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Friday, 8 September 2017 00:00 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}
Interbrand has announced the introduction of its Best Sri Lankan Brands table in 2017, which will identify the best performing Sri Lankan brands and is modelled on Interbrand’s prestigious annual Best Global Brands report, the definitive guide to the world’s 100 most valuable brands.
“We believe the Sri Lankan market is quite ready now, having coming out of the strife that extended for a long time and seeing stability now in the political context, there is a lot of pent-up growth. There is a lot of pent-up demand. This market wants to be unleashed,” Interbrand India Managing Director Ashish Mishra said at media briefing announcing the move yesterday.
“Brands are intangible assets but they are hugely valuable economic assets that thrive on a strategic agenda that directly influences the growth of their businesses. These are the important discussions Interbrand wants to have in Sri Lanka so that brands can experience growth on both a domestic and global scale.”
Interbrand will be partnering MND in Sri Lanka. MND is a company which has branded and repositioned many of Sri Lanka’s most iconic and respected brands, including Aitken Spence, Elephant House, Lion Lager, Ceylinco Life and Goodhope among others.
“For the past 15 years, MND has been working to raise the bar of Sri Lankan brand management practices. I’m therefore extremely pleased that we can today announce the introduction of Best Sri Lankan Brands,” said MND CEO Michel Nugawela.
“Interbrand’s brand valuation methodology is the most rigorous and respected formula in the world; it is the global benchmark and we look forward to beginning conversations with business leaders on the value and role of the brand to directly influence the growth of their businesses, and celebrate the most valuable Sri Lankan brands every year.”
Established in 1974 and growing into an opinion leader in the field of value-based brand management, Interbrand was the first brand consultancy to recognise the significance of a brand as a business asset and introduce the brand valuation concept. Interbrand’s Best Global Brands methodology evaluates each brand’s financial performance, role and strength through a five-step Economic Value Added methodology which is also the first of its kind to be ISO certified.
“That’s the perspective that we use with our partners. We encourage our partners to begin to see brands as business assets, much like you would see with more traditional business assets.
“Brands need to be treated on equal footing and given the importance that it deserves, and not be relegated to an ad agency and communication department; it needs to be put in the centre of the organisation.”
Interbrand first entered the Sri Lankan market in 2016 with the rebranding of Hatton National Bank together with Sri Lankan partner MND. Interbrand’s impressive portfolio of clients includes brand leaders in every industry, category and segment such as HSBC, Barclays, GE, IBM, FedEx, UPS, Singapore Airlines, Maersk, Unilever, Nestle, Kraft, FIFA, Gucci, Prada, Rolls Royce as well as cities, regions and nations such as Edinburgh, Johannesburg, Holland and Chile.
The first batch of rankings is expected to be out this November, with 10-20 Sri Lankan brands expected to be included in the table. In the interest of transparency and integrity, Interbrand has rigorous criteria by which brands are selected into its ranking systems.
First and foremost the brand’s country of origin must be Sri Lankan. Secondly, the brand’s financial data must be substantial as well as publicly available. Mishra was keen to stress that Interbrand does not accept private data from any brand. Third, the brand “must have a broad public profile”, in that consumers’ awareness of the brand must play a significant role in their purchase decision. Finally, the brand’s economic profit must be positive, “showing that there is revenue above the company’s operating and financing costs.”
“Our purpose for the Sri Lankan market is to grow the Sri Lankan brand and grow the Sri Lankan economy, therefore we have to create a truly sectoral, globally benchmarked content.
“We have a plan to create an analysis of key sectors and correspond it the sectors globally. The best technology brands in Sri Lanka need to learn from GAFA (Google, Apple, Facebook, Amazon). The best media brands, the best personal care brands, they need to learn from their corresponding counterparts of the best global brands.”
Interbrand’s Best Sri Lankan Brands table is expected to shine a light on many stagnant local brands, with announcements expected in the coming months and weeks of local brands that may be commissioning the services of the brand consultancy firm.
Some of the data Mishra highlighted during his presentation seemed to suggest that it might even create resiliency among brands to market volatility.
“We’ve tracked the performance of the best global brands as an index, against the top four market indices of the world and we compared them over a 150-year period - 2000-2015 - which had some of the toughest economic situations the world has seen. What’s quite evident through this data is that the best global brands - which are the top 100 brands in the world that figure in our ranking globally - compared to the other three indices, or in simple words strong brands, outperformed even the top market performing brands of the world by a fare margin.
“This creates resilience. When the market goes down as it began to do from 2007 onwards, the best global brands did not fall as drastically. When the markets began to recover - 2009/2010 onwards - the best global brands rose much faster. So that’s the power of the brand, that’s a demonstration of how brands can add to the economic value that businesses create or business values that businesses desire.”
Mishra also emphasised the need for Sri Lankan brands to evolve beyond borders, their industries and geographies.
“In today’s converged markets, a global brand outlook is not just a matter of aspiration but an imperative. Before 2001, the only Asian brands listed on the Best Global Brands table were Japanese and about a decade ago, Samsung entered the listing from South Korea, joined four years later by LG and Hyundai. Interbrand’s larger purpose is to identify the best Sri Lankan brands today and in the future, and help them in their journey towards becoming Best Global Brands.”
Nevertheless, for Sri Lankan brands to take off globally via its export sector, Mishra believes that more help is needed from the Government.
“The acceptance of a country’s product or service outside the country also gets influenced tremendously by the ‘nation brand’. We buy fashion from Italy, we buy technology from Germany because those nation brands stand for it. Anything coming from France is aesthetically pleasing and such categories find acceptance everywhere.
“The country brand drives certain choice drivers and that’s the additional layer that will have to be done by a consortium or the Government itself to build the nation brand of Sri Lanka.”
