Adopting Brand Orientation for Organisational Success

Most valuable brands in the world

Apple - $488.9 billion
Microsoft - $352.5 billion
Amazon - $298.1 billion

Gromark and Melin 2011 p.394

Strong brands aren’t given. they must be earned over and over again. Therefore, most companies nowadays seem ton agree that brand building is not a project but a process.

Urde 1999

proposed the notion of Adopting a mindset of ‘building brands into strategic resources’…. Also known as Becoming ‘Brand Oriented’.

Importance of being brand orientated

Carabi & Gjols-Anderson 2017
The brand is more than just a marketing and advertising activity. Under the right conditions, it can engage employees and customers. It can power strategy. It can align decision making and behaviours… But to recognise the full potential of the brand, it must be lifted to a higher realm than marketing and advertising. It needs to be placed where it rightly belongs - at the heart of business strategy.

Context of brand orientation

Any customer can have a car painted any colour he wants as long as it is black - Henry Ford.

Evolution towards brand orientation

Product orientation - Focus is on production and distribution of efficiency, own operations become obsession.
Product orientation - focus is on continuous product improvement, ignores changing markets and environments.
Sales orientation - focus is on finding and converting prospects, emphasis is on transactions, not relationships.
Market orientation - focus is on the customer, goal is understanding the needs and wants of customers.
Brand orientation - focus is on the customer, competitor and your own brand, goal is making brand at the heart of the organisational decision making.

The egg model - market and brand orientation

Urde 1997
Market orientation approach - taking an outside-in perspective. The brand image is key. Satisfying the needs and wants of the consumer.
Brand orientated approach - taking an inside-out perspective. Brand identity is key. The brand as a resource and strategic hub. Satisfying the needs and wants of the consumer, within the limits of the brand core identity.
Top of the egg - The customer and the non-customer stakeholders (External).
Round the middle of the egg - the brand promise and core values.
Bottom of the egg - The organisation (Internal).

Many definitions of brand orientation

“The extent to which organisations regard themselves as brands and an indication of how much (or little) the organisation accepts the theory and practice of branding” (Hankinson, 2001, p.231).
“The degree to which the organisation values brands and its practices are oriented towards building brand capabilities” (Bridson & Evans, 2004, p.404).
“The extent to which the organisation embraces the brand at a cultural level and uses it as a compass for decision making to guide four brand behaviours: distinctiveness, functionality, augmentation and symbolism” (Evans et al., 2012, p. 1471).

Perhaps the best? Urde (1999, p117)

An approach in which the processes of the organisation revolve around the creation, development and protection of brand identity in an ongoing interaction with target customer with the aim of achieving lasting competitive advantages in the form of brands.

Organisation change required - brand at the heart of the organisation

Carabi (2017)
One must have the courage… to see the brand as more than just a passive result of marketing activities and instead use it as an active ingredient in organisational decision making. Only then can it bring engagement, meaning and value to employees and customers and only then the brand’s full potential be realised.

Does brand orientation work?

Hankinson (2001) - charity organisations - yes
Bridson and Ewans (2004) - Fashion retailers - yes
Napoli (2006) - Non profit organisations - yes
Wong and Merrilees (2007/8) - Mostly SME - yes
Voskuyl (2009) - 500 largest companies - yes
Baumgarth (2009/10) - SME-museums and B2B - yes
Koolman (2010) - Charity organisations - yes

Drivers to adoption of brand orientation

Product based differentiation difficult to sustain (King, 1991). Increasing media costs (Urde, 1999).
Integration of Markets / Globalisation (Urde, 1999).
Brand vs Employer brand – both should treated as one (Urde, 2003).
Strong competition / need to differentiate (Wong & Merrilees, 2008).
Changes in the environment (Urde, 1999).
Commercial (ability to command a price premium).

Barriers to adoption of brand orientation

Lack of financial resources (although Huang & Tsai, 2013 refute this).
Time constraints
Perceived lack of relevance / Lack of CEO Support (Boso et al. 2016).
Short term focus on sales activities / lack of long term planning (Wong & Merriless, 2005).
Organisational Structure & culture (Reid et al. 2005; Huang & Tsai, 2013).

Identifying/Measuring degree of brand orientation

Some questions to measure brand orientation.
The ability to build a brand is regarded as a core competence.
We actively use brands to create relationships with our employees.
We actively use brands to create a value-driven organisation.
We actively use brands to create committed employees.
Our brands are regarded as being one of our most vital assets.
Our brands serve as the strategic starting point for practically all our business operations.
We are very brand-orientated. We feel inspired to use our brands to create sustainable competitive advantages.

Internal brand building crucial to success of adoption of brand orientation

Temporal (2019, p.238).
It is not too difficult to develop the brand strategy, nor build the image power via external communication campaigns and other activation programmes, but the real challenge is involving employees in linking the two.

Focus on building brand pride 

Silverman (2016)
In today’s world, loyalty is hard to come by, so its more important than ever to help employees feel pride in their company. Brand is the greatest source of pride a company has. So it is critical to help employees understand, feel and buy into its true meaning and purpose. The results will be brand proud employees who will share their pride and in turn, help customers stay customers, because brand pride is contagious.

Focus on brand pride continued

Pride is a positive, self-conscious emotion resulting from the appraisal that one is responsible for a socially valued outcome or for being a socially valued person (Jung, 2013).
Pride has been identified as a strong motivator of employee behaviour/citizenship behaviours (Arnett et al., 2002).
Pride manifests itself through reflected appraisal when others notice that one exceeds social standards or expectations (Webster et al. 2003).
Building affiliation and distinction are important for individuals (Donavan et al, 2006).

Person/organisation fit

Wieseke et al. (2009, p.124).
The perception, the value and the emotional significance of oneness with or belongingness to the organisation.

Why internal brand building is important

Raise employees’ confidence to endorse the firm (morokand et al, 2016).
Committed and loyal (King and Grace, 2008).
Improve intention to stay; develop brand ambassadors (Matanda & Ndubisi, 2013).

Needs ‘buy-in’ from company leadership and front line employees

(Urde et al. 2013)
CEO - Senior Management - Middle Management - Staff.
Provides the vision - Implements the vision.

Frank Larsen

By operationalising the brand in everything the organisation does, the core of the brand is deliberately expressed at every touchpoint in the customer experience, as well as in everything the company does internally. People are recruited based on it, the internal culture and ways of working are built on it, and people are rewarded based on it. The brand becomes the company, and the company becomes the brand.

Kotler and Keller (2006)

The most distinctive skill of their professional marketers is their ability to create, maintain enhance and protect brands.