Avoid your competitors’ strength, attack their weakness

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In my first post of this “Engage” series on my blog, I spoke about the need to engage the target market with a defined Brand Experience that allows them to clearly see (by you firstly drawing them closer and attracting their interest), understand (the fit between their life and your Brand) and then adopt your Brand Value Proposition into their life.

What’s naturally needed is for you to do this by cleverly taking advantage of your strengths and not necessarily just by attacking the competition (or the consumer for that matter) with a “we’re better because we do this; offer that; etc.” campaign.

In his book “The Art of War”, Sun Tzu talks about seizing the advantage through 6 principles and this post focusses on his 2nd principle – that a winning strategy needs to follow the course and learnings of water “as flowing water avoids the heights and hastens to the lowlands, so an army avoids strength and strikes weakness” (Sun Tzu).

In my view, the best way to strike a winning strategy with the consumer is to focus on the areas and things that matter most – those that will have the biggest impact in your campaign and which are relatively free and open (the “lowlands”) from a competitive point of view.

If you’ve missed the boat and your competitor has already taken an angle that you’d like to focus on, its probably better defining a new approach than tackling the competitor head-on with the same message.

Not only will it be an expensive exercise – as you will have to go toe-to-toe in marketing spend, if not outspend the competitor to beat them with the same value proposition (refer to my previous post on the laundry war) – but you will not be carving out your own emotional territory and path with the consumer that will give your Brand that real, relevant and authentic place in their life.

This naturally comes out of having an innate understanding of your consumer, NOT writing what YOU think it is that YOU understand about them or what you’d like your Brand to represent of them, but going the extra mile to seriously understand the good, the bad and the ugly of what THEY THINK of your Brand category, your Brand and what it is in their life that will allow you to build a campaign of relevance, authenticity and clarity.

The consumers view must be built into everything you do and being able to identify those “lowland” strategic points for your Brand to take, will result in a more effective marketing campaign that is faster in winning them over. (Note: Your Brand has to deliver against your Brand promise though!)

A few examples of who, I think, have been doing an excellent job in this regard is Unilever Dove and Heineken and I share these insights below.

Dove “Real Beauty”

Dove adopted a strategy of bringing their Brand Experience of “real (inner) beauty” to life through a range of authentic stories of real consumers and their challenges around beauty. They didn’t focused on the “this product will make your skin soft; make you look beautiful; etc.” but rather got the consumer to see and understand that their beauty lies importantly within them and that Dove is really a function of accentuating their own internal beauty.

These Dove stories have resonated with the consumer, not because it has been the Brand pushing “false” and “fake” hope to an already confidence lacking audience, but rather as a result of them telling a story of the consumer and how she can feel better about herself. Its more authentic about the consumer and less “hard-core” functionality from the Brand.

In other words, they didn’t compete on the high ground of beauty where every other Brand is playing, but have rather carved out a story that is not only real and relevant to the consumer, but is now Dove owned!

Have a look at the Dove “You’re more than you think” (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=litXW91UauE&spfreload=10) and the Dove “Beauty is a State of Mind” stories (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EGDMXvdwN5c) to see how they did this.

Note that they have had a combined 27 million views of these two pieces of content on YouTube. People have related to them, they have touched an emotional trigger of their target market and have then used it as a “lowland” area of opportunity to attack the market and build value for their Brand.

Heineken Champions Planet

Heineken are certainly not the first, nor will they be the last Brand to sponsor soccer (football). There are so many Brands out there doing it, resulting in it just becoming a “slapping a Brand on a billboard” exercise, with little leverage and Brand value really taken from the spend associated to the sponsorship.

Through their sponsorship of the EUEFA Champions league, Heineken have, however, woven their Brand into the passion of the consumers’ life and well beyond that of a pull-back or logo on a TV screen or billboard.

They’ve used their sponsorship to deliver ‘random acts of kindness’ to their consumers and then used these experiences as stories in a content marketing strategy to leverage their sponsorship.

They haven’t taken the same “high-ground” approach as what everyone else does, by just bringing the game to the people (via their televisions), but have made them (the consumer) the center of their sponsorship – not the team or the player (which are the shiny objects)…. but the consumer.

I share below a few examples to illustrate how they have done this, noting that there are many examples of Heineken consistently driving this approach of their EUEFA Champions League sponsorship over the last 6 to 8 years.

1. Heineken – The Decision: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nce5GU-TnEQ&list=PL1rxvfq_wFsJSKDgFsmPDxECm-vQoQJ5g&index=5&spfreload=10
2. Heineken – The Negotiation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nf1u6s-LQq4&spfreload=10
3. Heineken – Champions League Vs Classical Concert: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tEqJV1acgN4&spfreload=10

Key Learnings to avoid your competitors’ strengths and to attack their weaknesses

1. Have a good innate understanding of your consumer – not desk top insights or what you think they are, but deep insight into what makes them tick.
   • You must be able to undentify those “lowland” areas of opportunity from which you can then strategically attack the market.
2. Don’t be arrogant to think that your Brand is better than the competition and will hence be successful just because this is your opinion.
   • Build real and meaningful value for it by making it the center of the consumers’ universe in everything you do (and this is built off having an innate understanding of your consumer).
3. Tap into the consumers’ emotions and passion points to ensure you engage them with meaning and relevance.
4. Leverage your sponsorships – don’t expect the money you pay for the rights (to be a sponsor) to be enough to do the job alone. Thats wishful thinking.
5. Use the Live experience people have with your Brand in a content marketing strategy that goes beyond just a generic ATL campaign.
   • Plan to capture your Live experience content before you start, so that it is a function of your campaign and not a poorly executed after thought.