• by John Gaffney , July 3, 2002

Media planners and buyers need to be more tapped into their account’s overall brand strategy, according to a new study from New York consulting firm Prophet.

For all the hype over a brand's importance as a key differentiator in today’s hyper-competitive marketplace, Prophet says the best practices identified at the corporate marketing level don’t find their way outside the corporation. So often the planners and buyers and even creative personnel at an agency are unaware of “big picture strategies” as they work on the brand’s ad campaign. The situation continues to limit the brand’s potential to drive business growth, according to the study.

“I think planners and buyers should feel great about the fact that their work in the early and middle stages of building a brand is still critical to brand development,” says Prophet partner Tim Munoz, who spent 11 years on the agency side of branding. “But later in the game, when you get down to the really tough work, agency people need to be more in tune with the overall concepts that the client had in mind. By doing that, the buyer becomes more important to the agency and the client.”

The Best Practices Study found that the concept of brand strategy is too often paid only lip service. Of the 90 global corporations surveyed, only a small majority (53%) has a long-term brand strategy (LTBS) in place, and of that number, only 40% are "very" satisfied with it. That satisfaction can't come, however, unless senior management leads the way and embraces brand's role as a strategic imperative, according to Prophet. And the study shows that has yet to occur: 62% of respondents cited lack of senior management support as the most pressing threat to brand's long-term success, manifested by lack of funding (68%); lack of understanding of what brand stands for (45%); and insufficient long-term financial rewards for brand successes (32%).

At the planning and buying level, Munoz says value added components of advertising relationships will become more important to communicating brand strategies. “Media planners have always looked beyond the buy to that extra page or extra service that a media company can provide,” he said. “In today’s world those are more important than ever. Media planners have a chance to revolutionize the business by tasking advantage of relationships with media companies to create a closer link with the brand customer.”

Convincing senior management of the link between brand strength and financial results can't be achieved unless the appropriate measurement tools are in place, according to Prophet. Only 35% of the responding firms said they measure brand value/equity, despite such findings as Total Research's EquiTrend study showing that businesses with the largest gains in brand equity realized an average return on investment of 30%, whereas those with the largest losses in brand equity saw their ROI average negative 10%.

Respondents whose senior management teams were ranked as having the strongest commitment to brand building attributed more of their brand strength to investments made into human resources and training (52% versus 22% among those whose senior management had little commitment to brand).