This article reflects information as of 2021. For the latest details, please contact us.
Written by:
Hello! Today I'll write about the importance of building corporate brand power — and within that, I'll focus on BtoB companies. This article draws on "Koho Kaigi (PR Conference), December 2021 issue."
1. Trends in Corporate Branding
Interbrand Japan, which provides branding services, introduces the top 100 Japanese companies by brand value each year in "Best Japan Brands."
https://www.interbrandjapan.com/ja/index.html
When the company interviewed representatives at 58 of the ranked companies, roughly 90% answered:
"The managerial significance of corporate brand is being further strengthened, and its role is becoming more important."
Several factors lie behind this. One is that companies are being pressed by the need for "globalization." Furthermore, amid today's unstable situation caused by the virus, the role that corporate brand plays seems to be growing for both customers (business partners) and companies. From the customer (business partner) side, whether a company is engaged in socially significant activities — its aspirations, SDGs, ESG, and so on — not just its products and services, is becoming one of the reasons for brand selection. As a result, corporate brand is growing in importance as a means of conveying a company's purpose and philosophy. And for companies themselves, corporate brand is growing in importance as a place to return to and as a means of increasing employees' sense of cohesion. The items that the interviewed companies emphasize are summarized as follows:
**7 TIPS for brand growth that leading brands emphasize
- Brand is an "important management resource" / "part of corporate value"
- The increasingly emphasized role of the corporate brand
- Deploying a series of purpose-based branding activities
- "Customer-centric" — accurately grasping shifts in customer awareness and applying them to management
- Becoming a more meaningful presence to society
- Continuously changing and evolving the brand. "Willful transformation" decides the outcome
- The importance of "internal engagement" to execute the above more effectively and generate results**
Purpose is featured in "Sendenkaigi (Advertising Conference), December 2021 issue," published by Sendenkaigi, which also publishes the reference material for this article. Please take a look as a reference. They're good at selling, aren't they...
Interviews with 58 companies ranked in the Japanese corporate brand-value ranking:
https://www.interbrandjapan.com/ja/bjb-ranking/japanbrands-2021-interview
2. Corporate Brand for BtoB Brands
As mentioned above, the importance of corporate brand is rising as a trend, but for BtoB companies, the managerial significance of strengthening corporate brand was originally large. Let's look at why, from the standpoint of the differences from BtoC business. Both BtoB and BtoC have a "purchase decision-maker." In BtoC business, this is often the same person as the "decision-maker" who wants to use the service or buy the product. In BtoB business, by contrast, not just the person who directly receives the service, but also the procurement/purchasing department, executives, and other approvers often become involved in decision-making. In other words, in BtoB business the "purchase decision-makers" can be considered more multilayered and wide-ranging. As a result, not only the functions and performance of the product or service, but the "reputation" arising from the company's activities can be said to connect to the trust of multiple purchase decision-makers. The Tokyo Stock Exchange will also restructure its market segments from 2022. As the newly established examination items include a company's environmental and social activities such as ESG, governance factors are becoming more important in the investment world, too. It can be said that raising corporate brand and gaining a good reputation is becoming more important.
3. The Process of Raising Brand Value
The process of raising a company's brand value differs according to each company's management situation and challenges. However, for convenience, I'll classify it into four main processes and lay out the keys to success.
1️⃣ Define the core concept of the corporate brand (Be it) First, define the brand's distinctive promise. This isn't just about creating words — because it will also guide subsequent business activities, you must define something beneficial to each business, too. As I've noted several times in this article, you must also include the perspective of how you'll be of use to the world (SDGs, ESG, sustainability, and so on). In recent requests from BtoB companies to Interbrand Japan for help formulating a management vision, there are apparently more that ask for one that includes sustainability.
2️⃣ Put the company's core concept into practice (Do it) This is a step aimed at building up, as actual business reality, the corporate-brand thinking defined in the core concept — it corresponds to business activities themselves. What matters is instilling the defined corporate brand deeply enough that each and every employee can judge and act on their own initiative. Because corporate branding is business activity itself, all employees are bearers of, and protagonists in, brand building. However, there are many cases where those not involved when the core concept was formulated, or certain departments, perceive the brand as distant and unrelated to themselves. What becomes important there is "internal PR" and "internal engagement activities." Internal PR is needed that deepens understanding and leads to action — showing employees how much raising the corporate brand benefits their own work, and how it can be achieved.
3️⃣ Spread the core concept through people's experiences and impressions (Say it) This is a phase aimed at customers (business partners) experiencing and feeling the corporate brand and spreading it. This phase calls for approaches unique to BtoB companies. One difference between BtoB and BtoC approaches is the difference in the touchpoints where the corporate brand is experienced. BtoB communication is more wide-ranging than BtoC communication in terms of its specialty domains and targets. Conceivable touchpoints are many, including websites, trade publications, exhibitions and events, and various marketing activities. It becomes important to carefully identify and select the methods suited to the target and their specialty domain.
4️⃣ Evaluate while gaining insights, and turn the PDCA cycle (Know it) Finally, a PDCA cycle — grasping the effectiveness of the whole set of activities while gaining insights from the target, and revising as needed — is indispensable to the branding process. Lastly, let me quote a summary of 1️⃣ through 4️⃣.
To summarize, for BtoB companies the managerial significance of engaging in branding is great, and whether or not it succeeds can be said to be the dividing point of whether a company can achieve sustained growth in this uncertain era. Clearly define each company's own "core way of thinking," foster understanding and internalization until it truly sinks in internally, and give it concrete form externally through actual reality.
4. Real Examples
Briefly, let me introduce a few examples of BtoB corporate branding.
Shimizu Corporation: Hitowaza!
https://www.shimz.co.jp/hitowaza/
This is an owned-media site that introduces, through articles and videos, the construction site of the "Toranomon-Azabudai Project" that Shimizu Corporation is currently involved in. In 2020, the company formulated its mid-term digital strategy 2020, "shimz Digital General Contractor." To advance it, it conceptualized the strategy's elements and announced them in July 2021.
https://www.shimz.co.jp/company/about/news-release/2021/2021023.html
The path has three parts: "Digital that supports monozukuri," "Monozukuri through digital," and "Providing digital spaces and services." As part of "Monozukuri through digital," Hitowaza was born to promote the increasingly digitalized construction site.
J-POWER: Depicting "employees" through an anime CM and manga
https://www.jpower.co.jp/powertoyou/
This is a CM depicting the work of each of eight employees of the J-POWER Group. Mr. Asami of the company's PR Office in the Public Relations Department describes its aim as follows:
To protect people's daily lives through the stable supply of energy. And to demonstrate the corporate stance of seriously tackling climate-change response and the realization of a sustainable society, thereby raising awareness of the group as a whole.
The CM was conceived as something that evokes not just the company name but positive empathy toward the company. Also, on the web, it's set up so you can read the manga of each of the eight characters in turn. Currently, two episodes are published. There's intent in the publication order, too: it starts with employees working on the existing power-generation and transmission businesses, continues to employees working on business expansion at home and abroad, and ends with an employee working on the technological development of hydrogen energy. The company says it was mindful of the publication order so that the wide range of businesses the group works on — from work protecting living and daily life to a stance toward the society of the future — would come across with a positive image. The company has announced "J-POWER 'BLUE MISSION 2050.'" It's a roadmap that aims for zero carbon-dioxide emissions from the power-generation business by 2050 and shows the expansion of renewable energy, the use of hydrogen energy, and more. Mr. Asami describes this announcement as follows:
As a group, it has become our company-wide strategy for working toward decarbonization, so we plan to continue PR activities based on this mission going forward.
I believe that by conveying that we're facing the same direction as the direction society is aiming for — specifically, that our products and services have social significance — we can gain more empathy and support from consumers.
You can sense the intent of branding while being mindful of social significance.
5. In Closing
Centering on BtoB companies, I've written about the importance of raising corporate brand. Again, this article draws on the following.
https://mag.sendenkaigi.com/feature/kouhou/kk202112/
The BtoB corporate branding that's stuck with me personally might be Taisei Corporation's. You've probably heard it, too. "Sorry. I can't make the reunion. I'm in Singapore right now."
https://www.taisei.co.jp/about_us/library/cm/tvcm/
It's a really memorable CM! I have almost no connection to that industry myself, yet I feel very close to it. The director seems to be Makoto Shinkai. This probably counts as a success example, too. As mentioned earlier, due to the impact of things like the Tokyo Stock Exchange's market-segment restructuring, corporate branding that includes sustainability is becoming important. I'd be glad if you'd use this as an opportunity to review it. Thank you for reading!