How to pick up your brand name special for marketer of CPG: boost your brand and sales

How to boost your brand: Practical advice for marketers of CPG

                                               

What is a Brand? 

Each provider of goods and services has to establish, create and maintain your brand, or suffer the consequences. A brand is more than a name. Is the halo around a product or service that makes all the difference for consumers running to and fro in a world full of options. Branding provides a competitive advantage in the market. It is the secret of the recipe for success. 

This guide is written primarily for sellers of consumer packaged goods, which we define as food, drinks, health and beauty, and general merchandise. In other words, the Fast Moving Consumer Goods sold in a typical supermarket - and often in the drug, convenience, discount, club, supercenter, limited assortment, and the dollar of the channels.   

However, there is something for everyone in the pages that follow. The fundamental lessons of the mark applied to dealers, brokers, consultants, service organizations of merchandising, sampling, and demonstration, enterprises and service providers of products and services. All have an interest in the CPG industry. What is more important, they are all in this together with each of which contributes to an important component of how it works the industry. When it works well, everybody wins. When it does not work well, someone loses.     

The advice offered goes far beyond the fundamental lessons of Marketing 101. These tips and knowledge related to the creation of brands through retailers. Some refer to the infrastructure of the CPG industry and what makes sense in the day-to-day business as usual.

Some of the leading thinkers and merchants of knowledge in the industry contributed to this guide. Many have survived the CPG wars over the years, so what they say is based on solid experience. They are giving a sample of its free tips here because you have enrolled in an online community where. 

Thus, in no particular order, here is a variety of practical tips and nuggets of information that will increase your brand: 

Be faithful to your brand at every point of contact

CPG every good seller knows that a successful brand must be delivered to a coherent set of messages and values over time. For example, Johnson's Baby Shampoo has defended the same thing to generations of breasts.

What makes brands such as J&J so successful? 

"The research tells us economic value is greater when we give consumers an experience of value at every point of contact. That's called brand alignment, and covers everything that a consumer sees, hears and experiences about your brand before, during and after the purchase," says Marsha Lindsay, president of Lindsay Stone and Briggs, a brand consulting company in Madison,

Many of the points of contact have slipped out of the control of advertisers of today, according to Lindsay. She wonders if the alignment still works in a world where brands can be praised or destroyed by the masses in the blogs, podcasts, and private Web sites. The only hope for advertisers in a world out of control is to Excel in the alignment of what you can control.

Lindsay offers these suggestions: 

Fulfill the promise of your brand your brand is a promise to their consumers a specific experience of quality and value that is highly relevant to their lives and different from the competition. If you are not fulfilling that promise in each point be outed by consumers unhappy.

Your brand promise of emotional basis or social benefits, not functional benefits or product features an emotional advantage is better able to withstand the occasional complaint or error. Emotional benefits are also more difficult for competitors to copy, more motivating for consumers and easier to extend with new opportunities for products and platforms.

Personalize your brand promise to make it relevant to their employees and channel partners to find ways to do it in their own interest, in order to promote your brand. Create brand experiences for employees, channel partners and consumers to get them inspired. 

Make your brand promise action oriented to teach employees and channel partners, such as putting your brand promise in their everyday behavior.

Inspire your team of new product development to meet the brand promise in each new concept to give them the tools and experience to understand what consumers' demands for the brand. Use your creative skills to the concept, not only products but consumer experiences advance the brand promise.

Develop a business model focused on the promise and the business plan leaves its mark to drive your strategic business planning. Assign resources to strengthen the brand. Manage and incent people to live the brand promise.

Integrate marketing and human resources brand an alignment is a behavioral approach for the management of the brand. HR can help you create a culture and a system of measurement of behavior that helps you comply with your brand promise.

In sum: Harness the power of your entire organization to fulfill its promise of a brand at every point of contact.

Retain your best customers

The majority of CPG marketing budgets allocate costs between three "cubes": Trade Marketing, Advertising (TV and press), and promotion targeted at the consumer. But Glenn Hausfater, a loyalty marketing consultant, CPG encourages marketers to create an alternative budget using only two categories: acquisition and retention. The acquisition is spending directly intended to win the judgment of your brand by consumers who have never tried before. Retention is directly aimed at curbing the inevitable loss of current buyers.

"The simple act of recasting of a budget can be a real eye-opener," said Hausfater, managing director of loyalty marketing partners (www.PartnersILM.com). "For most brands, shows that more than 85% of the costs of their marketing focus on the acquisition".

The analysis focused on the dollars of expenditure against large buyers vs. media and lights also reveals valuable lessons. For the majority of the marks, Heavies (i.e., the top of the 25% of shoppers) control 60-75% of the sales. In contrast, 50% of buyers generally represent between 6% and 12% of sales. Many of these lights are buyers at once. Most brands spend only a tiny fraction of the total of its budget in the strong retention of the buyer; the vast majority of retention is spending for trying to "sell" Means and lights, normally a very inefficient in the use of the limited funds for marketing.

"For the majority of the marks, half of the franchise (i.e. Lights) is mine during most of the year," says Hausfater. "It makes us feel good to count them in the franchise, but the reality is that they are a distraction from the company to satisfy the needs of consumers to tell. The expenditure against the retention or sale of lights (and even the media) is usually very inefficient. When it works, that have essentially 'rented share point' and in many cases brand equity eroded by excessive traffic. However, almost all brands we have looked at is to pursue new buyers and to accommodate the short heavies who truly are the core of its business".

According to Hausfater, 10-20% of large buyers of a mark on a year-on-year basis leave the excess value completely. Another 15-30% "reduce" their buy-rate. Therefore, instead of having a "blockade" of his heavy buyers, most brands have a major problem of retention. 

"The reason why the short marks allow the expenditure against the heavy retaining the buyer", says, "it is because they mistakenly believe their buyers -- especially Heavies - are much more faithful than they really are. The truth is that these days in a hand-to-hand battle to retain 25% of the buyers that drive your business".

Retention Marketing is not easy. The inclination of the majority of the budgets for expenses related to the acquisition means that brand managers are mainly taught skills of acquisition. The majority of "relationship marketing" programs fail because they try to build a closer relationship with the Heavies using the same messages, offers and creative that the mark used to acquire completely new consumers.

Hausfater recommends the use of some simple and effective strategies to create relationships. Is a key to understanding Heavies understand its benefits, point of difference and effectiveness. You have equity with them, therefore, talking with them in "mode of acquisition" is condescending and a waste of time. Instead, the communication focuses on the effective relationship allowing heavy buyers to discover information that validates their pre-existing beliefs about the efficacy and the good qualities of the brand.

"When you look at the budgets of brand marketing through the lens of the acquisition and retention, what you see is that most of the expenditure for the brand is focused on the activities with lower performance and segments of consumers," he says. Winner of brands on the market today only grows heavier retaining the buyer coherent and an important part of your marketing mix, and increasing their knowledge to create a true relationship-Creation of communications".

 

Develop a strategy for Retail Management Consumer-Driven

Retail brands cannot succeed without the collaboration between trading partners. Such work must go beyond a buyer-seller relationship. For best results, the CPG manufacturer must implement a marketing strategy that allows the retailer to understand how the consumer shops the category and how purchasing decisions.

Brand consultant Paul Thompson recommends that this work is preceded by an analysis of where the brand fits into the mentality of the market. The determination of an understanding of the behavior of competition in the frame of reference means the following:

• Who is your target audience and how they behave?
• What are the role and the basic purpose of the product in the consumer's life?
• What other products compete to occupy that role and purpose?
• What are the key factors of purchase and use of the product?
• What products are substitutable?
• Where are your best opportunities?
• What products are your biggest threats?

The advertisers tend to think in terms of proximity in the competition when in reality the framework of competitiveness is much larger than the category immediately. "If I'm selling cereals, I am really competitive with waffles and things that I don't think, but part of the frame of reference of what people have to meet their needs in that occasion of use?" asks Thompson, a partner in the Dallas office of Henry Rak Consulting Partners, Libertyville, Illinois (www.hrcpinsights.com).

Thus, the formula starts with a frame of reference. This is where to compete and how to compete. That leads to the positioning of the brand. Start with the final consumer in mind and understand how to use the product and what is important in terms of how to make purchasing decisions.

"Another market strategies usually begin with the retailer in mind," he explains. "We believe that the customer is important, too, but we can provide ideas on the consumer to help the customer to sell better because they understand how the role of trade or the role of consumer promotions fits perfectly in the positioning of the brand. It is driven from the manner in which the consumer uses the product".

What follows is to decide on the best way to market the product. What is the optimal marketing mix? What is the return on investment for all marketing elements if it is a trade, consumer promotion or advertising? How can you optimize and understand what the cost level is for you to be able to take advantage of the brand and its equity with the consumer?

"Once you set, you will need to determine which is the role of trade," says Thompson. "It is driving the consciousness? Is to create a test between new consumers, perhaps because it is a new product? Is the widespread availability of impulse buying? 

"If they are impulse products like candy and chips, it is really about the availability; depth of discount cannot be a driver and only denigrates the profitability," he continues. "It is to be there when you're buying and getting the urge to buy. If it is a brand of cereal or food for cats, there is a lot of happening because the category switching is driven by the variety; that is to say, consumers are looking for variety and are less loyal. Thus, the role of the trade becomes get their fair share of variety switching between consumers with their brands. It is ensuring that the promotion of trade is the fulfillment of their diverse needs how to think about the category of cereals."

Thompson lists other trade promotion issues to deal with: 

• What is the proper frequency of promotion?
• What is the correct depth of discount?
• What are the proper tactics -- if it is display or function?
• What is the best way to promote the product?
• What is the price that will generate the appropriate amount of takeaway without overspending? 

The objective may be to maximize the trade in dollars and optimum performance to meet objectives of the brand - either to the unit displays for compulsive shopping, or characteristics of the unit to obtain the variety in the basket. Take the market structure and create a vision of education driven by part number for the retailer, according to Thompson. Is to help the retailer think of rack to facilitate the flow of Shopability, driven by the manner in which the consumer defines the category and how is purchased.

 "It is really about placement, assortment, pricing, and then you can add the promotional aspects of that as well as in the role of trade," Thompson summarized. "We really are taking advantage of all the different types of information throughout the organization to create a retail consumer driven by management strategy. But to make these changes, it has to be beneficial to the retailer or will not buy into it. These ideas must conduct themselves in a manner that is consistent with the philosophy of the merchandising of traders and how they relate to its base of buyers."

At the right end, the retail strategy for the manufacturer to implement is driven by the consumer.

Help the merchant of the brand shop

"When customers enter the portals of the shop, they have to be transported in something that understands and connect with," says Ron Lunde, a consulting firm headquartered in Jacksonville, Florida, "what happens to be the work of the merchant. You have to shoot down to the wishes and needs of the customer and find out some sense of theater in a way that makes a connection with the subconscious of the customer".

Lunde supermarket and other analysts coincide in pointing out that the retail trade is difficult today because there is so much competition. To succeed in a market, a warehouse stored should be distinguished as a "mark" that is understood and embraced by the buyers. It must stand for something. For example, the brand is synonymous with Wal-Mart at low prices.

A Brand effectively can mean a lot of other things: presentation of high and an assortment of organic products and gourmet cuisine, offering exceptional customer service or creating a sense of theater with the marketing in the store.

CPG marketers can share at the time helping the retailer store brand. In doing so, they help their brands that are involved in the various promotions in shops gain recognition and a lift in sales.

A well-orchestrated ensemble of promotional tactics you can do many things:
Create emotion - Kitchen events, sampling and demos, and In-store audio and video create a dynamic atmosphere.
Maintain store loyalty - most buyers enjoy a lively shop full of attractive POP screens, decals for the floor, and on shelves couponing, as opposed to a boring store with a clean floor policy.
Attract new buyers, consumers tend to buy from stores that offer interesting promotions when they have a choice of where to buy groceries.

Get ready for the new coupons

The coupons are still the most popular consumer promotion for CPG brands. Despite some concerns about low rates of redemption through the years, promotion managers continue to rely on this valuable tactic to encourage the purchase. 

The good news is that coupons will be a better promotion in the future. We are working on the redesign of coupons to make them more effective and to
Reducing fraud and misredemption. The big change will be a new barcode called Reduced Space Symbology (RSS) that will contain more information for the best promotions. 

"The real lines and bars on coupons have been around for decades and
Have some problems", explains Larry Fox, vice president of locating data, a coupon facilitator who helps companies of CPG design, plan, and execute the promotions of consumption (www.pinpoint-data.com). "The barcode is quite large and the manufacturers complain that does not occupy too much space. It is not a smart technology". 

The change of barcode is a small part of the greater measure for global data synchronization of all products and promotion information. Dawn 2005, the industry initiative which began on 1 January 2005, had the Uniform Code Council (UCC) that urges all manufacturers and retailers in North America that scan the UPC symbol of traditional 12-digit will be able to analyze the 13-digit EAN Symbol already used outside of the United States and Canada. With the change, retailers will be able to explore the imported products without the packages also taking the traditional UPC codes.

In the meantime, GS1 US (the new name for the Uniform Code Council) has begun issuing manufacturer identifiers (minutes) which are up to 11 digits. Barcode coupon of today can only handle a min of 6 digits, which is one of the reasons why you need a new barcode. To accurately determine the process of an exchange coupon, retailers and distribution centers depend on the uniqueness of the minimum number. 

Today, CPG marketers may not place many promotional options on a coupon because of the limitations of the barcode. That will change with RSS.

After scanning the new symbol with precision, the POS software in the box would then decode it; that is to say, get the details in the interior to validate the coupon offer requirements. These details can include multiple manufacturers and make multiple purchases, performing "free up to a maximum value" offers, order total discount calculations, greater control of date to control sooner or later redemption, accepting coupons only in a particular retailer, and others.

Another important advantage of RSS will be a greater capacity to combat fraud, which has affected the industry for years. Today everything in the coupon barcodes printed in legible numbers below it. So it is relatively easy for counterfeiters to read these numbers, find out the details of the offer, and then produce counterfeit versions.

With RSS, the bar code data is much more complex and will not be printed in legible form. Therefore, coupons will be more difficult to counterfeit and reproduce.

 "The new coupon should result in an improvement in the accuracy of the reading at the time of payment and reduce fraud and misredemption, as well as offering complete follow-up and promotions more efficient," says Fox to locate the data. "The new bar code symbol pills also extends the illustration available space in coupons to encourage the creativity of design".

Taking only the code Coupons RSS is not issued for several years. But Fox said that there are several steps between now and then, that need to be taken to help manufacturers to make the transition with ease. It is important to have a gradual change in the coupon barcodes to avoid interruptions in daily transactions. 

Fox recommends that manufacturers of CPG be part of the process. Specifically:

• Make sure that the marketing department is aware of the change and its consequences.
• Get involved with coupons to redesign by joining the RSS task force of the Association of Professionals (www.couponpros.com). coupon
• Experiment with the enlarged space of illustration in the coupon to increase brand awareness.
• Submit ideas, questions, and concerns to the task forces created by the ACP Group and the promotion of other trade associations in the industry.
• Get started today. 

Remember that the Family Code in coupons 

It is the perfect setting. A marketer of CPG distributes a coupon nationally to support a new hot product whose brand is sure to become a household name.
The cents in the value of the coupon is seductive. The expiration date is far, far away. The expectation for the mother of all promotions is mounting. And then.

The coupon cannot analyze and validate at the time of purchase. Why? The family code is wrong.   

The Family Code is the Achilles heel of promotional coupons. When the family code is correct, the mark gets an increase in visibility and the incentive in the short term of the promotion. But when it is bad, everyone loses, the marketer, merchant, and consumer. 

The Family Code is a three digit number on the coupon that identifies the product or family of products that offer may be used. CPG manufacturers assign the family code to identify elements that can issue coupons for actually being analyzed in the box when acquired by the buyer.

The good things occur when the family code is correct. The coupon analyzes and valid at the time of purchase. The buyer slides through the checkout lane. The trader is happy with the coupon and do not hesitate to accept another from the same manufacturer. This occurs nearly 90 percent of the time.   

But then there are other times. There is trouble in paradise when the family code is inaccurate. First, the cashier receives an error code when trying to analyze and validate the coupon. This slows down the checkout lane, compounding the buyers seeking a quick exit. When this happens very often, the retailer is aggravated and blame the manufacturer of CPG. Both share the guilt in the eyes of the consumer who bother to the box while grabbing a new hot product and a coupon for cents. 

Then evil action begins.

Some retailers well to their trading partners. The amount of the fine varies depending on the retailer, but violations can be as much as $2,500 per coupon. Fines to test the strength of the relationship between the trade association.

"Many times the manufacturer is not aware that there is a problem," says Jane Michels, president of J. Michels Consulting in Bloomington, Indiana (www.familycodes.com). The marketing department can be in charge of the family codes, but the fine goes to the finance department. The marketing people you never know nothing".

Therefore, the lack of internal communication is often the culprit. When the fines home, CPG marketers suddenly begins to pay attention to the family. 

What is the best way to create family codes of coupons or fix inaccurate family codes? Michels recommends the following:

Make sure that someone is in charge of the family codes at all times sometimes no one is the cause of billing. The person who was in charge of the left and there is a vacancy for a time.
Make sure that everyone knows who is responsible for the family codes that this person is in marketing in some companies, while in finance in others, and even in the graphic arts in other companies. 
We have the right person to assume responsibility for the family codes, because there are many other things to do, the right person is key. The person must know about the codes of family and pass this information on to the next person in charge.

One flight coupon can give a new product or energize a discoloration of the brand. But neither will happen without the right family code.

Choosing the right horses

The easy way to increase your brand is to associate it with fantastic promotions. What captures the attention of the buyers of supermarkets and the interest of the CPG marketers
And retailers? That varies with time, but today a promotion stands out: the fuel.   

Yes, the fuel! The price of gasoline has become a matter of irritating to consumers all over the country. The newspapers and the gatherings are filled with stories about the increase of prices, labraban by oil companies, and the problems facing drivers with a limited budget.

The fuel is a sensitive product at a price that is consuming more and more the family budget. The problem has reached a point where it is impacting on the life styles. Consumers are cutting back on trips to the grocery store. Some are even telephone for take-off delivered to their doors. Such behavior is detrimental to the food retailer and manufacturer.

Enter the promotion of fuel. How does it work? Products in the store that are found in the program are clearly marked with shelves. Customers who buy these products receive discounts at the pump. Accompanying the brand loyalty is obvious and can withstand even after the decrease in gas prices. 

Retailers which offer a program of fuel have benefited. The supermarkets with a fuel in the facilities of the island become a magnet for buyers. It gives them a common motif of grocery stores and not from its competitors that does not offer a promotion of fuel. CPG marketers also benefit.

"With a promotion of fuel, the CPG companies will see increased the movement of products. It is a great way to move boxes of product," reports Scott Wetzel, vice president of marketing and development partners in Excentus Corp., one based in Irving, Texas, a company that supplies fuel site marketing programs, technology and services integration (www.excentus.com).

"Many of our retailers are implementing programs in the Midwest of the United States," he says. "You can literally see the holes on the shelves of the store. The section is fully equipped, except for products that were linked to the promotion of fuel. Often there is no product to the left, only an empty space with a fuel label on the shelf. That is all from the freezer to the section of dry goods. Obviously, the impacts of fuel movement".

                                                                 

Learn more about logistics

What is the number one brand of CPG in the world? Coca-Cola. How Coca-Cola to become a leading global brand? Supply chain management.

There are not many marketing executives have experience in distribution and logistics. The management functions in enterprises of CPG are usually occupied by lawyers, accountants and sales executives. The companies are not structured to be effective, and evil is use benchmarks to measure performance.

As a result, there is a general lack of knowledge about the logistics of the CPG and the critical role it plays in the momentum of a brand. 

"Logistics does not happen by chance," says Richard Kochersperger, a professor at the St. Joseph's University in Philadelphia, which defines logistics as the "movement of materials, services, information and dollars round trip through every aspect of the supply chain".

The most important are the attributes of marketing product, price, place and promotion. The new approach today is that, who, where, when and why? Kochersperger lists the "Seven Rights of logistics": the right product, at the right place, at the right price, in the correct amount, on the rule of law, at the right time, for the right consumer.

The recommends that companies CPG, do the following: 

• They have all the key executive having from two to four years working in logistics.
• Have one person responsible for all marketing activities and logistics.
• Put the best managers in logistics.
• Synchronize the process and benchmark (scorecard)
• Reward the desired performance.