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Meeting demand responsibly?

This case was very interesting for me, as I grew up in a place (Venezuela) where being tan from the beach was a compliment, but at the same time it is a place were beauty is extremely rewarded. With this in mind, Fair & beautiful sheds light into meeting a huge market with a high demand but advertising causing damage to the population by promoting racism and biases. So the question is how to meet a demand and advertise responsibly and not be part of the problem? This is a question that is coming more in the spotlight in recent years as a society and generation we become more aware of our own biases. I believe companies will now have to include social responsibility to not promote unintended racism, biases and negative self reflection for people specifically the younger people. It is important to note that even though branding is not a popularity contest and that you have to focus on your target and communicate with them, brands should also understand and actively assess whether they are promoting unwanted biases. 

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Sometimes it’s a matter of timing!

According to Roger’s five factors: relative advantage, compatibility, complexity, trialability, and observability affect how products are perceived and adopted. However, something that is not included is timing. That’s why companies such as Webvan were not successful at the time, but companies like Instacart that came later, are so successful. Timing influences almost every aspect of Roger’s five factors. We can also see this in the example of the invention of the telephone, which was invented in the 1870s but not fully adopted until the 1980s.

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Singapore Airlines

In a commoditized space, differentiating one’s brand is extremely difficult. Exceptional flight service is definitely a way to differentiate from competitors, specially these days that even non-budget airlines are compromising service for profits. We see airlines like British Airways, American Airlines, etc. charging more and more for everything including food, luggage, seats, etc. and see a decrease in customer experience and satisfaction from customers engagement with airlines employees.

Contrary to other airlines, Singapore airlines is one of the few airlines that have kept their brand representing an excellent customer experience. From the case, Singapore airlines established themselves from the beginning as a service company, when in the old days airlines didn’t see themselves as such. 

The Singapore girl promotion represented Singapore airlines’ values and their tough training for employees to provide an outstanding experience. Measuring customer success is also engrained in their values, they track metrics such as number of compliment and complaints, conduct service performance surveys and measure customer satisfaction through the Global Airline Performance. To promote an excellent service, the airline also rewards employees who provide above and beyond customer experience. This is so engrained in their culture that they continuously rank among the best airlines out there. Even though this differentiates them and make customers choose them over other airlines, it also causes rising expectations from customers that they don’t expect from other airlines. 

As an avid traveler, I have seen the decrease in customer experience from non-budget airlines and an increase in cost, and Singapore airlines is one of the few that continuously prioritizes customer experience and luxury, continuously strengthening their brand value. An example of this is the below article that was published two weeks ago, about how Singapore airlines is creating hotel like cabins for their premium passengers!

https://www.travelandleisure.com/airlines-airports/singapore-airlines-a380-first-class-suites

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A/B testing as a way to experiment

In my prior life I worked in customer acquisition at Marcus by Goldman Sachs and in product Strategy and Ops for a smaller fintech startup, whose product was a credit card for people who were new to credit. In both jobs I used A/B testing to test consumer behavior and nudging. 

One of the experiments that got stuck with me was an email to nudge people that were overdue in their credit card payments. The first nudge was a general email an notification asking the person to remember to pay their bill. The second one was a personalized email by the CEO. At first we were skeptical, but the CEO email ended up performing 80% better, with people replying back amazed and thankful for receiving an email from the CEO and paid their bills right away. This CEO nudge encourage a particular behavior using people’s emotions, which at the time, we thought we were just trying things without much structure but based on the readings, emotions are an important key to understand people’s reactions towards change and nudging to encourage a particular behavior.

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Corona

As a hispanic, when you see a corona you think of home, you think of the good weather. As an american, when you think of Corona you think pf vacation, a beach. Corona’s brand strategy has allowed them to differentiate themselves from other beer brands such as Heineken and allowed them to enter the US market successfully. Corona became the staple drink brand in Mexico with Mexicans in the US identifying with the brand, so when grupo modelo entered the US market with corona, focusing on states near the Mexican border where many of the Mexicans immigrants were, made a lot of sense. As the US hispanic population grew, Corona was able to take advantage of that growth and establish it’s brand, and by becoming “the vacation” light beer, they became the go to brand for the rest of Americans who wanted to feel like they were on vacation. This is a different strategy than established brands such as Heineken and what I believe and could corroborate from the case it’s what made them what they are today. My take away from this case is that as I build my own business, branding itself could be a differentiation from competitors.