

Acknowledge that the bad / challenges / weaknesses exist but make a concerted collective effort to fight them. For years the most famous brands have battled against economic, distribution, sales and production factors, in the same way Brand South Africa is facing some severe issues, the difference is that these challenges are fuelled by extreme emotions.

My belief is that ultimate success for Brand South Africa is possible through the harnessing of collective positive energy. It’s not a rose-tinted, blinkered approach but a realistic optimism; acknowledge that negative forces that have destroyed a large percentage of our brand equity but choose to focus on the future and the opportunities that exist.

If you have chosen to reside here then you should act as a responsible customer and custodian of Brand South Africa, we all have some level of duty or commitment to the brand’s future. Allow me the opportunity to be openly positive and give me a forum in which to do that. It starts on an individual level – share good news stories, choose to interact with positive, optimistic people, fill your head with uplifting information.

Believe in the brand. Perhaps we should take a lesson from the marketing textbooks that document the rebirth of some of the world’s best-known brands. At such an emotionally charged time it may be necessary to introduce a degree of objectivity in order to instil a collective sense of purpose and determination for a more secure, successful future. From a textbook marketing point of view our brand is down but by no means out. Go back to the basics, assess the factors, adjust the strategy and pick the right vehicles to spread and celebrate the successes.

This post is a chapter of the SA Blook: A Piece of Significance, an online book written by a diverse group of writers with strong views of our country and the reality we find ourselves living in. The other chapters in the Blook are here:

Introduction</a >
1 . The new South Africa – is it real?
2 . Is SA rich or poor?
3 . What the world thinks of South Africa and what our global opportunities are
4 . The importance of each individual’s contribution collectively
5 . SA Inc and the business of doing business in SA
6 . The beauty and grandeur that surrounds us
7 . The importance of technology in SA’s global emergence
8 . Building brand South Africa
9 . Making the most of SA’s creative talents and abilities
10 . Innovate for a better South Africa
11 . The role of the younger generation in SA, and what we need to do to support them
12 . Connecting South Africa – Communities that transcend technology
13 . We are African – the role of collaboration in South Africa’s growth

Copyright Melissa Attree 2008. Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Non-commercial No-derivatives 2.5 ZA license.