Special Session Summary Lessons From Outstanding Companies

SPECIAL SESSION SUMMARY

LESSONS FROM OUTSTANDING COMPANIES

Youjae Yi, Seoul National University, Korea

Why are a select few companies better at marketing and brand activities than their competitors? This is a question that has been raised by a number of marketing researchers and practitioners over the years. Although there may be many approaches to this issue, one way might be to observe closely what outstanding companies are actually doing. We can then gain insights into best practices and learn lessons from the role models in the field.

The objective of this session is thus to bring together companies that are well known for their excellence in marketing and brand strategies. Four leading companies are selected and featured in this session: Samsung Electronics, Samsung Engineering and Construction, AmorePacific, and TNS Asia Pacific. They range from electronics such as mobile phones, housing industry including apartments, cosmetics and household products, to marketing research firms. By providing in-depth case analyses as well as describing overall marketing and brand strategies, these companies present "what they do" as well as "how they do it" in order to achieve excellence. We are eternally grateful to these companies for their cooperation, their trust, and their willingness to share their own experiences.

This session will be particularly interesting to those who wish to understand key factors for successful brand strategies as well as marketing research processes. This session covers a number of issues that are important to consumer researchers, brand managers, and marketing managers. These issues include brand value, brand equity, product leadership, sports marketing, product placements, needs-based segmentation, differentiated marketing strategies, corporate brand management, consumer-brand bonds, brand personality, brand commitment, globalization strategy, motivational research, layers of brand image, etc.

Brief descriptions of the four presentations are given below.

BRAND STRATEGY BEHIND THE RISING SAMSUNG

Hyunsuk Chung, Vice President, Samsung Electronics

Over the past several years Samsung Electronics' brand value has increased dramatically, placing Samsung at #25 in Interbrand's 2003 Brand Value Survey and registering Samsung as the fastest growing brand in the world among its peers. In the process, Samsung's brand reputation has changed from a mass marketer of cheap TVs and VCRs to a leader in innovation and design commanding a premium price. In order to achieve such phenomenal growth in its brand equity, Samsung has used a number of key brand strategies and tactics, including product leadership, corporate brand management and differentiated marketing activities

RAEMIAN' LEGEND: STRENGTHENING CONSUMER-BRAND BONDS

Jung-Chae Suh, (On behalf of) Samsung Engineering & Construction

"Raemian Legend" is the successful brand management story in the housing industry. It is also one of the fabulous examples of putting the textbook brand theory into best practice. The company started business in 1974. In 2000, it launched the brand, "Raemian." Over the few years it has become the industry leader in the housing industry.

After the 1997 Asian Economic meltdown, the Korean housing market was deteriorating. Many housing businesses went bankrupt. To revive the housing market, the Korean government deregulated price control. This deregulation shifted market power from suppliers to buyers. Faced with the demand-oriented market, Raemian needed a brand for differentiation. With CEO, SangDae Lee's strong support, Raerman successfully developed and implemented a brand strategy.

Raemian's logo consists of three Chinese characters against three columns, gray and light green. The first Chinese letter, Rae means future. Mi means beauty, and Ahn means comfort. Great care has been taken to this logo. For example, originally developed by Interbrand, the logo's color has been changed from three colors to two. Uniqueness, Pride, and Trend-setting are Raemian' brand essence that are incorporated into Raerman's marketing messages, such as advertisements.

Raemian's target consumers are 30-40 years old, upper middle class women who live in the urban and metropolitan areas. The brand personality is set to be sophisticated, intelligent, and sincere. To strengthen brand commitment, Raemian implements its brand strategy. It has divided the market into two: Residents and Nonresidents. Raemian's brand strategy for residents focuses on customer satisfaction from direct experience. Since 2000 when they first launched the brand, it has systematically constructed the database. Based upon the detailed information stored in the database, it works on marketing activities to increase brand commitment among residents. One of the examples is Raemian Festival. The programs of the festival are carefully choreographed to reflect Raemian's brand concepts and image, along with the messages of the banners, "Raemian is your name. " "Be proud to be a Raemianse." Raemian also provides cultural experiences in "Raemian Academy."

The brand strategy for nonresidents focuses on advertising and corporate image management. Another strategy for nonresidents is through "intelligent apartment", a model house where potential consumers experience Raemian's future offerings.

These splendid brand strategies and successful implementation brings us to terrific market performance. According to Park and Srinivasan's survey method (Journal of Marketing Research 1994), Raemian Brand Value is 1.4 billion dollars. According to the KSSQI (The Korean Standard- Service Quality Index), Raemian ranks highest. According to K-BPI (Korea Brand Power Index) and NCSI (National Customer Satisfaction Index), Raemian has marked highest for the four consecutive years. Faced with keen competition from burgeoning competitors, Remain continues its saga by providing upscale offerings, such as health, digital convergence, and environmental quality.

Raemian's brand strategy of strengthening consumer-brand bonds has worked and will continue to maintain its position as the leader in the housing industry.

AMOREPACIFIC: PEOPLE SERVING WITH COSMETICS

Jeff Luddington, AmorePacific

AmorePacific is the name of the No. I cosmetic company in Korea, and the name of our brand (AmorePacific) in the global market. The purpose of AmorePacific is to develop anew engine of growth based on our competencies in order not only to satisfy with the present position of No. I in the domestic market, but also to be a constantly growing enterprise. In this presentation you will see the globalization strategy of AmorePacific in U.S. AmorePacific promotes Korean beauty and culture abroad through the brand of AmorePacific.

TAKING THE GURU MYSTIQUE OUT OF MOTIVATIONAL RESEARCH

David Richardson, Regional Director, TNS Asia Pacific

Marketing is based on meeting consumer needs. Motivational research which began with great promise when Ernest Dichter introduced needs based research in the 1950's and 60's to the marketing community devolved into the more common prosaic form of research which became synonymous with the focus group it craze of the 1980's. In the process motivational research became needlessly discredited.

Paul Heylen, a friend and disciple of Dichter, not only promoted the use of these models but was also visionary in his ability to link biological/neurological drivers to consumer behavior and by doing so created a framework for the various quantitative needs-based models. By structuring the~research around this model the overwhelming importance of the moderator was reduced taking the "guru" mystique out of motivational research. To illustrate the structure and insights provided by the model we present a case example from the Korean market.

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