The Work
What we do
Brand Fuel Solutions lives in the space where companies understand the markets they serve, make strategic choices, collaborate and get results. The work is designed to build a foundation and establish alignment on the business mission, the behaviors and the overall collaboration needed to successfully achieve key objectives. Using the 5e model, we facilitate assessments to expose outages or risks and make data-driven decisions that put the focus on the predictive actions that produce results. Gaps are reconciled with training, systems and/or technology.
BRAND U
For businesses needing to create, formalize and communicate a consistent and resonating brand character, this solution fleshes out the unique identity for new or existing brands. The key segments of Brand U start with an assessment of the existing habitat, from which a brand resonance pyramid is built. Working from foundational core values and pillars, the brand character is revealed and standards around guidelines, assets, voice, tone, expression, customer target personas, and resource access are created. Templates are then built and accessible for use at critical points of communication or messaging. The result is a clear and concise delivery of; Why do you exist? What do you sell? Who do you sell it to? How do you sell it? Ultimately these standards are utilized in every brand experience and sales process,
BRANDCHISE MODELING
For those seeking the scalable consistency of a franchise operation, but wanting to preserve an independent business channel, a brandchise model is the solution. The value of most B2B business relationships lives in fulfillment and service. Those with the highest performance and retention levels transcend that and strategically plan how the customer experiences a brand. We will structure a platform that includes professional merchandising, schematic planning, animations at key interaction points, story telling and education that drives retail in the guest-facing habitat. How the customer experiences your brand, whether it be self-guided, digital or with a service liaison, ties directly to productivity and leverages your business above others.
STRATEGIC RETAIL
This conglomerate of best practices and consumer science is a path to best-in-class retail. It’s a must for companies with beginnings in the live retail arena and plan to grow there in the future or have launched a virtual platform (b2c) and are now looking to build a powerful on-site brand merchandising program. This content will take the team on a journey exploring the current retail landscape (both on-site and digital), takes a deep dive into Digital, Operational, Physical and Experiential (DOPE) disciplines and reviews the Fundaments of Retail Merchandising (FORM). If the objective is to design and deliver highly effective brand animation, Strategic Retail can make that happen.
LEAN EXECUTION
According to Harvard Business Review, when 400 Global CEOs were polled to prioritize their top challenges, they sighted execution excellence as their #1 obstacle, above driving top line revenue. It’s doesn’t help that roughly only 15% of companies actively track strategic implementation. This explains the Wharton and The Economist conclusion that only between 47% and 63% of strategic objectives are achieved. Brand Fuel Solutions gets all stakeholders on the train; identifies any bandwidth gaps; builds and launches solutions; tracks predictive behaviors; and formalizes the improvement of the next iteration. The 5e Model is applicable to small projects requiring collaboration to larger strategic initiatives with cross-function organizational scope.
NEW BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT
Consultative selling competence is a required skill for most solutions-based sales initiatives, while new customer acquisition and/or new channels are generally the strategies with the greatest growth opportunity. Brand Fuel Solutions approaches recruitment from two key perspectives. First, outward-facing geometric indexes are built to assess market opportunity based on current sales performance and demographic data. Second, inward-facing new business development processes are built to understand funnels, cadence and shortening the sales cycle. Looking beyond the initial sale to onboarding, transitioning and ongoing communication increases retention and experience quality. From the Where-to-Play choices, an assessment of bandwidth ensures the capacities needed to execute. No one size fits all here. Key deliverables include mapping, new system builds, data sourcing, index development, SOPs and training.
SCENARIO PLANNING
Today, with the fast pace of change and higher level of threats, 3 to 5 year traditional strategic plans have been replaced by 2 to 3 year, multi-pathed scenario plans. How we look at current business reality, build possible scenarios and execute those strategies, makes the Brand Fuel Solutions method exceptional. Building on the dynamics of the 5e Model, the approach adapts well to modern, fast-paced workflow environments including tech. Making Where-to-Play, How-to-Win choices and building a cascade of strategies and supporting tactics, opens clear lines of sight to business goals. This also departs from tradition by taking a page out of the marketing playbook. Since it’s critical to keep the unique character of a product or service intact while driving growth, a new or refreshed brand pyramid is integrated into the process to weigh all aspirations against. This process keeps brand equity front facing and consistent.
In addition to foundational solutions, we offer focused initiatives for brand equity, industry segmentation, collaborative framework and sales development.