6 Brand Management Skills All Businesses Should Be Seeking
To the vast majority of businesses, their brand is everything. As advertising guru David Ogilvy once said, ‘a business without a brand is like a person without a personality’ and an organisation encapsulates its values, purpose, external perception amongst customers and other stakeholders, and, ultimately, its very raison d’être, within its brand. Its guardians are therefore vital, ensuring that a business maintains its strength and unique appeal, while being able to evolve in the future in line with market conditions, customer demands and other external shaping factors. But what brand management skills should organisations seek to identify in candidates for these critical roles?
Naturally, specific demands will vary from market to market, and the knowledge and expertise of a professional operating in the pharmaceutical industry, for example, will differ from those offered by an individual working in the same role in fashion. However, there are some evergreen traits possessed by all the best brand managers regardless of their area of focus. These include:
Top Brand Management Skills
Strategic Thinking
Brands are constantly evolving, and managers must therefore be able to think strategically and align initiatives with the overarching and shifting goals of the wider business. This includes being able to analyse market trends, understand consumer and customer behaviours, and develop plans that position the brand effectively and in a way that differentiates them from their competitors. Those who possess the ability to think strategically and laterally can factor in all of these varying elements and develop plans that appeal to both internal stakeholders and external customers and target audiences, which is no easy feat.
Creativity & Innovation
Along similar lines, it can be challenging to keep a brand fresh and relevant, particularly in such a rapidly changing world. The very best organisations, such as Apple and Google, can roll with the punches and adapt to ensure they are constantly at the cutting edge. However, for those working at firms with less established reputations – and smaller budgets or resources – this can be challenging. That’s why creativity and the ability to think outside of the box are critical skills for any brand manager. These individuals will need to find ways to reinvent their output and constantly develop fresh content that is still linked to central organisational values, whilst also developing ways to set their brand apart from their rivals. It’s not an easy job, but being creative certainly makes it more manageable.
Communication
Brands are ultimately built on effective communication, and any organisation or individual that can’t articulate its brand’s purpose, values and goals will struggle to gain any foothold in its core markets. These individuals must have the ability to advocate on behalf of their brand both internally and externally, collaborate with cross-functional teams, and engage with a wide array of stakeholders, as well as ensuring there is consistency in all messaging and other interactions, which is nearly impossible without the ability to communicate clearly and coherently.
Cultural Intelligence
In the multicultural global market in which most modern businesses now operate, cultural intelligence and an understanding of different contexts are critical. There are numerous examples of organisations lacking these traits and being badly impacted, particularly those that work internationally. The automotive market is seemingly particularly vulnerable and Chevrolet, for example, must have wished it had more cultural intelligence within its brand team when it launched its ‘Nova’ model to customers around the world, and quickly found that this translates into ‘it doesn’t go’ in Spanish, which naturally impacted sales in Latin America. Equally, Asian firms Mazda and Mitsubishi both faced problems with their respective ‘Laputa’ and ‘Pajero’ cars, which translated into far ruder phrases in the same markets.
But it’s not only automotive businesses; outside of the transport industry, KFC’s trademark phrase ‘finger-licking good’ was initially translated into ‘eat your fingers off’ for its launch in China, which doesn’t quite have the same appeal. We could go on, but having an awareness of cultural differences in other markets and possessing these skills in brand teams can save organisations a huge number of problems and significant potential embarrassment.
Organisational Expertise
As with other marcomms roles, managing a range of branding initiatives involves spinning plates and coordinating multiple projects, timelines and teams. Strong project management and organisational qualities are therefore key and help individuals to plan effectively and allocate resources to ensure all strategies are executed under budget. Timing is also critical in effective branding, and having the capacity to ensure different tactics are being deployed at the right times can have a major impact on overall success.
Technological Know-How
The only thing that evolves as quickly as the wider market is the technology that brand managers and indeed all marketing professionals have access to. The digital landscape is almost constantly changing, and while AI-led platforms like ChatGPT, Claude and CoPilot were in their infancy only a matter of years ago, they are now established parts of the day-to-day lives of many brand specialists. This also applies to new social media channels, design tools and more, meaning it’s critical to remain up to speed with the latest developments, and ensure they are being utilised to their full potential to help build brand awareness, engage with audiences, and manage workloads.
Brand managers play a pivotal but often overlooked role within organisational marketing and communications teams, and without their expert skills in maintaining and evolving organisational perceptions, the work of those in other roles would be wasted. If your business is seeking its next key hire, then speak to our expert team to find out how to find the best specialists in the market.
