Lean Brands

Catch Customers, Drive Growth, and Stand Out in All Markets

Luis Pedroza

• Publisher: Career Press
• Year: 2020
• Print ISBN:
  9781632651655
• eBook ISBN:
  9781632657671
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Advertising
• Index: Business

"Everything you need to know to take your brand global. And going global is not an option today. That's where your future market is going to be." —Al Ries, author of Positioning and The 22 Immutable Laws of Branding

"Filled with vivid, relevant case studies, Luis shows that brand success in tough global markets comes from having deep market knowledge, being lean and agile, creating real, meaningful differentiation, and executing creatively using tools that work. I was impressed by the ideas and guidance from this book and you will be as well." —David Aaker, vice chair of Prophet and author of Strategic Market Management

"Luis shows what it takes to win in an increasingly multipolar world. Spiced with great examples, he brings to life the simple wisdom of what it takes to be locally relevant and globally efficient in building brands." —Paul Polman, CEO of Unilever

"A must-read for every manager of global brands." —Gerard J. Tellis, Neely Chair, American Enterprise, and Director of the Center for Global Innovation, USC Marshall School of Business

There's no denying it. Business has become global, yet few people we meet in our everyday lives have any actual international experience to share. Markets are increasingly messy and rapidly evolving. Leaders know that they need to adapt, but they are usually too busy—and they're unsure about what exactly to change.

Lean Brands provides a lean, agile approach to building global brands, helping you 1) quickly analyze your environment; 2) create a differentiated and meaningful brand positioning; and 3) bring your brand strategy to life on the ground, where it counts. You'll learn how to "recon" and take advantage of weaknesses of your competition, as well as hone in on what will work in new markets to make sure you are memorable.

Part 1

Assemble Your Toolkit

The Ninja 1

“Ninjas don't wish upon a star, they throw them.”

—Jarius Raphel

So what do ninjas have to do with global brand building? For me, ninja warfare provides a perfect metaphor for the scrappy kind of lean marketing that is required to enter and unlock growth in foreign markets. I am not talking about the way ninjas are typically portrayed in Hollywood, infiltrating enemy lines and assassinating emperors under the cover of night. And, I'm definitely not saying that you need to kill anyone. What I am talking about is getting inside the head of your enemies (your competition) and devising a plan of attack to beat them.

What Do Ninjas Do?

Ninjas practiced Ninjutsu, an ancient form of warfare used in feudal Japan. Ninjutsu required that warriors prepare for battle using a strict methodology that relied heavily on intelligence gathering and strategy creation.¹ Ninja fighters were trained experts in reconnaissance, so they could thoroughly scout an enemy and understand its strengths and weaknesses before exploiting what they had learned to create a competitive advantage.

Jinichi Kawakami is the sixty-seven-year-old head of the five-hundred-year-old Koka ninja clan and teaches a business course at Mie University in Tsu, Japan. According to Kawakami, “Ninja[s] were skilled in many arts, but one of the most important has always been collecting information about your opposition. That is just as important in the world of business today as it was in the feudal era hundreds of years ago.”²

Ninjutsu is actually a type of guerrilla combat in which smaller groups of faster-moving fighters were able to take advantage of larger, slower-moving armies. That's because established armies, like established brands, tend to be slow and predictable. When entering international markets, global brands are often tempted to replicate their existing structure, brand associations, and value proposition, hoping what worked before will work again. Unfortunately, this kind of wishful thinking is almost always suboptimal because it is predictable, doesn't take advantage of being new, and assumes that the brand will have the same level of support in the new market as it did back home.

Like the global brand builder who is asked to enter a foreign market to compete against larger, more established local brands, ninjas had fewer resources than the established armies they faced. That's why both ninjas and global brand builders benefit from engaging in guerrilla-style, asymmetrical warfare to gain a competitive advantage.³

To win in a foreign market, you almost always have to adapt your brand's value proposition to meet the needs of local consumers and stakeholders. Like a ninja, take advantage of the predictability of established brands and learn from their mistakes and weaknesses.

Nestlé China

Nestlé China learned from the earlier mistakes made by Kellogg to improve its launch of breakfast cereals into China.

Early on in my career at General Mills, I accepted an expat assignment in China working for a joint venture between Nestlé and General Mills. I led a successful launch of Nestlé breakfast cereals into China following a failed attempt by Kellogg in the early 1990s.

Kellogg's big mistake was trying to build the cereal category in China the same way it had in the United States in the 1940s. Back then, the popularity of eating breakfast cereal started to grow in America, as companies like Kellogg positioned cereals to adults as a convenient way to eat grains. Grains were known to be nutritious, and breakfast cereals, unlike oatmeal that required cooking, was “ready-to-eat” right out of the box (see Figure 1.1). In the 1950s, Kellogg and General Mills started leveraging the nutritional equity they had built and added more sweetness to appeal to Baby Boomer children.

Following its existing playbook, Kellogg entered China and started targeting adults with unsweetened corn flakes, rice flakes, and wheat flakes positioned as nutritious. However, Chinese adults were not looking for new nutritious breakfast solutions. They already had their traditional Chinese diet.

As my team at Nestlé prepared to enter the breakfast cereal market, we noticed how China's one-child policy had created a nation of single-child families and thought we could use this to our advantage. We discovered that the parents and grandparents of these “little emperors” were extremely motivated to find nutritious breakfast options to help their children grow up healthy. We also found that mothers in China, like their counterparts all over the world, struggled to get their children to eat a nutritious breakfast before sending them off to school. Kids in China were just as picky as kids in America and also enjoyed eating breakfast cereals because of the fun shapes, texture, and sweetness.

So when we launched breakfast cereals into China, it was with an adapted portfolio of nutritious products that we knew Chinese kids would enjoy eating. Our battle cry was “Moms trust it; kids love it.” Nestlé breakfast cereals eventually grew to become the category leader in China (see Figure 1.2).

Figure 1.1. Photo of vintage 1951 Cheerios print advertisement. Photo credit: Amy Hsu

Figure 1.2. Original launch packaging for Nestlé Milk & Egg Stars, 2003. Photo credit: Amy Hsu

Plan Your Attack

1. Identify the attributes that your competitors are committed to, the ones that would be difficult for them to change. How can you use that immobility to your advantage?
2. Predict how the existing brands in the market will react to your entry. How did they react to new entrants in the past?
3. Study and learn from the mistakes competitors made when entering the market before you.

See the New Battleground 2

“Some people don't like change, but you need to embrace change if the alternative is disaster.”

—Elon Musk

Building a differentiated brand in a foreign market requires agility. Each time you prepare to enter a new market, you must revalidate your industry assumptions and be willing to reframe your perspective of the competitive landscape. So get ready to unpack your assumptions and prepare to be surprised.

Reframe Your Perspective

The truth is, you can't just flip a switch and change your paradigm. So here is an exercise to help you gain a fresh perspective on your competition. List out the major assumptions that underpin how you operate in your home market. Then, validate that they still apply to the new market you are trying to enter. Pay particular attention to

1. The T...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Acknowledgments
• Contents
• The Pre-Journey
• Part 1: Assemble Your Toolkit
• Part 2: Define Your Strategy
• Part 3: Bring It to Life
• Conclusion: The Secret Traditions of the Global Brand Builder
• Notes
• Index
• About the Author