A CMO’s View: Xerox CMO Shares technique at the back of Re-Branding one of the World’s top brands
Charged with the launch of Xerox’s “Work Can Work better” marketing campaign, CMO John Kennedy shares what he is learned and what he hopes to succeed in.
In the identical approach Kleenex has been synonymous with tissue, Xerox has owned the phrase for printed copies for more than half a century.
This 12 months, the company launched a new branding marketing campaign to increase its place — and the notion of its brand — throughout the a couple of industries it serves.
“the new strategy and marketing campaign idea — Work Can Work better — places Xerox over a domain we are calling work within the broadest feel, which includes the evolution of the logo in a range of different industries from consumer care to transportation,” says Xerox CMO John Kennedy.
Xerox’s new branding strategy involves an intensive advert marketing campaign that includes print, television and digital and the relaunch of Xerox.com.
“We imagine that improving the flow of labor is at the core of enterprise transformation and world development,” says Kennedy. “It puts us squarely in the heart of labor, know-how, productiveness and efficiency conversations — proper had been where we belong.”
After serving as a vp of selling for IBM global industry services and products, Kennedy joined Xerox in August of 2014. seeing that being named CMO, Kennedy has led the launch of Xerox’s new branding strategy. these days, he was generous sufficient to share what’s he realized during his first 12 months at Xerox and what he hopes to succeed in as the brand’s advertising lead.
John Kennedy
CMO @ Xerox
Takeaways:
1. brands should be in accordance with enduring ideas, now not on the companies that an organization participates in.
2. accomplice with totally different segments of the business when creating a brand concept, comparable to gross sales and HR.
- promoting cycles are lengthy — so it must at all times be clear how and where your marketing activity is contributing to what a part of the selling cycle at what time.
- employees are ceaselessly the face of the organization, so it’s important to join your worker inhabitants in the whole thing that you simply do.
3. position edition alternate and transformation must occur within your individual group.
Amy Gesenhues: You were named Xerox CMO in August of ultimate yr. How used to be your first yr with the logo?
John Kennedy: I’ve learned so much in 12 months, but the greatest thing i noticed was that these days’s Xerox is essentially the results of two corporations that had come together — the original record know-how company coupled with the newer products and services side that got here from the acquisition of Affiliated pc services (ACS).
It’s well-known that Xerox is, and has been, an organization in transition. My role as CMO is to guide the promoting and communications staff in aiding that transition by way of creating strategic and consumer-centric content material that draws the hobby of C-level executives, and influencing buying decisions reflective of the buyer’s journey these days.
Amy Gesenhues: How do outline the Xerox model?
John Kennedy: Xerox is a brand and company that’s in transformation. At its core, Xerox is an iconic firm, almost 75 years previous, with a legacy in know-how. it’s something that made Xerox such a very powerful a part of industry historical past and resulted in implausible identify recognition.
today, we compete in a large and rising $four hundred-billion market, with most of that boom coming from our products and services section. And this growth is pushed through the significant amount of change that’s happening not handiest in industry however on this planet — in healthcare, in transportation, in monetary products and services.
because the industry environment becomes more sophisticated and technologies shift, firms are increasingly more on the lookout for Xerox to help them manage their complicated business processes and drive greater productivity.
Amy Gesenhues: What used to be the incentive behind the new model strategy?
John Kennedy: regardless of already being recognized as a number one international brand (Interbrand 2014 international highest manufacturers study), we’ve got a significant probability to extend our brand consciousness, consideration and advocacy — specifically on the products and services aspect of the business. It represents a niche in model perception versus model fact.
That information of the perception gap immediately influenced the creation of a new brand technique that defines what makes Xerox genuine, differentiates us from the competitors and makes us related to industry and public sector leaders.
Our new strategy is constructed around ideas which are relevant to our entire industry. however what’s most essential about the new technique is that it isn’t about file know-how or services or the rest that we market or sell. this is about our customers and the shared perception that business shouldn’t be so much work.
Amy Gesenhues: Did every other company features, beyond advertising, play a task in helping form Xerox’s new model strategy?
John Kennedy: The senior group used to be involved from the very starting of our work on this technique, and that was key to gaining their purchase-in and enhance.
In our expertise, whilst you show the C-suite and gross sales that you simply interested by studying more about the consumer and in turn can speak to them in a more genuine, significant manner, they’re apt to practice. We were lucky that used to be the case with this technique shift. the complete group is excited about and impressed by the brand new strategy and expression.
It’s been almost a yr-lengthy technique of collaboration, evaluation and dialogue. We’ve been fortunate to have the roughly time that’s been provided to work with the senior workforce and the Xerox Board of directors, as well.
Our intention is that all staff bear in mind, embrace and be in contact our purpose — each what is Xerox and why is the work we do necessary. We’ll lean on our senior leaders to talk with as many workers as that you can imagine to get them energized and activated as brand ambassadors.
Amy Gesenhues: i know Xerox has rolled out an in depth marketing campaign to launch the brand new model strategy. What channels are you leveraging?
John Kennedy: in addition to tv and print merchandising, we’re additionally revamping Xerox.com with new content types and focal point areas on the forefront of the remodel.
highly visual, shareable tales emphasize Xerox purchasers and their industries in a more customized, easy-to-bear in mind presentation. Dozens of new responsive and shrewd pages are devoted to Xerox’s services choices to better mirror the corporate’s evolving industry strategy.
We’re additionally inspecting our tactics with autos like Twitter, facebook and LinkedIn and continue to take dangers, and meet and inspire our shoppers and possibilities on every occasion they’re gathering and having discussions.
Amy Gesenhues: can you share more about the relaunch of Xerox.com?
John Kennedy: The position of digital is also core to our complete effort. We’re very fascinated by the evolution of Xerox.com. For rather some time our internet traffic wasn’t reflective of our earnings, in particular in that visitors on services pages lagged some distance at the back of other areas, despite those offerings generating more than 1/2 of our revenue.
So we’ve got down to be in contact and encourage via a uniquely Xerox person-centric digital expertise – one that is more representative of our focus areas.
while a whole re-launch of a web site, including website online design, experience and technology platform, is essential in its own proper, we all know that websites these days are just containers for content material that can are living anyplace on the social internet. a good greater element to our digital strategy is our new content strategy.
Newly launched Xerox.com:
To pressure this strategy, we hired a new digital chief, Josh Golden, who was once prior to now the CMO at Story, a content material company based totally in new york. very nearly conversing, we’re developing content that speaks right away to our clients, not about ourselves. And we’re doing it partly with bite-sized stories that make us relevant and easily understood.
Amy Gesenhues: On a social level, how do you protect your model’s recognition whereas instilling an authentic “brand voice?”
John Kennedy: Social media is a two-approach conversation, and a successful conversation can’t occur if one particular person isn’t listening. We’re sharing content material, but extra importantly, we’re taking note of the conversations taking place about and round our model.
We’re continuously replacing ideas with our followers and the usage of their comments to ensure we’re offering precious insights that may lend a hand enhance the way in which they work.
CTO of @Xerox shares best possible practices around #innovation for #futureofwork #newwaytowork http://t.co/w4bwgrwPth p.c.twitter.com/GiyAzPbuip
— Jacob Morgan (@jacobm) October 14, 2015
Amy Gesenhues: What metrics are you the usage of to measure your brand’s strength?
John Kennedy: There are three metrics that I consider key markers of success for this launch:
- A shift in the best way the arena sees Xerox.
- growth in the best way our clients and prospects reply to us and are extra open to doing industry with us.
- increase within the stature and contribution of the marketing and communications operate because of having led this work.
Amy Gesenhues: One ultimate query: are you able to discuss to how an extended-standing, respected brand like Xerox manages a brand new branding strategy and the challenges you’ve confronted?
John Kennedy: while there’s definitely no scarcity of challenges, I’d say these challenges are actually unique in the feel that we’re looking to have a good time a heritage and endured leadership in record technology, while also exhibiting an evolution as a services and products firm that’s literally changing the best way the sector works.
the obvious problem is to evolve the Xerox brand into something that’s broader than simply printing and copying. The acquisition of ACS more than five years ago gave us an important attain with our portfolio of services in particular, and it translated to Xerox which means a lot of various things to a variety of different audiences.
at the comparable time, we’ve contended with the concept our brand is synonymous with photocopying. So we not most effective needed to update the company’s picture, however to give ourselves a North megastar.
different challenges had been rather predictable for a model technique shift of this magnitude: How do you get senior management on board? How will you roll out globally? How do you get so many work streams aligned? We’ve cleared many of these challenges in an especially compressed time frame — something we’re all very proud of.
(Some pictures used beneath license from Shutterstock.com.)
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