Author: David Preston

Brands, beer, rails, poems and puns

Crow Essentials / Research

We passed our 11th Birthday in December which is uncrowlievable… but it’s important to never assume that everyone knows what your company is and what it does. So here’s the first in a series of Crow ‘101’s which we’re putting out in our social feeds.

If you’ve got a brand building challenge and what a rigourous, pragmatic and pacey answer – get in touch (+44 (0) 7885 408367 or caw@thecrowflies.co.uk

So here we go, Crow ‘Basics’, part 1, with a little focus on how we help our clients with market research.

Brand Growth: More Is Rarely More

Increasingly, the pressure is on brand marketeers and the businesses they serve to do more to drive growth with ever tightening budgets. When brands are being challenged from many different quarters, be it own label challengers or agile, ‘edgy’ brands, the endless temptations of “new is better, old is dead”, and lubricated by a soup of increasingly capricious consumers, you can understand why. ‘Spare’ investment to test and learn, with the acceptance that elements could likely fail, feels like a luxury from a bygone era.

This can lead to the poorly informed seeking ‘new news’ and worshipping at the alters of false marketing Gods. Tempted by the lurid snake oil charms of the next best thing, much activity intended to build brands and enhance company value, often has the opposite effect. In the rush to do more, with less, it’s wise to pause and consider if there are more effective alternatives for growth. Here are a few growth alternatives to counter ‘the usual suspects’:

Issue 1: ‘salami slicing’ your brand’s product quality.
At a time when the cost of goods and taxes have risen so sharply and beyond any sensible forecast, it’s only natural that attention turns to how these costs can be reduced. But when it comes to changes in product quality, a snip here and there, perhaps imperceptible in the short term, or invisible inside the business, will be noticed by those outside, if not immediately, then soon. Remember that consumers migrating away from your brand is likely to be imperceptible in the short term, but very noticeable not long after – and difficult to stop by that point.

Growth Alternative…
Understand what your product truth is and relentlessly protect and amplify it. Great brands are built from undeniable, defensible and owned product truths, often a key foundation of what makes your brand distinctive. Once you know this, you can look for cost savings that support your brand, e.g. cheaper, more sustainable packaging or actually you may find you can add cost because the value exchange reinforces the very thing that consumers buy your brand for.

Issue 2: Fight on more fronts. Win more victories.
It’s easy to slip into a ‘more is more’ attitude without realising it, or believing that in today’s tech-enabled world (a) we can manage this and (b) we can manage this effectively. And initially it can feel energising…. new frontiers for brand growth? Whoopee!  Wrong. Not only will you drive yourself burn out, it’s unlikely, unless you really do have considerable, sustained, investment, that all this new stuff will even be noticed. Media fragmentation doesn’t mean personalisation. It means more opportunities to be missed. New messaging on the brand doesn’t mean ‘new news’ and excitement, it means dissonance for your consumer versus what they love you for. Tech doesn’t drive enablement and efficiently. It drives endless filler that fills up the working day with low value-add.

Growth Alternatives…
(i) Decide what not to do.
Virtually everyone, and certainly most organisations collectively, have eyes bigger than their stomachs.  Stop prioritising from a long list; instead sacrifice to get a short list. If you’re building a brand, repeatable, scalable consistency is a win-win, so it pays to remember the power of refreshed repetition.

(ii) Don’t get bored with your positioning.
As humans we only have so much mental processing capacity and brain space to consider things. If you’re of the opinion that someone will consider your brand more important, or for longer, than their family, friends, job, or dog, then bon chance and viel glück. Find out what people love about you and then reinforce and leverage the hell out of it. Resist endlessly extending the agenda.

 

Issue 3: Following in the competitor furrow rather than ploughing it yourself.
When the competitor grass looks greener it can be oh-so tempting to try to mimic your way to success. But who wants more of the same when they’re already happy with what they’ve got? In truth if you closely align to your competition, you are more likely to fall into their shadow even more.

Growth Alternative…
Remember the Magnet and the Mirror.
Step back and confront some hard realities. Knowing what elements of your category you may need to ‘mirror’ for reassurance, and what elements of your brand are your leadership ‘Magnets’ will prevent you from being pulled in different directions.

Rigourous diagnosis, born from well-specified consumer research. Simplicity of focus when developing activity. Fighting on just a few fronts that matter to consumer and brand, sacrificing the others. Scaling with as much effort as you can muster, year in year out. That’s the alternative growth prognosis we recommend this year.

Gael Laurie is Brand Building Director of The Crow Flies, a research, strategy and innovation company that helps brands find a direct route to long lasting success.  gael@thecrowflies.co.uk; +44 (0) 1889 725670 or +44 (0) 7885 408367; www.thecrowflies.co.uk; @crowflieshigh. © The Crow Flies, 2025

It’s time… the Christmas Brand Mashups!

The long wait is over. The searing heat and parched, chapped lips of Summer a distant memory. The crisp, loamy mulch of leaves now all gone. Yes, the World has turned on its axis once again and the time for The Crow Flies’ famous (and celebrated) Christmas #Brand #Mashups is here. Do enjoy!

Answers at 3pm on Christmas Day here and on the Crow Socials (not Twatter) FB @crowflieshigh INSTA @crowflieshigh.

Magnet or Mirror?

There is a balance to be struck when building a brand. On the one hand, there are brands that have come into being on the back of an experienced eye seeing or sensing a gap in the market. Often this coincides with the belief system of their founder – and the brand becomes a way to fulfil that belief. We call these Magnet brands.  On the other, there are brands that are created through a research process, by spotting patterns in the data, by seeing what people are saying or how they’re behaving and working from there – these are Mirror brands.

Both Magnet and Mirror brands are built from a market orientation, but reflect different approaches, different attitudes to risk and different cultures too.

Magnet brands have a confidence in their beliefs. They act with an inner confidence and are set on shaking up or disrupting their market because they believe there is a better way. And these brands aren’t solely ‘purpose’ brands – a purpose may be articulated, it may not, but it’s more about an attitude of if you like what we stand for, how we do things, and what we believe in you’ll be attracted to us. Magnet can be seen across the spectrum from smaller, fleet-of-foot start-ups to some big old behemoths.

BrewDog was built from a manifesto that beer should be interesting, tasty, different and a bit ‘punk’. Dyson believed that vacuum cleaners should actually be able to suck up dust effectively and new technology was needed. Patagonia want to save our home planet. Fat Lad At The Back believe that cycling is for everyone no matter your size. Dacia believe that simpler is better and that you don’t need all the bells and whistles that most cars have.

Crucially, Magnet brands have market orientation; they undertake market research and seek consumer feedback – but they do this through the lens of their principles and red lines. A Magnet brand recognises that because it is forsomething, it is not for everyone. It wants to understand how it is used, perceived, how it is trending, but also is clear around what can flex and what can’t.

A Mirror brand conversely reflects the market. Again, market orientation is crucial, but here the usage is different – Mirror brands look to understand what’s trending, what’s on the way up and build it into their mix. It will want to know the attitudes and perceptions of its current and potential consumers are positive or becoming so. And crucially, a Mirror brand responds to the feedback by altering its course – perhaps only slightly, perhaps quite markedly – and usually because it is following the short-term money. Most household name brands are Mirror brands, and they have been incredibly successful meeting our needs for years and years. Whether this is Persil launching a new variant, Mars stretching their incredible confectionery brands up or down in size to meet different occasions or whether this is Tesco extending their offer so that every little helps.

And this isn’t a case of ‘one is right’. Both directions have validity. Both can lead to success, or failure; both indeed have risk attached. For every Who Gives A Crap there are 10 copy cats struggling to cut through. For every Warburton’s Toastie there’s a competitor covering its packaging in baked beans because ‘that’s when our customers use it’.

It’s best to be honest and upfront about what your brand is. If you have a clear point of view on the world leverage it. It doesn’t have to be grandiose; it just has to be something that the business really believes in. And if you’re a Mirror brand, that regularly audits what consumer think and how they use your category good for you, because you’ll be many steps ahead of those who think that market research is unnecessary.

David Preston is founder of The Crow Flies, a research, strategy and innovation company that helps brands find a direct route to long lasting success.  david@thecrowflies.co.uk; +44 (0) 1889 725670 or +44 (0) 7885 408367; www.thecrowflies.co.uk; @crowflieshigh. © The Crow Flies, 2024

Creative success for Warwickshire Buses

It was great to hear about the advertising success for Warwickshire Buses – we helped our friends at One Black Bear with the research for their creative development work for Warwickshire Buses, operated by Warwickshire County Council. The aim is to recruit more young bus users, and underline that bus travel is great value for money. Use a bus, and you’ll be Squids In, no squidding.

 

*NEWS* More innovation success for Pieminister

Here’s the thing when launching new products. It’s important after all the hard work creating, testing, refining, developing, prototyping… to feel that the actual launch is the success. But it isn’t, sadly. Success comes with relentless hard yards, taking the set-backs and the counter-punches and still getting up and keeping going, or perhaps more optimistically, grabbing the early momentum by the scruff of the neck and going for scale like a pie-fuelled rhino charging at a door. Whatever it is, innovation requires alignment, courage and resilience.

Our friends at Pieminister show this pie-sistence day in, day out. And with it comes rewards. Brilliant news for them to extend the distribution of their Handy Pies into Waitrose – go out, try them and enjoy a change from a sandwich – especially with the cooler days of Autumn now bearing in.

And they keep on innovating too – it was brilliant to see their new Sharer pie coming to market last week – available from launch in Waitrose and Ocado too – check them out!

We’ve been delighted to play our small part helping the Pieminister team – get in touch if you’d like some sage (and onion) innovation advice and guidance.

Brand Myth Busting

Companies have more data to hand than ever before; multiple sources, multiple dashboards enabling them to look at any one performance data point from a multiple of different angles. And every sale resulting in jillions of tonnes of data to the analysis pile.

Yet, despite this seeming richness, brand myths still abound in many companies. Brand myths that no amount of rational analysis seems to be able to shift. Brand myths that people either willingly accept, grudgingly accept, or circumnavigate. Myths that are are wasteful and potentially dangerous, because they can become a smoke screen, behind which the slow tides of change in the market place can go unnoticed, or false truths can become anchors that prevent necessary action, or channel investment and resource into the wrong things.

How, then, do brands and companies remove the myths? How do they allow the truth to shine through and future opportunities be seen and realised?  As with many things in life it involves going back to basics, in this case brand basics:

  1. Know your core target versus your source of business. This is really important to get right. Miss the bullseye of your core target and you will miss the fertile ground that understanding their attitudes and needs feed. And whilst consumer behaviour does not change overnight, subtle shifts can happen over time that if you are not checking in with your consumers can be missed and false assumptions can manifest in sub-optimal executions. This doesn’t mean ignoring your source of business – they are commercially important, but are likely to be more transient and focusing on them will dilute your brand proposition and strategy where it can really make a difference.

Action 1: generate and test alternative hypothesis to whom your core consumer is – age, needs, attitudes, occasions for engaging with your product based on clues you are seeing and have gathered from; other research you have done, trends, performance data or simply speaking to people you know.

Action 2: Identify and have a clear understanding of your source of business – subtle shifts in action planning can ensure this bucket remains topped up and you can focus on that part of them that can become the habitual consumers of the future.

  1. Being clear what your brand is. Everyone thinks they are clear on what their brand offers. But, with pressure to grow, incremental creep can mean that internal views of what the brand is can be very different to how a consumer sees it.  Just because your brand can launch into multiple categories doesn’t mean it should. Indeed, by being clear on what your brand is means it can be more successful and selective in the categories it extends in to.

Action: does the consumer view on what your brand is match the interval view? If not, why not, and take the action to align them. Brands can only be built successfully when all audiences agree on what the brand is.

  1. Brand thinking and understanding never stops but the final brand basic is knowing the benefits and ‘reasons to believe’ that really resonate with your core audience, and are properly grounded in a product truth.

Action: understand whether your brand benefits and RTB’s are as compelling as they should be. Are they expressed in the right way, do they really deliver against the wants and needs of your target audience?

If you need help cutting through the data, or challenging the brand myths that have built up in your business over time, get in touch. They can often be the biggest impediment to future growth – get your house in order however, and you have a chance.

Gael Laurie is Brand Building Director of The Crow Flies, a research, strategy and innovation company that helps brands find a direct route to long lasting success.  gael@thecrowflies.co.uk; +44 (0) 1283 295100; www.thecrowflies.co.uk; @crowflieshigh. © The Crow Flies, 2024

What’s in a name?

Peter Andre doesn’t often make me ponder, but recent headlines about how long he took to announce the naming of his baby daughter did just that. The importance and diligence behind naming children today;  the myriad influences of cultural references from film characters, royalty, pop stars and even politicians… all leave a  heightened sense of loading names with meaning and sentiment. Did people used to put this much thought into naming their child?

Naming a brand or company is arguably just as hard and serious in this highly competitive world. The name chosen will be at the centre of the base of mental associations that the brand or company will be building up; it will help steer or navigate people towards  -or away from – the brand; it will, over time, become loaded with meaning which helps or hinders it commercially (and beyond – it could help or hinder employee recruitment or engagement too).

So, naming requires some careful thought, a rationale consideration of the alternatives and a clear fit to the business’ strategic intent.

It’s also alchemy.

There are no rules, no playbook – but you can consider whether you want your glass full, half full or empty in terms of giving you a helping hand – and trends undoubtedly do influence this.

  • The obvious place to start is to name after a founder. Some would argue it is the least creative approach, yet it may be perfectly serviceable (in, say, a smaller independent business) and it has traditionally been the most common approach in that most creative of industries – advertising. Ogilvy; Saatchi & Saatchi; Doyle Dane Bernbach; White, Collins, Rutherford, Scott – take your pick.Naming after the founder can mean the naming ‘glass’ is empty: you have to fill it with meaning over time. Equally, though, in many professional fields naming after the founder brings gravitas, expertise and a confidence in who and what you are buying into. (This is why celebrity spin offs rely heavily on carrying their name).
  • Likewise making up a name entirely, which conversely, often seems like the most creative approach is also, typically a ‘glass empty’ start point. Whether you’re ‘Diageo’ or ‘Velcro’ or ‘Wii’ you’ve got to invest to create meaning.
  • A slightly more ‘glass half full’ approach is when you choose to use a strong cue from the category you are entering (assuming the category is established): e.g. Crunchy Nut Cornflakes, Dairy Milk, Home Bargains…
  • …but when suggestion of the product benefits is added, with a sprinkle of emotion the glass fills a little more. Take the soft furnishings and curtain company, ‘A Room with a View’ for example.
  • Recent trends include single word names that are weighty and loaded e.g. Loaf, Gusto, Guu as well as interesting pairings e.g. Wolf & Badger, Fable & Eve, Bricks & Stitches that work well together and the more personal approach where the consumer is made to feel intrinsic to the name, such as Bio & Me or Me&Em.
  • And layer over this whether you’re creating a new master brand, or a brand extension, or if you’re rebranding…. it really becomes alchemy not science.

So, where you should start?

Firstly, and most importantly you have to remember that any name, no matter how wonderful is a fairly empty vessel that has to be filled with all the things you want associated with it. Brands are built not born fully formed.

Second, start from a clear positioning. This will give you a broad direction and help you understand the best approaches to consider – half empty, empty or full.

Third, be realistic about time and investment. The name is a critical part of creating a company or brand, but it will only become known as you invest hard graft and your not-so-filthy-lucre in it.

The Crow Flies can help build your brand’s strategic foundations – be it creating a brand from scratch, or deciding where to go in the future. Get this right, and the naming pathway becomes a little easier to see.

 

Gael Laurie is Brand Building Director of The Crow Flies, a research, strategy and innovation company that helps brands find a direct route to long lasting success. If naming is perplexing you, get in touch: gael@thecrowflies.co.uk; +44 (0) 1889 725670; www.thecrowflies.co.uk; @crowflieshigh. Copyright 2024