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Tony Seba y los 9 fundamentos de la estrategia en mercados tecnológicos

Tony Seba es emprendedor, conferenciante, profesor y consultor estratégico para algunas compañías de Sillicon Valley. El pasado 2 de febrero ofreció una conferencia acerca de las 9 reglas que según su dilatada trayectoria hacen a una compañía o a un productor ganador en un mercado tan rápido, cambiante y competitivo como el tecnológico.

Los ejes fundamentales en los que se basa su estudio giran principalmente en torno al cliente, como sujeto de necesidades, emociones y de miedos al que el mercado debe ofrecer productos completos pero simples, de fácil adopción, altamente fiables, y con valor. Efectivamente, "hay que sentir el dolor" antes de desarrollar un producto: hay que escuchar a los clientes, centrarse en sus problemas y definir ese nuevo nicho en el mercado. Ese producto ha de ser sencillo de usar y ha de añadir valor a la experiencia global del cliente (y no consistir simplemente en una serie de características); así mismo, un producto tecnológico ha de infundir confianza en el cliente, hacerles sentir seguros en su decisión de comprar ese específico producto. Para facilitar el posicionamiento de un producto es imprescindible contar una buena historia, con la que pueda identificarse emocionalmente el cliente; efectivamente, la adopción no es más que un proceso social, por lo tanto humano, y por ello resulta también crucial encontrar "valedores", líderes de opinión que animen a los demás a adoptar el producto concreto. Por último, seguir siendo ganador en este mercado requiere constantemente mirar al competidor (descubrir cómo acabar con él), seguir escuchando al cliente, estar abierto a ideas de fuera, conocer la cadena de valor, innovar en el modelo de negocio, etc.; es decir, cambiar o morir.

IE Marketing Club is pleased to announce the visit of Francisco Ballester, CEO at Novartis Pharma Spain.

 

 

 

 

 

Presentation:

IE Marketing Club and IE Entrepreneurs Club are honored to welcome Top speaker-lecturer Tony Seba .

Tony Seba is an educator, entrepreneur, author, speaker, business architect, and consultant.

He is a lecturer at Stanford University where he teaches high tech strategy and entrepreneurship. He has created and taught "Strategic Marketing of High Technology Products and Innovations", "Business and Revenue Models Innovation", and "Finance for Marketing, Engineers, and Entrepreneurs". He teaches at top business schools around the world such as The Auckland University  (New Zealand) Business School, has been guest lecturer at Northwestern University's Kellogg Graduate School of Management, University of Southern California, and in-company at some of the world's top high tech companies such as Google, Inc.

Seba holds an MBA from the Stanford University Graduate School of Business and a BS in Computer Science and Engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

[http://www.tonyseba.com/bio.html]

Our guest speaker will be introduced by Enrique Dans, IE professor in Information Systems

 

 

 

 

 

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THERE ARE 150 PLACES AVAILABLE.

Lastly, if you sign up, attendance is mandatory so please attend or cancel in advance by sending an email to marketingclub@ie.edu Failure to comply will result in the Student Office barring you from future club events. Thank you for your understanding and cooperation.

Movistar: A new Brand Identity-

Opportunities and Challenges in Latin America

"The biggest launch in Western Europe...."

On June 12^th 2008, the IE Marketing Club welcomed Procter&Gamble to discuss "the biggest launch in Western Europe" - the launch of Gillette Fusion, a new and innovative razor which did not only have blades on one side, as the Mach3 but also a short trimming blade on the other side of the razor, allowing for a whole new shaving experience.

Demian Pintos and Javier Martinez, the two P&G brand managers, explained, that at the time, P&G held 91% of the blades and razor category, 62% of the disposable razor category and was able to maintain 80% of consumer loyalty.  Despite the fact, that the older population as part of the life cycle was leaving the category, men's care showed continuing growth with 5-10% increase every year.  P&G found that 67% of males buy razors themselves and that there was a 100% conversion rate from disposable razors to blade systems.  In addition, their star product Mach3 had reached maturity.  With grooming marking the cornerstone of men's care category, P&G developed a superior razor that moisturized as it shaved and contained an additional blade to shave "hard-to-reach" places.  "When you are already the market leader, it is hard not to rest on your laurels. In order to stay at the top you have to constantly innovate and aim at improving your product", Demian Pintos explained. P&G realized that launching a new product would cause cannibalization amongst their other blade systems, however, sales margins were expected to be promising.

The Gillette management team had thought of something different for the launch of the new fusion product. They were striving for a logistically challenging, big bang launch which took place February 28 2008.  "We call this approach a Harry Potter launch, where in one day, Gillette Fusion was made available everywhere with elaborate displays following extravagant trade support", the P&G managers explained.  In addition, a teaser campaign was developed, were the company tried to create hype through kindling the consumer's curiousness for the new product. During a two-month period, 60 Fusion ambassadors "generated excitement, awareness, and education" as they traveled throughout Spain in two buses to four cities.  The last week before the launch, a nationwide teaser campaign was developed to keep consumers wondering and curious what Fusion was all about.  The company advertised the same Fusion TV spot during primetime on every channel in Spanish television. Other means of promotions included direct mail and internet optimization tactics like e-mailing and Fusion banners. 

As mentioned before, on the designated day X the company had to make sure that all supermarkets and outlets had the product in stock that they had received sufficient delivery and that none of them was going to shelf the products before they were supposed to. "This can be quite challenging, and as P&G we are lucky that we can rely on our good client relationships to make such events possible".

In terms of campaign content, the brand managers focused on the consumer needs identified through extensive market research. Mr. Martinez explained, "Men want security, comfort, and a close shave" when they choose a blade system.  The marketing professionals supporting the campaign felt Gillette Fusion made men, "look and feel their very best."  That is why they decided that they would continue with their successful strategy of using celebrity endorsement from David Beckham, like they had done with the Mach3. "We felt like David, at the time, best represented what we wanted our innovative product to stand for." In the end, the elaborate product launch, which of course was supported by a large advertising budget, enabled Fusion alone to take over 17% of men's shaving systems category, cannibalizing only little of the existing Gillette products, in fact, growing the category and the market itself.

Overall, the case presented by P&G shows, what challenges even a market leader has to face and how, even if it seems that the market is divided upon your own product and the competitors, growth can be achieved through not only stealing market share from your rivals but also through growing the category in itself. The IE Marketing Club was very proud to host P&G and would like to take this opportunity to thank the participants again for sharing their "real life marketing session" and the continuous challenges faced by a brand manager with the interested audience.

By Fanny L. Cardona

"Country Branding- The new era of branding Countries and Regions"

Jose Filipe Torres, CEO of Bloom Consulting

Tuesday, June 17^th 2008

Pinar 211

17:00 - 18:30

Bloom Consulting is one of the few Brand Strategy consultancies in the world specialized in the area of Country "Trade Offer" Branding.

­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­With clients such as:

The Spanish, Portuguese, Bulgarian and Latvian governments among others, also consistently working with the Region of Madrid.

Locations among others in:

Berlin | Buenos Aires | Caracas | Copenhagen | Istanbul | Madrid | Miami | New York | Lisbon | Oslo | Paris | Sao Paulo | Singapore | Sofia

_______________________________________________________________________

For more info:

http://www.bloom-consulting.com/

Procter and Gamble manages a house of brands with over 350 popular products. They span from household cleansers and personal care to laundry detergents and luxury products.  Come and find out what it takes to launch a new product in the Spanish Market and making it category leader.

Interbrand is an international top brand consultancy which serves clients worldwide from 30 offices including New York, London, Madrid, Milan, and Paris. They assisted companies such as Xerox, Unilever, Sony, Johnson&Johnson, UBS, IBM, and Kraft Foods manage their brand assets to create value. Interbrand is expert in packaging design, retail design, brand valuation, brand strategy, naming and verbal identity, corporate identify, digital branding tools, brand analytics and integrated brand communications.

The audience was able to hear first-handed from the CEO about the start-up of the new company and the challenges facing the launch of the mobile service provider. másmovil has been supported by companies such as Northzone Ventures, Schibsted, and Dehesa de la Plata S.L. which facilitated the business setup.

As a start, Meinrad gave a quick overview of the competitive landscape and explained why másmovil chose yellow as their color (the existing competitors have the colors red, blue and orange).  "We have managed to reunite a European Team of telecommunication experts. They don´t only bring numerous years of industry experience to the table; they also combine knowledge of the Spanish market with previous experience of launching mobile service providers in other European countries", Meinrad explained.  He talked openly about how they identified their opportunity since current Spanish mobile phone customers were mostly unsatisfied with high prices and bad customer Service.The Company aimed to address these issues through an innovative communication strategy targeting young spirited people.

As their marketing budget was limited, they took a strong grassroot approach focusing on acquiring customers 1 by 1 through recommendations and community marketing.

Even though másmovil took an emotional approach in their marketing communication to reach their main target of students and young people between the ages of 18 and 25, they wanted to stay true to their motto Telefonica 3.0 and communicate the objective benefits of their mobile service: másmovil is the cheapest mobile service provider in Spain offering a combination of prepaid + postpaid tariffs. Their cheap tariffs of 8ct and 10cts per minute are recognized by renowned Spanish consumer organizations and are the main competitive advantage. "Through our tariffs we are setting up market entry barriers for competitors. Apart from the prices we are operating highly efficient which gives us a cost advantage", Meinrad pointed out. Additionally the measured customer satisfaction of másmovil customers is higher than industry average. "The market is starting to change. Customers realize that a free phone with a contract isn´t really a free phone. They are discovering the hidden costs and are increasingly looking for real benefits."

Meinrad said he was convinced that their product had to convince with the objective criteria and benefits; i.e. being cheaper and not just with emotional benefits like a great free phone. If másmovil is able to overcome the image problem associated with a low cost mobile service provider, they are likely to become very successful in the Spanish market.

According to the CEO, the first months have exceeded expectations.  In the following years, new mobile service providers in Spain are expected to capture 15% of the market and másmovil is determined to capture the biggest chunk of this.

The IE Marketing Club inaugurates its conference cycle with key speaker Joseph Gelman, partner at Prophet.

 Last week, Tuesday April 22^nd, the IE Marketing Club was proud to host speaker Joseph Gelman, partner at Prophet in Madrid at the conference "Branding in a Strategic Marketing Consultancy".

Before arriving at Prophet, Joseph Gelman co-founded BBDO Consulting in Madrid and worked as consultant for McKinsey for several years with a focus on the telecom and Internet sectors.

With his significant experience in devising impact-oriented brand and marketing strategies and programs, Mr. Gelman provided the audience with the latest information on the different trends in branding and the importance of building strong brands in today's markets.  As consultant for leading companies in developing and implementing effective strategies for brand identity and positioning, brand portfolio and architecture -including many of Spain's largest companies across several industries-, he earned every attendee´s attention through an interactive discussion.

His conference was riddled with real examples of successful -and not - branding strategies of financial institutions, low coast airlines, food industries or office supplies superstores, among others. He conducted a particularly dynamic conference through questions addressed to the audience, rewarding best answers and insights with a book on branding.

As he explained, a brand is basically a set of expectations and promises that are waiting to be fulfilled at every touchpoint that the customer has with it. Therefore, the customer's experience of the brand is going to depend on how well these promises are actually delivered. In this sense, it is going to be essential to develop a deep understanding of the relationship the customer has with the brand. This means knowing exactly what expectations our brand evokes and how we are able to fulfil them accordingly through the different experiences that the customer has with it.

As he pointed out, to create a successful brand-customer relationship organizations need to build a brand identity, which captures what the organization aspires to and will align business with brand strategy.

He also mentioned that brands can be measured to monitor their performances. But such brand evaluation shall be the subject of a single session... We hope to have soon Mr. Gelman coming back for another lecture!

As he also explained, not too long ago, the relationship a customer had with a brand was limited to his/her awareness for a product or service, measurable through marketing activities such advertising and direct marketing. Today, awareness is not enough to build a strong relationship with our customers. Companies need to build consistent and coherent experiences with the customer, experiences that will touch the customer at a physical and an emotional level. Such consistency relies in "what they say and what they do" in every act of the organization -as he stressed out putting some examples- in order to gain customers' intense loyalty.

"In order to build successful brands, traditional media as we know it is not enough anymore. We are faced with an extremely competitive environment, where the client is better informed; we need to build strong touchpoints between the client and the brand" Mr. Gelman declared.  

By creating a strategy for our brand we are able to treat a brand as a valuable asset for the company. In this sense, regarding "corporate branding" as a "valuable strategic asset" will result in increased profitability for our company, giving us a true competitive advantage.

On the other hand, brand strategies must be aligned with the all the levels of the organization as a whole, coordinated by the highest executive positions at the company (from top management) to be embraced by every single department (bottom). Every person in the company has to be committed with brand-building and be aware of the brand essence and values in order to be able to transmit a single and coherent message to the final customers. As he emphasized, "every employee needs to embody what the brand stands for and understand the role he/she needs to play in bringing the promises to life".

Students were able to discuss with Mr. Gelman different viewpoints on the matters presented and learn from the consultant's experience and knowledge through an excellent lecture.  

The event, attended by numerous IE students, concluded with an informal cocktail where they were able to discuss the learnings of the conference and enjoy the rest of the evening.

Prophet is a consultancy specialized in marketing, branding and innovation. Their aim is to help companies grow by "getting more of their brands, their investments and their people". The company was founded in 1992 and today it employs more than 100 expert consultants. With offices in Chicago, Hamburg, London, Madrid, New York, San Francisco, Tokyo and Zurich, their strong reputation has been built thanks to the good results that they deliver to their clients. Among them we may find companies such as, Abbott, Boeing, BP, Cargill, Philips, Visa, UBS and others.

Ever wondered what Marketing and Consulting have in common?

IE Marketing Club proudly presents

 "Branding in a Strategic Marketing Consultancy"

The interface between Marketing & Consulting

A conference by Joseph Gelman, Partner at Prophet

Date: Tuesday, April 22^nd, from 17:30 to 19:00 hrs. Venue: Aula Magna (María de Molina 11)