Branding in Financial Services
Issue
This well-known UK financial institution completed the takeover of an equally well-known competitor.
The Board’s challenge was to identify a positioning, proposition and product range for each of the two brands that would enable both to sit side by side on the high street without cannibalising each other’s business or customer base.
A number of outline, proposition ‘candidates’ had already been developed.
Solution
Brandspeak was brought in to conduct a programme of qualitative research capable of:
- Identifying the most appropriate proposition, positioning and brand essence for each brand
- Defining the core product set – including key features and benefits – most appropriate for each
- Understanding the hierarchy of service expectations these new propositions and positionings gave rise to – also by brand
Brandspeak was also asked to conduct employee consultations with the staff of both brands in order to:
- Identify their concerns and issues regarding the takeover
- Finalise the detail of the communications strategies capable of:
- Informing and reassuring tens of thousands of staff
- Enabling staff to explain the implications of the takeover clearly and succinctly to customers and colleagues
Brandspeak conducted a total of 20 focus groups and 10 employee workshops across the two brands.
The qualitative work was followed by a comprehensive programme of quantitative research with both customers and employees, in order to establish awareness and satisfaction benchmarks for ongoing monitoring.
Outcome
The project was debriefed to the Board. The debrief recommended numerous changes to both brands and product ranges.
The research was also used as the basis for a series of animated videos to be shown internally as part of several training programmes that were created during the period of the merger and consolidation.