Focus7 Blog

I won’t name names, that always feels a bit unnecessary to me, but I would like to share a story with you about brand promises.

In December, I ordered a new sofa from a company that promised that I could shop with confidence, expect quick delivery and receive unrivalled customer care and attention to detail. A new sofa is not an insignificant investment, I have an expectation it will be around for many years, so these are important factors, especially when it’s easier to buy cheaper!

Roses are red

We often meet clients who say, “We’re not sure our customers know us. As in, really know us.” What we say to that is, “Well – do you know you?”

We are hugely delighted that our very own COO Leona Barr-Jones has been named Director of the Year for Inclusivity in 2019

Ok, confession time. Here at Focus7 it’s true to say that we’re obsessed with brand – and with good reason.

We’ve been banging on for years about the need to approach B2B marketing with the same verve and creative energy displayed by the best practitioners of B2C. We believe that just because someone is at work, doesn’t mean they stop being human. Or stop having the same emotional responses to thoughtful, well-targeted, intelligent brand communication as they do at home.

It’s a fundamental truth that businesses that don’t move forwards go backwards rather than stand still. Balance sheet reality insists that you simply have to keep growing – your customer base, product and service portfolios, sales lines, margins, profits, and, most precious of all, your brand reputation.

Love is in the air, everywhere we look around. Harangued hubbies are discovering that all the restaurants are already fully booked, supermarkets are selling limp red roses flown in on lumbering freight liners from Kenya’s Great Rift Valley (yes, really) and marketers are going all gooey with their copycat social media posts.

We’ve been celebrating National Storytelling Week here at Focus7, gathering around the agency hearth to swap tales of the good old days when marketing was easy; when all a brand needed was a single-minded proposition and a reasonable above-the-line spend.

It’s a perennial problem for creative and strategic agencies everywhere. We’re always busy honing essence, personality, differentiation and the like for our clients. The challenge can be to recognise when it’s time to look inwards to discover whether our own brand needs an injection of fresh thinking.