Brand-building in Asia takes time, effort and focus
OPINION: It is well understood that brand building takes time, and that a good brand comes with benefits.
Think of how many applicants there are when a well-branded company hires.
But brand building can use up a lot of resources.
Think of how many people actually look at the billboards that you put your advertisement on and how much more you have to pay to get the best located billboard or the best placement on a webpage.
Brand values are easy to destroy. Think of how Samsung’s brand value was wiped out due to last year’s headlines of exploding phones.
The above are just some fundamentals of branding.
The complexity of branding exercises has resulted in the advent of many branding indices.
In the latest BrandZ report, it is evident that Asian brands are starting to rise to global standards.
Three Chinese brands made it to the Top 20, 6 made it to the Top 50 and 13 made the list of Top 100 Global Brands.
Tencent, the developer of WeChat, the instant messaging tool, even managed to get into the Top 10 (ranked at 8). The company was only ranked in 52nd place back in 2011.
Alibaba, China Mobile, ICBC, Baidu and Huawei were the others in the Top 50 list.
China had only one slot in the Top 100 10 years ago.
Although other Asian brands do not feature in the Top 100 at this point, brand value data suggests that the top brands in India and Indonesia (two other large Asian economies) are on the rise and it won’t take long before they enter the Top 100.
There are also signs that rising Asian brands are not just about state-linked companies and finance companies. Increasingly, privately-owned ones and in particular technology-oriented ones are moving up the chain rather swiftly.
The concept of brands and what a brand means is always not clear in Asian markets.
Brand building is not the same as brand awareness. Having good
Brand values are easy to destroy. Think of how Samsung's brand value was wiped out due to last year's headlines of exploding phones.
exposure to Asian consumers is necessary but is not sufficient for building a brand in Asia.
The size of Asian markets means that Asian consumers are often exposed to a wide variety of product categories. So much so that they can become overwhelmed, even those who do some online research before buying.
Even strong global brands will find themselves having to continue to invest on brand awareness in order to stay in the game.
So for foreign players seeking to establish a branding presence in Asia, this means that focus and deeper engagement are needed.
Some of the strategies adopted by foreign players in Asian markets include corporate social responsibility, educating local consumers by providing free samples and training, promotion through online channels, and most recently through ‘key opinion leaders’ (KOL) just to name a few.
KOLs are bloggers that command a lot of followers on e-commerce messaging platforms that make assessments of products.
Due to their social influence, foreign players are now targeting KOLs as a focused way to engage consumer awareness.
Though the price of engagement using KOLs is rising, the targeted approach is thought of as a good way forward to engage. Companies big and small are using it: for example, in China the technique has been adopted by companies such as Unilever, Tiffany, and New Zealand’s own Antipodes.
We should see this being adopted in other key Asian markets soon.
Nonetheless, this strategy is just one of many potential targeted approaches to brand building in Asia markets.
Any approach is likely to work to some extent, but being aware of changes in local consumption trends and understanding the difference between awareness and brand building are still the critical elements for gaining recognition in Asian markets. Siah Hwee Ang is the BNZ chair in Business in Asia at Victoria University of Wellington.