World can learn from top SA ads

We tend to overlook local examples when doing case studies for clients, and instead use the oh-too-familiar global icons such as Apple and Coco-Cola. These examples of best practice are of course great and have rightly earned their titles as the most successful brands in the world, but if you’re looking to position your own brand within the South African market, surely it is best to look at some local winners?

Within this country we have a melting pot of cultures, languages, living standards and consumer needs and wants. So surely if brands can make it here, they can make it anywhere?

Themes common amongst SA’s top brands are:

Be challenging:  Capitec has grown dramatically in the last decade as a result of their courage to turn banking on its head. By targeting a market that has previously not been correctly catered for, they were able to take advantage of the gap by using accessibility techniques such as retail outlets to satisfy consumers more easily. Their marketing, of including the bank in the story line of Generations, is well aligned and been successful so far.

Be bold: There’s nothing better than a brand with a little guts, willing to challenge the norm and be disruptive in everyday activities. Nando’s is the best example of this. Their boldness and courage has turned them into an icon, with consumers constantly forwarding their adverts relating to a current affairs topic. Their cheeky nature and political commentary have them making conversations throughout the world.

Be relevant: Relevance is differentiating brand around the world as consumers are well trained in filtering out information that doesn’t pertain to their individual needs. Checkers is a good example of using unfavourable economic conditions and turning this into positive opportunities for their brand whereby consumers don’t change their lifestyle but rather their supermarket. This understanding of the consumer’s mindset at this particular time has the business succeeding in numerous markets.

Be local: Embracing one’s roots and staying true to what you stand for rather than acting like something you’re not is a characteristic of great brands. Klipdrift has carefully used a tapping into of the local market to do this, while not over using sensitive stereotypes. Everyday characters makes the brand endearing, while few are able to order the drink without thinking ‘met eish ja, met eish’.

Hopefully in future we can learn more from these local successes, and prove that local really is lekker.

Bianca de Beer, OIL JHB intern

3 months over already!

I guess it’s true when they say time flies when you’re having fun, in this case I can’t believe that it’s been 3 months already since I have been an intern at OIL. As this is my last day, I’ll take this opportunity to share my experience at the agency.
When I first came in, I remember thinking this is where I want to be and what I want to do, even though I did not know the in-depth details of what I was to do. Having studied Marketing communication from the University of Johannesburg, I thought with theory I could tackle anything thrown my way. Oh boy, was I wrong, theory is good and all but the practical part of any field of study is almost never what you expect it to be.
On my first day, I had exactly two seconds to breathe before plunging into work handed to me, which involved intense research and insight mining. Having had interned at another agency before, what I appreciate most about OIL is the liberty and responsibility given to interns to actually work on their own. Nothing feels more rewarding than working on a brief or a campaign and actually seeing where your hard work is going. And best of all you get acknowledge for the work you put in, and that is what kept me motivated to actually push myself to do better.
I have learned so much from Kath, who taught me how to write meaningfully, Mike who taught me how to think meaningfully and Sylvia, who taught me to always look for the “So what”.
So all in all… OIL Joburg rocks!

“Creative without strategy is called ‘art.’ Creative with strategy is called ‘advertising.)”

Jef I. Richards

Thobeka Sibiya, OIL JHB intern

A museum of brands proposed for Johannesburg

Brands and Branding in South Africa publisher, Ken Preston, recently proposed the development of a not-for-profit ‘brand museum’ in Johannesburg.  Much like the one in Notting Hill, London, the objective would be to conserve branding history for future generations of marketers and consumers, while also becoming a tourist attraction for the general public.

 Preston believes that brands are the most powerful business idea in the commercial world, and need to be recognized for their influence on consumer behavior. He feels that brands are a “part of the social history of the times, reflecting the fashion, art, literature, technology, health, sport and social norms of the day.” I can’t agree more – the nature of brand communication has changed significantly to become more engaging and interactive.  Some brands do it better than others, but consumers are increasingly becoming aware of the role that brands and marketing can play in their lives.

Preston also believes that every one of us are “subconsciously curators every day of our lives”, and as a result wants to open the floor to the industry and public to decide who should make the branding hall of fame. “By inviting people to become curators of the Brand Museum we are saying that this is their space to have an opinion, take a stand and leave with an experience.” Hopefully making the museum a creative and collaborative project will draw enough interest to validate it’s inception, amongst both industry and consumers alike.

With branding in South Africa dating back 300 years and iconic brands such as Nederberg, Mrs Ball’s, Old Mutual, Standard Bank and Pick ‘n Pay standing the test of time, there will be no shortage of those deserving of recognition. Apparently, locating the museum in Rosebank, Johannesburg, will ensure it’s accessibility, and already the project has received significant sponsorship.  Coming from within the industry and admitting of my bias, I do think this initiative is a great idea with potential.   Time will tell, however, whether consumers think the same and whether South African brands have the power to attract crowds as big as 80 000 per year, as seen at Notting Hill! 

Bianca De Beer

Intern, OIL JHB

Spekko ups their game

I recently visited the Good Food and Wine Show in Joburg, and I realized there that a brand can spend enormous amount of money on communication to, admittedly, obtain a high SOV (share of voice), but the impact of the message remains extraneous to the public. The Tastic stand at the show had minimal participation from the audience and the communication was more passive rather than interactive.  The Spekko stand, on the other hand, was booming with people were invited to participate and interact with a famous chef on their cooking show. What was interesting was that the Tastic stand was rather stayed and staged while the Spekko stand which is the challenger brand to category leader Tastic, was more interactive and fun.

Spekko, up until recently has been quiet, and more of a price fighting lower LSM brand. They may have had a positioning, but consumers might not have been aware of it. It seems that they have now identified this affordable quality positioning as something they can own, and doing it with vengeance.  Spekko showcased at the Good Food and Wine show, a relatively premium event, and in my opinion owned it better than the category leader.  Their stand had more of an impact on me, and I definitely took note of their new ‘world’ range which seems to be a focus.  Spekko is upping it’s game both in communication and product offering, and positioning itself up against Tastic while maintaining their value proposition.

It will be interesting to see how far Spekko takes it, and how consumers react to this.  Does Tastic have an unbreakable brand equity, a guaranteed habitual purchase?  Or can Spekko eat (excuse the pun) away at this?

Thobeka Sibiya, OIL Intern

Human touch and the art of branding

Consumers are bombarded with thousands of messages daily, yet it still seems as if many marketers neglect a basic common denominator in every human being irrespective of any colour, age, nationality and gender: the human touch.

One brand that does seem to understand this, however, is SAB’s Castle Lite. This brand has proved its worth by tapping into something which many consumers want: a cold beer. Castle Lite marketers knew that competing on packaging or taste alone against the likes of Heineken, Windhoek or Amstel, would be optimistic. Instead, they opted for the human sensory elements of see, touch and taste to validate their positioning of coldness in the marketplace. After all, most consumers always respond to their thirst for beer as a “need for a cold one”, an insight that Castle Lite understood and explored by introducing a thermo chromatic icon onto its packaging.  It is in the shape of a nifty little snow castle, which is synonymous with the Castle brand, that turns blue when the beer is at the perfect drinking temperature letting the consumer know that the beer is ready to be enjoyed. It’s a gimmick, yes, but gimmicks are fun… and clearly they work! Today the brand is achieving exemplary results with an annual growth of over 25%, making it the largest growing premium brand in South Africa. In the words of Mr Norman Adami, MD of SAB, he articulated that, “we will not sacrifice volumes for brand equity. We don’t just make a brand more available, stack it high and discount it. We are not chasing volume or going head to head with Heineken, we are playing to our strengths, not theirs”.

The era of pushing brands to consumers has long passed its sell by date. The question marketers should be asking is, “What is in it for the consumer?”, because consumers are certainly not asking “What does this piece of communication tell me about the brand?”

In the words of Leo Burnett, “The greatest thing to be achieved in advertising, in my opinion, is believability. Nothing is more believable than the product itself”. This is a profound truth that, in my opinion, Castle Lite has incorporated through understanding the human touch.

Thabiso Ramolefe, OIL intern

Black(Sem)Berry Woes

This week saw millions of Blackberry users across Europe, the Middle East, Africa, Brazil and India go into virtual “darkness” when Blackberry’s messaging and browsing services experienced an outage from Monday to late Wednesday for some.  Blackberry, the very brand that pioneered 24/7 mobile connectedness  – had not only left users without access to email, messenger and social networks but virtually in the dark with regards to the cause of the problem, current efforts to address the issue and expected resolution.

Obviously a system failure on such a worldwide scale would result in considerable embarrassment for Research In Motion (Blackberry’s parent company) but serious damage has been done to the Blackberry brand and it will take a very concerted effort by RIM to gain back credibility.

Other brands are loving the opportunity to create tactical ads at Blackberry’s expense.  Take Medal Paints, for example, which released a radio ad today comparing one conversation to another, with the one that fails being in ‘Berry Black’.  It talks directly to the Medal pay-off-line “The right colour matters”, they spotted the opportunity, and jumped at it!

 Blackberry’s critical error was the delay in the issuing of communication (as of Thursday morning RIM’s South African office still had not granted any interviews or official comment). The silence was stark and seemed to spark panic (any Blackberry or RIM search on Twitter will reveal the levels of exasperation felt by hundreds) and has literally left users re-evaluating its reliability. The outage could not have come at a worse time – Blackberry is facing mounting pressure in North America where Android and iPhone are taking direct share (incidentally this week sees the launch of Apple’s iPhone S4). Locally Blackberry leads the smartphone market however it is likely that more Blackberry users will be open to competitors when the time comes for a contract upgrade – the likes of HTC, Apple and Samsung will no doubt take advantage of Blackberry’s compromised integrity.
This episode need not be a death blow, particularly in RIM’s emerging markets, but Blackberry would do well to go back to basics – firstly apologise and give current and potential consumers a real reason to believe in the product again. 

Zaki Mtshali, OIL Intern

September Mystery Speaker

This month’s mystery speaker was Survivor Maldives contestant, Simon Coetzer, who provided some interesting insights behind his strategy in playing the game.

It seems a cliché that every reality TV show contestant has a strategy or a game plan.  But in listening to Simon, the value of having a clear approach to a very tactical and ever-changing game was very evident – similar to the way we build brands in a highly competitive environment.
From the audition and screening phase (where he actively sought to stand out from the rest, even if it meant not taking the usually assumed “leadership role”) to production, where after merger he lobbied to keep the strongest contestants longer while voting off weaker contestants first, Simon had a clear plan of attack. Despite him being voted off after 17 days, one could argue that his strategy didn’t work, but Simon did play a game authentic to himself and his principals, and by his own account it was a very rewarding experience.  Isn’t that the value in the strategy that we know, keeping brands aligned to their essence, yet allowing them to adapt in a relevant way in a dynamic market?

Zaki Mtshali, OIL intern

FNB is the leader of the pack

There has been much buzz about the recent FNB tactical campaign on the back of the Darren Whackhead Simpson Prank Call on 94.7 a few weeks ago. Whilst there is much that can be said about the really smart and responsive thinking from the brand and agency along with a real life “unmarketified spin” proof of proposition, there is a much more significant message being sent out there right now: FNB is the innovation monster of our time and leading a traditionally archaic industry to the point of leaving the competitors eating dust!

The proof is in the pudding.

If you have heard the latest radio campaign from FNB, you will realize that they are not holding back.  Well they are at least going as far as the stringent ASA will allow them in taunting their competition. It is a strong product led campaign that launches a strong offensive attack with an arsenal of features and benefits. If you know South African bank advertising, you will know that it’s an industry in love with itself and with being warm and fuzzy. The truth is that in this day and age consumers don’t want to fall in love with their banks; they want their banks to work. Do what you say and deliver when I need you too. Then every once in a while hit me with a warm and fuzzy to make me feel good. FNB is truly showing off and in a very smart way. Nothing says to a customer “maybe I should consider” like giving something to consider, or in the case of FNB, some things.

A brand that is not slowing down

FNB recently launched their banking application on mobile. Now I won’t even get into the amazing services that FNB has pushed out on mobile services in that past. All I want to say here is that in 3 months they have managed to develop the application across all major mobile platforms and have managed to generate over R160m worth of transaction volumes. If that does not amaze you, nothing else will. CEO, Michael Jordaan is already promising enhancements.  My only question is … where are the other guys?

Your strongest allies will always be converts to your cause

I am sure that by the first paragraph it became clear that I am FNB banking customer. Well I am! And proudly so. I have a few rules I live by, I don’t like brands on Facebook and I don’t really follow brands on twitter.  FNB has broken that rule in my social behavior. And there is only one reason. I love that brand. They do what they do very well. They are responsive, they have a great product and they definitely live by how can we help you as Sherwin has clearly demonstrated. When you can deliver in this way, it’s a lot easier to forgive nor is recognition that hard to come by either

This is a brand that truly knows how to offer both the sausage and the sizzle and brand marketers along with business at large can learn a lesson from this. Whilst the adage remains true, “Nothing kills a bad product faster than good advertising”, FNB shows how advertising a fantastic product can be the true icing on a great cake.

Lesego

It’s the weekend baby!

I was talking to a friend the other day, who referred to the latest Appletiser campaign as ‘that 5FM promo’… This got me thinking about a few aspects of the Appletiser brand & its campaign…

Appletiser vs. Cliff vs. 5FM

By using a very well known & recognized slogan from Gareth Cliff, who gets more brand exposure & which brand is being built – Appletiser, Cliff or 5FM? The line is already so entrenched with the Gareth Cliff show (& has been for years), that it seems almost impossible to get consumers to now associate it with Appletiser

Limiting usage (whilst launching a bigger pack)

Can be considered a good thing to link the brand to a specific occasion, but by doing so the brand might be tying itself into ‘special occasion’ & soon be in the same predicament as sparkling wine found itself a few years ago?  One would think that the brand would rather opt for increased usage seeing as it is now in a bigger pack & therefore can be enjoyed everyday

Plastic not premium

It might still be a perception, but the fact is that consumers still perceive glass to be more premium to plastic

Brand consistency

Think back to the previous Appletiser TV commercial… Sultry blonde female archer walking through a forest shooting apples off trees, which explodes into golden liquid. Now try & bring the old & the new together…

Broader appeal?

Appletiser has moved from being the champagne of fruit based beverages, to just another family fridge weekend staple

The campaign is a catchy song & a well recognised DJ slogan / saying. But… what is this doing for the brand? What is it saying about Appletiser?  

Mia

Five Roses showcases range in style

Up until now, Five Roses Tea has had quite an old feel to the brand in that it was classy and superior, but also quite traditional and predictable. It seems they are pushing out of this, not only in their innovative new range, but also in the way they are communicating it.