ASIA'S TOP 1000 BRANDS: Brand personality traits

DIGITALLY SAVVY BRAND: AIR ASIA

Considered an early adopter of social media in advertising in Asia, the brand successfully manages to create buzz through networking platforms in local markets. Last year, the brand topped Campaign Asia-Pacific’s Top Digital Brands study in the Malaysian market, yet it wasn’t listed among the top 10 digital spenders. The brand has managed to achieve high conversion rates thanks to its in-depth understanding of digital media to reach its target audience. Its recent ‘The Midas touch’ campaign is a good example of how the brand used search to promote its first long-haul flight to London. Combining branded key words with Asian destinations and having presence when users searched for AirAsia’s competitors, AirAsia X managed to receive US$165 for every $1 spent.

DIGITALLY SAVVY BRAND: HEINEKEN

The brand has produced some extremely interesting initiatives, from its Facebook million fan rewards, live iPhone football betting, to the ever-so-famous AC Milan vs Real Madrid Champions League concert/match in 2010. Despite a somewhat uncoordinated approach, the brand really embraces digital in consumer spirit and proper brand values spirit.

DIGITALLY SAVVY BRAND: NIKE

Nike is still ahead of the pack in terms of utilising digital to connect. Nike Run was probably the best consumer initiative to integrate consumers, technology and social in a completely coordinated approach. Following the launch of the Nike Kobe VII System campaign, Mindshare rolled out the Nike Social DNA, a new digital dynamic messaging platform. The agency rolled out three series for Nike, Kobe VII achieved 179 per cent more clicks; the ‘Nike women amazing’ campaign achieved a phenomenal 651 per cent additional clicks, while Nike Football ‘My time is now’ campaign raised the bar to 683 per cent.

DIGITALLY SAVVY BRAND: BURBERRY

In many respects, Burberry can be considered one of the first luxury brands to spur the industry into adopting digital media in its advertising and marketing mix. Boasting a Facebook following of 12 million, a twitter following of 800,000 and garnering 12 million views on its Youtube channel, Burberry has attributed its strong results in 2011 to “continued investment in innovative design, digital marketing, and retail strategies”, according to its CEO Angela Ahrendts. Burberry has consistently stunned the luxury fashion industry with its aggressive digital push, from showcasing influential bloggers to 3D catwalk shows in an industry infamous for being stubborn and preferring to stick to traditional ways of marketing.

DIGITALLY SAVVY BRAND: STARHUB

As a fully-fledged telecoms company and the second largest mobile operator in Singapore, StarHub does not rest on its laurels when it comes to rolling out campaigns and initiatives that keep digital to the fore. From its recent purchase of the domain name ‘.starhub’, to its Cannes Lions and Spikes Asia 2011 award-winning musical fitting rooms and its equally award-winning launching of a geo-targeted music website in partnership with MTV, the brand is always thinking of new ways to connect with its Singaporean consumer base — undoubtedly among the most digitally savvy and technologically hungry consumers in Asia.

INNOVATIVE BRAND: SINA

Although not entirely original in its concept, Weibo has combined the best of Twitter and Facebook to become China’s leading social media platform. To say it has achieved critical mass would be an understatement. The most important thing about brands like Sina Weibo is that they provide an ‘open’ forum for discourse and debate where none existed before.

INNOVATIVE BRAND: APPLE

As predictable as this may sound, innovation and Apple are synonymous. It may not be an Asian brand, but it certainly has cachet in this region and has been embraced with fervent enthusiasm. There are great innovations coming out of Japan and Korea, but nobody packages the brand experience the way Apple does. The brand has thrived as a result of this trait, and its future success will very much depend on whether it can continue to deliver on this.

INNOVATIVE BRAND: UNIQLO

Another category shaker, Uniqlo has become what Benetton was in the 1980s — modern, hip and super-efficient. Their inventory management is astonishing, and their brand has an unapologetic simplicity that only the Japanese can pull off. While their products are priced affordably, their marketing has two key traits that tend to set them apart from other high street brands. The first is a commitment to sustaining the Uniqlo T-shirts line, where the brand engages in design licensing partnerships with prolific, up-and-coming and quirky artists to create limited edition T-shirts. And because the partnerships are short-lived, this provides something exciting and new all the time. Secondly, it’s the way the brand constantly finds new ways through new media to engage and keep the conversations up about the brand.

INNOVATIVE BRAND: SAMSUNG

You cannot select the most innovative brands without mentioning Samsung’s accomplishments over the past few years. Aside from having a strong retail presence and above-the-line marketing, the brand has been able to create desirability by being innovative and differentiating its products from its competitors. Simply looking at the Galaxy Tab, its functionality and user experience is what sets it apart from the iPad — something that other Apple rivals have been unable to achieve.

INNOVATIVE BRAND: GOOGLE

Google is always finding new ways to draw on its brand to expand its offerings and generate cash from new revenue sources. From mobile operating systems to mobile wallets, its latest bid sees the company rolling out a DoubleClick Digital Marketing dashboard, which aims to consolidate the online advertising ecosystem for advertisers and agencies in an attempt to grab a slice of the money they are still spending offline.

YOUTHFUL BRAND: PEPSI

Pepsi has always had very strong integrated campaigns that generate high levels of excitement and engagement across Asia. In recent years, it has made increasing use of digital, including its own YouTube channels, to broaden its reach and appeal. The brand has also ensured that its campaigns contain a community angle, such as the ‘Thirst heroes’ campaign in China and ‘Bottle light’ in the Philippines, which enables Pepsi to connect with the youths of Asia by giving them a voice and helping them effect social change.

YOUTHFUL BRAND: ADIDAS

Adidas does a confident job when getting in the ring with its nemesis Nike. The potency of adidas’ appeal lies in how the brand has mastered the fusion of sport and street culture to deliver a truly unique youth-engagement model. Football is blended with dizzying skateboard skills and pop stars mixed with off-the-hook house parties. As a result, adidas is able to harness a highly relevant and youth-defining energy, which exists everywhere from locker rooms to nightclubs.

YOUTHFUL BRAND: FACEBOOK

A lot of Facebook’s youthful spirit can be traced back to its founder Mark Zuckerberg. Aside from launching the social networking service from a college dorm room, at 28 years old, Zuckerberg has already been named one of the wealthiest and most influential people in the world, even winning Time magazine’s Person of the Year in 2010. Everything about the brand screams it is young. The brand itself only launched in 2004, but quickly and fundamentally changed the way people communicated. Its original target audience was also the young — anyone aged between 13 and 22. And even as the brand continues to mature, its youthful company culture is often pictured led by its hoodie-wearing CEO and staff stationed at Facebook’s headquarters.

YOUTHFUL BRAND: GREE

As Japan’s largest social network, the brand focuses primarily on mobile games — about 90 per cent of its users access the site via their mobile phones. One of the primary ways the company makes money is by selling virtual goods to users for their in-game avatars. The nature of the business therefore lends itself nicely to the youth audience, which is generally more willing to express themselves in the blogging sphere, and tend to have a stronger obsession with gaming.

YOUTHFUL BRAND: CHUPA CHUPS

From its product packaging to the stardom status of its puppet mascot Chuck, Chupa Chups’ entire outreach strategy has a youthful vibe about it. Its campaigns exude fun, energy and humour while promoting the idea that people should take life a little less seriously. Perhaps the brand itself was truly the inspiration for its recent ‘Life less serious’ campaign. The brand’s use of social media and online games speaks volumes about the target audience it wants to reach. In fact, its agency BBH recently committed the brand’s intellectual property and provided seed money to game developers in exchange for revenue cuts from any games developed. The brand can’t be faulted for its commitment towards reaching the youth, and finding ways to stay youthful itself.

HARD-WORKING BRAND: FEDEX

The ‘We live to deliver’ campaign successfully conveyed the idea of the brand’s ‘superhuman’ spirit. The campaign portrayed not just hardworking values, but also oozed a brand personality that is efficient and smart. It served to convince customers of the can-do spirit of its service staff, regardless of the odds, barriers or challenges that they might face on behalf of their clients, so they can always rely on FedEx.

HARD-WORKING BRAND: COCA-COLA

Hardly any other brand works as tirelessly to connect with consumers. Its Chok! Chok! Chok! Campaign, done by McCann for Coca-Cola China, transformed the traditional TVC into an exciting experience by building a mobile app that invited people to swing, or ‘chok’, their phones in front of their TV screens to catch tumbling bottle caps. The interactive gaming promotion became the most successful branded app ever launched in Hong Kong. The hype from the campaign saw penetration rates jumping from 78 to 83 per cent. The campaign scooped a bronze for most effective use of direct marketing at the Festival of Asian Marketing Effectiveness this year, and a Grand Kam Fan Award in 2011.

HARD-WORKING BRAND: CITIBANK

The bank that never sleeps is an obvious choice for a brand that exudes a hard-working spirit. Running around the international clock to ensure your money is working hard for you, the brand itself is always finding new ways to offer fresh services that make life easier for its customers. From retail concept inspired bank branches to an online service division that boasts one of the most successful in the industry claiming about 15 million users, the bank has managed to pull itself out of the maladies of the financial crisis paying off all its loans, in fact first quarter net income at the bank for Asia was US$1.1 billion, up 18 per cent year on year.

HARD-WORKING BRAND: SKII

The incessant quest for perfection makes the miracle of SKII desirable amongst professional women who work hard to fight against the inevitable forces of aging every day. The brand speaks to its target group because just as they have to work hard to climb the corporate ladder, the brand is also working hard to create products that are seen as a companion to a woman’s life journey, to strive for youth and beauty while juggling all other responsibilities at the same time. Its target market – the high-income, affluent woman – demands that the brand works hard to search for new formulas and technology to boost its skin care range, and its marketing often reflects this quest, which SKII never stops pursuing.

HARD-WORKING BRAND: BLACKBERRY

The verdict is still out on whether it’s a good thing, but Blackberry has become synonymous with the globe-trotting workaholic who cradles his or her smartphone in bed at night. While it might not be the phone you’d choose, it certainly is the phone your company would buy for you. Their campaigns deliver a strong message about the rewards of hard work by demonstrating how hard it works as a brand, too. Take for example its ‘Love what you do’ campaign. In order to establish social media as a strategic channel to build relationships and sell to consumers, RIM worked closely with Edelman to create highly engaged social media communities across Asia-Pacific. As a result of the campaign, RIM’s social media presence now spans 13 countries with over 4.5 million fans.