Gigante Vaz Partners » Case Studies

Case Study: Digital Brand Strategy

GVP — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 19:37:58 +0000

CHALLENGE
Increased competition had recently placed Let’s Go’s notable heritage, unique editorial organization, and specialized focus at varying points on the brand asset-liability continuum, resulting in a brand identity crisis and plummeting sales. The youth travel guidebook also needed to radically upgrade its online presence and take advantage of the way its market uses digital channels.

SOLUTION
Through structured analysis, market research, and creative insight, Gigante Vaz brought clarity and a new strategic brand vision to Let’s Go.

GVP’s core strategic insight was that Let’s Go needed to get better at being who they already were, as opposed to re-casting themselves into some new or revised role in the marketplace. We recommended that the brand play to its strengths and focus on attributes, values, and features they could genuinely and authentically own.

Based on existing brand executions, we recommended avoiding dated, historical attributes, and focus instead on moving the brand more successfully into the digital channels. GVP conceived an immersive, interactive web site destination centered around social networking and travel planning functionality.

RESULTS
GVP’s strategic recommendations resulted in a revised design identity for the brand across all of its product and marketing assets. The youth market was recaptured, and GVP undertook a comprehensive new web site design for the brand destination online. Let’s Go implemented a significant portion of the branding and design work, and in January of 2009 announced a new publishing and distribution partnership with Avalon Travel and Publisher’s Group West.

Case Study: AIWA Sound

GVP — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 18:51:10 +0000

CHALLENGE
Aiwa was the #1 brand in Mini Systems, the #2 brand overall in consumer audio and the fastest growing brand in all of the key segments. However, AIWA’s potential was limited due to a lack of top-of-mind awareness, ranking #7 in unaided awareness among the prime target audience. Without the legitimacy of a strong brand image, AIWA was forced to compete primarily on price. GVP recommended a shift in advertising direction from product support to a focus on building recognition of AIWA and enhancing the AIWA brand image.

SOLUTION
GVP brought a critical insight to the Aiwa brand challenge. The one simple thing that consumers looked for in audio equipment is GREAT SOUND and no other brand was claiming that position.

GVP created and introduced a branding campaign with the objective of building awareness for the AIWA brand and establishing a brand image as “The Leader in Sound”. The campaign used the tagline, AIWA SOUND. “You Gotta Hear This” and was designed to convince prospects that – whatever the audio product – AIWA represented the highest quality sound performance they can get.

RESULTS
The AIWA SOUND campaign produced results immediately. In the first year of the program, awareness among the target audience increased by 44%. And, although AIWA Share of Voice over the first 3 years remained flat and never exceeded 5% of the Consumer Audio category, awareness doubled.

Case Study: New Spirits Product

GVP — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 17:37:58 +0000

CHALLENGE
OP. Natural Flavored Spirit was a new product from V&S Vin and Sprit AB and was imported in the US by Crillon Importers, LTD., which is owned by Michel Roux, the marketer widely credited with the success of Absolut. OP. is an Aquavit, a major distilled spirit segment in Scandinavia, but not well known in the US. The relative obscurity of Aquavit in the US presented a significant barrier to the launch of OP. because the introductory budget would be insufficient to educate consumers about Aquavit.

SOLUTION
Advertising had to create awareness and generate trial of OP. while avoiding the need to explain Aquavit. To this challenge, GVP’s Challenger Brand Process brought two key observations:

Recent successful ultra-premium spirit launches had been built with a younger user profile
Early adopters of new spirits are always searching for the “Next New Thing” that serve as a badge of their own sense of sophistication, style and cultural leadership

The intellectual curiosity of the young adult target audience led GVP to create a campaign that built trial through allusions to the unique rewards of OP. Using cool, minimal imagery and strong package representation, the campaign positions OP. as “The Most Sophisticated Spirit” and incorporates the brands promise into its tagline, Forward Drinking.

RESULTS
In the four months following the launch, the brand exceeded the full year sales projection by 20%. The campaign also had a strong impact on retail acceptance of the brand and distribution in Year 2 increased to almost 70% of the US.

Case Study: Brand Awareness

GVP — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 16:57:20 +0000

CHALLENGE
Ricoh needed a big, visionary idea that prospects in the new, digital document management environment expect while also clearly moving Ricoh out of the “stand-alone” space. It also had to provide a clear and differentiating position that elevated the Ricoh brand.

SOLUTION
GVP’s Challenger Brand Process revealed that purchase decisions involved surprisingly strong emotional influences. With this insight, GVP created a new positioning for Ricoh designed to “own the emotional connection” with the customer by focusing on a big idea that promises a real end benefit for their company:

Ricoh Moves Your Ideas Forward.

The advertising campaign featured the Jazz standard, “I Get Ideas” by the great Satchmo, Louis Armstrong, as background for scenes of workers in typical office tasks using Ricoh products to move their ideas forward. The commercials acknowledge the role of office equipment in the very human tasks of everyday people trying to move their ideas ahead. This human connection, combined with the unique joy and emotional power of the Armstrong music, elevated Ricoh and separated it from the other companies in the office imaging sector.

RESULTS
In just 6 months overall awareness of Ricoh increased by 30% among prospects. And prospects who regarded Ricoh as “The right brand for my company” performance increased a stunning 250%.