iPod Nano photos
courtesy Apple Computer

Truly great design goes very deep into the entire consumer experience with a brand, and effective design is critical in every moment of a consumer's contact with a product, package, or media message.

Is Design Really Taking Hold as the New Corporate Marketing Strategy?

By Ted Mininni

Corporations have relied on innovation to gain market share with new products and services for decades. Now, with intensifying global competition, business executives are learning that innovative products do not enable them to uniquely position and differentiate their companies from their competitors. Predicating a company's "unique selling proposition" on innovation is no longer an effective strategy. It's just too easy for competitors to knock off any new product or service in a few short weeks or months.

Apple Computer Inc. and cell phones are a perfect example. Even as the technology giant, in conjunction with Motorola, is expected to unveil its long-awaited iTunes cell phone, the new product is already facing stiff competition from other popular brands. How new will Apple/Motorola's innovative technology be when the iTunes roll out? Will competitive models be coming out simultaneously with the new iTunes phone? Or even before it? Are these new innovative technology drivers alone Apple's corporate brand differentiator? Or does Apple's core (no pun intended) go much deeper?

Steve Jobs and his management team at Apple have a design-centric point of view. They've created a fertile environment that makes innovative thinking the norm. But there's something more: When it comes to designing a total customer experience, Apple customers demonstrate they have an absolute passion for the brand. In international business circles, marketers have long admired, and desired, the kind of brand passion Apple commands from its customers.

While innovation built into new products and services is vital, few executives have understood that the cornerstone of ground-breaking innovation is design. Design encompasses far more than the addition of innovative features to products. Design, when great, has its roots in thorough consumer research. Design represents a basic, intrinsic value in all products and services. Essentially, making design the focal point of every corporate effort, in every corporate department, has the power to create a unique corporate and brand identity like nothing else can.

Evolutionary design thinking

The integration of design into an overall marketing strategy has been slowly evolving in the corporate world. This evolution is beginning to create a powerful impact on executive management's perception of the value of design. "Experiential marketing" started it all.

Experiential marketing theorizes that the customer's experiences with corporate brands go beyond actual products or services. It's really about all the intangibles around those products and services that form customer perceptions, thoughts, emotions, and attitudes based on repeated, interactive experiences with corporate brands.

This mix of intangibles transcends actual products or services—all of which can be purchased from a number of competing companies. Meaningful brand experiences are unified experiences; that is, they are corporately designed, properly managed, and aligned across all customer touch points.

The goal of corporate executives should be to create the environment for customers to become emotionally involved with their brands. Over time, an emotional level of interaction develops into the formation of ever-deepening relationships based on trust. Only then will significant levels of brand loyalty be reinforced by repeated, positive experiences. Smart corporate executives know that the overall design of their customer's experience is the key differentiator that ultimately builds brand equity.

Extensive consumer research is the key to great design. Research that observes and studies consumers' interactions with products and services yields valuable information. Studies like these assist companies to deliver the brand first; products and services second. Observing how consumers actually live, and interact with products or services, then getting their feedback as to what they like and don't like, as well as their preferences, helps companies and creative consultancies design the most satisfying customer experiences.

The packaging factor

Companies that are intent on fully leveraging the power of their brands now realize that they had better establish meaningful dialogue and interaction that develops into true relationships with their customers. Deep customer relationships are the result of a strong corporate and brand identity, developed over time with deliberateness and consistency—the product of a strategic marketing plan. Clear, concise brand communications are an important part of this strategy, and must be carefully designed.

The savviest companies and design firms recognize that they must evaluate and come to understand the customers' total experience at each touch point. Then, their marketing strategies can be properly aligned across all channels to ensure that they are delivering a consistent, personal, and meaningful brand experience to every targeted customer, every time.

Packaging presents an integral part of a company's brand communications. It also presents an all-important opportunity to create emotional connection with the customer. In our experience as creative consultants, uncovering what we call the Enjoyment Assets™ of a brand helps us to create a unique visual communication of that brand's attributes in packaging. In-depth research helps to uncover the brand Enjoyment Assets of a new line or product. Some assets are overt, others can be dormant, or remain uncovered. Consumer-based research into the brand experiences that impact customer perception and decision-making must be assessed. Package design solutions that honestly and directly communicate brand values create an emotional connection with the consumer.

Strategic integration

Positive experiences are built into the overall design strategy of every successful product or service, and the underlying corporate brand, in the marketplace. When corporate management, their internal design departments, or design consultancies share the same vision, they can work toward fulfilling mutually shared, strategic goals.

Corporate management needs to learn to integrate a creative approach with the analytical while designing the entire customer experience. And design firm management needs to learn to integrate a more analytical approach to their usual creative methodology in order for both parties to maximize their collaborative efforts.

This balanced approach to branding and building design strategies will become a determining factor to future success in corporate business. For the skeptics among us who don't think so, there is currently a trend among some of the nation's leading business schools to add elective design and creative thinking courses into their MBA curricula: Harvard, Georgetown, U.C. Berkeley, and Northwestern, to name a few.

To be successful today, the corporate and design sectors must integrate their analytical and creative problem-solving with true design solutions as never before. The dividends this will yield will be better and better customer experiences that deepen into meaningful relationships built on trust. That is where we will realize the full potential of brand loyalty and brand equity.

Ted Mininni is president of Design Force, Inc., a metro New York area consultancy that specializes in brand identity, package design, and consumer promotion campaigns for the food and beverage and toy and entertainment industries. Mr. Mininni can be reached at 856-810-2277, or online at www.designforceinc.com