Maruapula Brand

Brand: Inspiration | Ideation | Implementation

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Quick Fact: 60% of brands are missing the opportunity to truly engage consumers by failing to measure the impact on society of their purpose campaigns. 

Work on an impact investment model with Maruapula Brand.

Impact investing will be able to fulfil its promise of improving the lives of poor and vulnerable people by generating large-scale, durable solutions to some of the world’s most complex problems.

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Your brand partner | Maruapula Brand

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Character is like a tree and reputation like its shadow. The shadow is what we think of it; the tree is the real thing.

Abraham Lincoln

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Proactively managing reputational risks

Companies are especially vulnerable to anything that damages their reputations as 70% to 80% of market value comes from hard-to-assess intangible assets such as brand equity, intellectual capital, and goodwill.

Here is how our Rainmakers advise our clients on proactively managing reputational risks:

Own it: Be accountable for your part (directly and indirectly). Accept and Apologise in whatever capacity your company is liable. Remember, a business is not an island therefore your actions affect your community and stakeholders (no matter how small you any think the issue is at the time)

Pinpoint your target audience: Often when crisis hits, businesses want to speak to media, second and third parties, and other bodies who may only fuel the fire. Be strategic in who you are talking to and why. Be consistent in achieving this communication or tactical goal. 

Do not be responsive, be proactive: Be ahead of curve. Lead the conversation and ensure that you maintain a responsible role in directing the risk.

Ask for help, be inclusive: Part of mitigating the risk is by ensuring that your business is inclusive in delivering a solution. Be open to engaging internal and external stakeholders in giving key insights on the best route to take in getting the brand to its safest position. Do not ignore negative feedback

Reputational risk assessment and how to determine the risk:

Does your reputation exceeds its true character?

How much has change in the external beliefs and expectations of the brand? 

Is the quality of internal coordination in coherence and sustainable?.

We can help assess your brand position. email [email protected] or send an enquiry on any of our social media platforms @maruapulabrand​

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You can have the All that you want to have ————————— #YouNeedToMatter https://www.instagram.com/p/BxbpsSjnjtM/?utm_source=ig_tumblr_share&igshid=1jjf3hgz04vor

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BRAND PURPOSE

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Habit is persistence in practice

In the age of automation, most brands have perfected the art of forming habits that are consistent with our lifestyles. A nudge for brand loyalty is what you can call it. These are a collection of choices we keep making, conveniently so but for what pleasure?

Have you seen how some travel products lure you in because apparently the experiences are far better when you buy into all the leisure treatments that they have to offer? What we forget to notice is the fine gesture of repeated experiences that become the value proposition in favour of the traveller. A traveller keeps a yardstick pointed in the direction of an expected brand experience. Why? This is because travel brands have succeeded in persistently creating travel habits for their guests.

We have formed habits that cushion our experiences. We have digital brands, travel brands, educational brands, and the likes, who have woven our habitual needs to their brand experiences. It isn’t all too bad or invasive (it can be though. privacy policy, much?).

We have seen that it all stems from what is called a trigger / que. Travel brands have tugged into your transit life, and assumed a role in all major contact points just to have your attention – whether you are aware of it or not. Your habits are triggered by the leisure treatments you are accustomed to.

Did you know, you spend 1 out of every 2 minutes doing something that you’re not even aware of? That is half your time buying things, agreeing to commitments, and experiencing brand triggers that get you loyal to the brand. 

Now to probe the question, are these choices made for our pleasure or the pleasure of the brand that you are loyal to?

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IDEATION | INSPIRATION | IMPLEMENTATION

Your brand partner. We turn strategy into brand experiences that matter

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Brand planning - the difference

You cannot manage what you cannot measure! Brand planning is a crucial area that paved the way for equity building and brand loyalty. If you plan ahead, it makes positioning the brand more measurable and effective in the long run

Start with reviewing your business, where you are and how you got there. It will need for you to be brutally honest and allow unbiased points to give a healthy and objective review of your current position

Derive key brand issues that need attention ( matters that inform the rest of the brands’ performance)

Create a sense of urgency for the planned deliverables. Creating tangible deadlines and associating / delegating concise activities to them will allow you to assess efficiency and relevance.

People use various planning tools. Maruapula Brand has customised brand planning tools that we share with our clients.

If this is an area you feel you need assistance with, drop us an email [email protected] so that we can share your planning process with you.

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Brand Trends to follow

Brand Trends to follow

There are tons of insights that could help your business grow more exponentially in relation to effective brand communication.

Our Rainmakers have studies trends that are prevalent in the business space and have curated creative strategies to help our clients communicate in a progressive way.

The top 3 trends we have spotted are:

Phigital: Phigital is a term used in relation to the merging of the physical world with the digital space. There is fusion between offline and online brand contact points that takes the customer through a brand journey. Both spheres support the convenience of extending customer service and brand communication. 

Take a stand: Remember the phrase “ stand for something or fall for everything?” Brands are now more than ever expected to rise prominently when it comes to social discourse. The line between corporate and society has been erased. Business is part of the broader community. Taking a stand means taking accountability and some brands shy away from this. A big mistake! People follow and trust brands when they are personal rather than consistently corporate and disengaged.

Customer drive the brand: With the above said, customers are growing a bigger and bolder voice in teaching brands how to treat them. Customers are realizing their power and by this, strive to ensure that brands become cognizant of the role in society.  

For more, follow us on our social media

@maruapulabrand  and see our interviews on YouTube

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Why employer branding is important

Understanding the Role of Organisational Processes in Cultivating Employee Brand Equity is central to a service brand. Maruapula Brand would like to propose practical implications for your organisation to design a balanced branding approach both internally and externally through the means of communication.

The branding of services starts from inside and employees are the key to brand success. Through an employee brand workshop, we hope to develop your organisations’ efforts  to further carve out a striking value proposition for key stakeholders.

In our interactive workshops, out main focus is to:

Reduce marketing costs

Improve productivity

Train employees to become your ambassadors

Did you know:

Employees who have the appropriate brand knowledge, are more likely to understand their roles and deliver the expected brand promise?

Our proposed structure for your employer - employee brand workshop:

We take pride in our ability to fuse Art and Business. Our delighted clients have defined our efforts as the ability to turn strategy and insights into experiences that matter - and this is exactly what we want to do for you.

We would like to ensure that your employees are a degree higher in resonating the organizations’ brand promise.

Through a structured interactive and experiential workshop, we take our participants through a brand journey and ensure that the brand essence is prevalent throughout all teachable moments.

Key takeaways we focus on in our workshops are:

Internal communication

External communication

Company brand as experienced by employees

Brand knowledge

Role clarity

Brand commitment

Many companies put the value of their brand on their balance sheet. All the tools of marketing and brand building have been used to create its value. Engaged Employees Build Strong Brands. Regardless of which industry you’re in, building a strong brand requires that all employees feel connected to the corporate brand and understand their role in turning brand aspirations into reality.

We would like to ignite a relationship of being your brand partner. Please find this proposal as the first step to achieving great news for your bottom line. Through our know-how to integrate these intrinsic factors into employee development.

Let us help you build your brand as an employer and business:

[email protected]

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Maruapula Brand

It is all about the brand experience

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Stop selling and start inspiring

www.maruapulabrand.com

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Ethical business training

Connecting business to the conscious of consumers

Businesses who endorse and practice ethical marketing demonstrate a socially responsible and culturally sensitive business. More and more businesses are realising that a lot of consumers actually do want ethical options.

In a world full of competitive choices, consumers don’t care about just your product anymore, they also care about what you stand for as a company.

Build ethics into your own business & brand:

Be proactive rather than reactive:

Use technology consciously:

This is about every single piece of that supply chain. Every consumer company needs to think about that too - it’s not just a tech issues - it’s an industry and business issue.

Develop and ethical plans:

internal engagement and communication and a business

Drive cultural change

How to respond to conflict or customer unsatisfactory

Position the business / project management processes in place that guide ethical processes

Commit to ethical trends that are aligned with your company’s long-term activities. Driving the shift means you gain sustainable benefits.

Hide nothing !

State the absence of harm in your product or brand. Even not doing anything wrong is an asset.

Monitor and update ethical practices as the company or products grow / expand

There is no refusing when it come to acknowledging the repercussions of not being ethical as a brand or business. The world is awake - so are your customers.

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Is it time to rebrand?

Do we really know when it’s time to rebrand? As the business evolves, so does the brand - the rebranding isn’t always a completely new identity but a transition that welcomes the new strategy / direction.

Rebranding is a great way to reconfigure your position and attract value driven goals. It doesn’t only stop with the physical or literal! It’s an opportunity to get the entire value chain geared up and involved in pursuing the promise set by new value proposition.

Maruapula Brand shares insights on how we help our clients through this journey. In no way is it erratic but a process of collaboration that’s managed in a way that ensures we raise brand equity while being consistent with what the customer knows and trusts.

Perhaps it’s time to rebrand if:

Your brand no longer tells a compelling story

If your  brand equity is being compromised

Your brand  is no longer highly distinguishable from your competitors

Your value proposition is not clear or the brand has become confusing and intangible

The demographics and psychographics for your market has changed

Remember also consider the following:

Market research and product knowledge is essential when rebranding

The capabilities, competence and resources in order to undergo this transition

Tracking the efforts and results is imperative - as you can’t manage what you can’t measure

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The top 5 brand reputation tips for  businesses

According to a study by the World Economic Forum, on average, more than 25% of a company’s market value is directly attributable to its reputation.

Brand reputation management has become a bigger priority for companies, especially in the age of online fluid engagement with brands.

Maruapula Brand has compiled key brand aspects that you should follow in order to keep your brand reputation in check:

Accountability is key: Be accountable for what your business does and how it does is. This includes assuring that the right person is delegated to attend to dilemmas relevant. Avoid misrepresentations and customer service bombs by assuring that the correct person with key product knowledge and empathy handles relevant conflicts (internally and externally)

Have clear processes: Once we have the “who” sorted out, the correct processes must be channeled in order to retain the brand consistency in language, image, customer expectation and most importantly the business mandate.

Customer experience is the glue: The ordeal may be a brand reputation disaster - but it doesn’t always have to be. This can be used as a learning curve or an opportunity to create a compelling customer experience. The experience is what relays the brand promise and story more vividly. Therefore, all your contact points require intentional efforts to ensure that the brad image and what the customer experiences are aligned.

Follow up: Reputation is what people will continue to say about your business when you’re long gone. Remember to check in for clarity and a mode of extracting insights for future references. Follow up on all relevant parties and encourage them to share their views on how to grow the brand or business. In allowing them to do so, enables them to take ownership of the brand perception and tell a more favourable tale.

Show that you’re remorseful or have learnt from your lessons: A pompous brand repels healthy brand engagement. It is better to nurture the brand advocates. When your business knows better, it does better. Therefore it’s beneficial to have the company reflect these lessons through their products, customer service, communication platforms and other key contact points.

Don’t Confuse Reputation With Brand. Remember that people buy from people they know, like and trust.

Though focusing too much on reputation at the expense of the brand can lead to product offerings that are inferior and irrelevant within in the market because emphasis is not placed on an accurate value proposition.

Focus your efforts on:

Relevancy, Differentiation and Legitimacy. This will enable stakeholders and processes that reinforce credibility and respect within the organization. This is to be consistent with the promise made by the brand.