What is Brandproofing and how should I accomplish it?

 What is Brandproofing?

Well, if soundproofing is the process of keeping sound in and not letting any escape, I figured Brandproofing would be the right term for the art of keeping the components of a brand contained securely as its vehicle (the business) rumbles on. 

Why does a brand need to be contained and what causes it to escape?

A brand is the sum of interactions between a business and its stakeholders. A business can control and influence the nature of those interactions through branding, but control is liable to slip as the busyness of business gets underway. 

A tremendous amount of effort goes into the ideation and planning of a brand. Founders, marketing teams and agencies spend months deliberating over the details, wrapping up the perfect formula to achieve set goals, only to find it unravelling with passing years as performance takes priority over perception and positioning. This is particularly true of small companies where owners get bogged down with working in the business rather than on it. 

The consequence is inconsistency. Tone, design, messaging, feel, sound, approach, attitude - all these things become scattered, perhaps subtly at first but as the great lexicographer, Samuel Johnson once said in different words: The diminutive chains of habit are seldom felt until they are too strong to be broken. A brand can seep from a business like air from tyres. The car rolls on until the driver and its passengers realise there’s nothing left. All of a sudden other cars pass them by and they’re stuck in a lay-by disillusioned, signalling for expensive help. 

Employees may jump ship, competitors can get ahead, and your market’s loyalty perches precariously on your raw performance, without the soft padding of strong branding for security. 

How to Brandproof a business

• Create a brand strategy that’s built for the long-term by leaning on data, insight and creative intelligence. Devise a tone of voice strategy to define the company’s voice too. 

• Such strategies can be clunky. It’s important that there are what David Ogilvy would call big ideas that capture the gist of things in a single, memorable phrase. I once summarised a 40-page strategy for the rebrand of a 5-star heritage hotel with the line ‘Luxury, Loosened’. It’s a phrase I helpfully referred to throughout the presentation to keep my audience on the right path, preventing them from getting lost in the granular detail of stratagem. 

• Simplification via taglines and big ideas helps the company’s team to retain the strategy and keep it front of mind during decision making. I’d also recommend having beautifully designed infographics and charts that they can transfer to office walls, desktop backgrounds, and elsewhere. 

• Whether it’s brand strategy, tone of voice strategy or any other blueprint, it’s essential that all levels of management are absolutely convinced and confident in it. They need to be able to retell this to the rest of the team, who need to remember the main nuggets, and perform in an on-brand manner everyday. Therefore, the way in which the initial strategies are presented to management is crucial - it needs to be delivered with passion and conviction, and there needs to be space for amendments and feedback so there is solidarity across the board. 

• If management cares about the brand, the rest of the company follows, and all external stakeholders will too. There ought to be weekly or monthly check-ins where the brand strategy is reiterated in inventive ways, and there should be innovative initiatives which drive home the brand’s values without preaching or lecturing. 

• Finally, recognise when the car is too big for the tyres it started with. In plainer words, identify early when it’s time to rebrand or refine the branding. You can predict this moment as you notice significant milestones being surpassed and the company’s objectives have changed. Maybe the market has shifted, and perhaps the business is now 100x the size it once was - these are all signs to go back to the original strategies and see what doesn’t make sense any more. It’s better to make adjustments than to procrastinate until you need a wholesale replacement. 

And that’s that. If you’ve made it this far into my article, please do let me know (it means a lot) and seek counselling immediately - you may be socially deprived. 

Tapping Arabia's Other Liquid Gold

 Arabia’s Other Liquid Gold

Coffee is a multi-billion dollar business in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia but it’s more than just business. The humble bean, once some magic has been administered to it, becomes a symbol of hospitality, and the means by which happiness is obtained and shared. It’s the lubricant that keeps chatting mouths moving at midday or midnight.

KSA’s ‘branded coffee shop market’ grew by 18.5% in 2022. That’s a lot - it was 10% in the USA for the same period. At Klinical, we contributed to that statistic through a brand we created called Sipside. We started working on this project just as the Saudi government had announced Vision 2030 - an ambitious state-wide commercial and societal development project that aimed to help solidify the country’s position on the global stage. Sure, there’s the other liquid gold underground that could sustain them for a millennia but they want to win the hearts and minds of the average Joe and Joanne around the world. Our contribution of Sipside (among a plethora of other Saudi brands we’ve created) is one more solid brick in the foundations of KSA’s future.

So, rhetoric and posturing aside, what have I got to share with you? Well, it’s been a 3-year adventure into the Saudi coffee sector and here’s what I’ve picked up:

• If you want to launch a consumer brand in the Middle East, Saudi Arabia is a great starting point because of its initiatives that flood down from the top. There’s a real entrepreneurial spirit in the country and the wheels of change are turning in favour of commercialism.
  
  

• Saudi Arabia has a remarkably young population (over 70% are under 30 years old last time I checked) and they are highly socially active. If you’ve got a vibrant brand with a quality product that’s marketed well, it’ll launch and spread successfully.
  
  

• Things happen at a gentler pace so you can expect Saudi entrepreneurs and founders to be more amicable, leisurely and appreciative than their European counterparts. Calls and meetings always involve warm, friendly intros and outros with compliments of a professional and personal nature exchanged like
  
  

• You’ll need a strong creative team designing and strategising social posts because photography will be lacking. Photos of Sipside are deceiving because they often show an empty albeit beautiful cafe. However, this is because taking pictures of customers is generally a no-go, which is a shame from a marketing point of view but something we certainly compensate for with our creative, designed posts.
  
  

• A winning formula lasts long. So, in other markets, it’s common to refresh marketing strategies and head back to the drawing board on a regular basis to keep your customers engaged and interested. The lifecycle of a campaign, a theme or a style is much longer in Saudi Arabia but this might change as commercialism rises, possibly turning contentedness into
  
  

• Saudis are not loyal to a particular coffee shop so there’s no point banging that ‘we’re the best, forget the rest’ drum. However, due to the amount of coffee they consume, you can expect your shop to be in their daily visit so it’s still worth introducing reward schemes and creating a community vibe around your brand.
  
  

• PR opportunities are extremely limited so word of mouth is an integral driver of growth. This puts extra scrutiny on the in-store experience and the brand positioning of digital assets (website and socials). It’s paramount to have clear, easy-to-follow but well-thought-out strategies and blueprints in place covering tone of voice, content, styling, uniforms, merchandise and more. Everything needs to be absolutely on-point because every in-store and online interaction is worth 10x more than it would be in a European coffee shop, for example.