A true Leader means you are perceived as the true intellectual powerhouse of your category. It means that you have the command of the issues impacting the vitality of the markets you serve, not just their needs. It means… you do more than sell them stuff. It means you are the one others follow… but often our leadership potential gets masked in the daily “noise”, challenges and occasional pitfalls that business will spring on us.
A perfect example of BrandBreath was the work completed for a major health benefits organization. That company had recently encountered issues that threatened its ability to survive. They installed a new claims adjudication system that wasn’t implemented properly. As a result, claims resolution got worse and the company started losing its Fortune 500 clients. Negative word of mouth spread and this started to accelerate. No CFO or CHRO wanted to be in the position of defending continued use of the client. Clients were leaving and the pipeline was drying up. Meanwhile, public perceptions of its core business continue to erode and costs for various chronic and behavioral conditions contribute negatively to the financial solvency of this great brand.
Prices couldn’t be raised to cover the problems unique to this company and traditional marketing of meaningless commercials would make matters worse. What to do?
Key insight: share your thought leadership with us?
It was time to inhale… take a deep breath and look for some real insights. Asking questions that get deeper into the brain is what was called for. We spoke to clients… not the ones leaving… but the ones staying… and wanted to know… Why Would You Stay With Us? Ponder that a moment and the reveal it would provide. Leaving this company as a client was easy… staying was hard, so it would have to reveal something very special about the company and it did! Those that stayed said this company had the best thought leaders in the business but doesn’t share that enough with their clients. Those thought leaders would help clients stay ahead in their jobs, and as a result, select clients were willing to ride out the storm.
VitaL Issues
So the next step was to identify the common vital issues shared by the company and its clients. A common theme was the impact that certain chronic and behavioral conditions were having on cost factors as well as employee productivity. That analysis centered around the following issues:
- Gender and ethnic disparities, mainly women’s heart disease
- Childhood obesity
- Infant prematurity
- Afflictions of the Brain: addictions, depression, etc.
VitaL Targets
There are many points of contact in the health benefits business, with many influencers, advocates and adversaries. They all needed to be taken into account and included, namely:
- Leaders and experts on Human Capital management
- Government leaders
- The medical community
- The scientific community
- Key members of the press and media
VitaL Alliances
To be credible, this company couldn’t go out on its own – it wouldn’t have been perceived as credible given its category and problems. So thought was given to the organizations to partner with that would have credibility with those VitaL Targets. They include major non-profits focusing in the designated areas of chronic and behavioral conditions. And an alliance was struck with a major scientific academic organization populated with Noble Prize winning scientists in the area of brain studies.
VitaL Program
From there a thoroughly integrated program was implemented focusing not only on the sponsoring health benefits company, but also on all the key alliance interests. The centerpiece was a thought leadership symposia held at the academic institution featuring the prominent members of the participating non profits and leaders from the VitaL Targets list. The program was also featured in sponsored editorial in major media and key business decision makers of client and prospect firms were invited to participate in the sessions. This program was also driven through the sales channel of the client firm allowing positive focus on issues impacting business. In turn, the sales channel reaped the benefit of a value add offering and being personal thought leaders themselves.
VitaL Scorecard: More for less!
For this firm:
- sales erosion was halted and an uptick began
- focus was placed on mutual challenges vs. the problem within the client company — giving time for the company to fix the problem
- brand perceptions grew, in spite of a 50% budget cut! — oh yeah I forgot to mention that part!!
This is NOT Just for the Big Brands
This approach is relevant for companies of all sizes and in all categories. While this client is a Fortune 100 company, smaller brands have much more maneuverability and can use BrandBreath to breath easier and get ahead of the situation! BrandBreath helped identify those vital alliances that actually did the heavy lifting for this client firm, just imagine what it can do for you!
