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"SAP Americas is a subsidiary of SAP AG, the world's largest business software company and the third-largest software supplier overall.
SAP Americas' corporate headquarters is located in Newtown Square, PA, a suburb of Philadelphia."
Source : SAP
Protecting and Nurturing Your Brand: Maintain and Grow Brand Value in a Time of Crisis
Supply Chain is also known as :
Supply Chain Model,
Demand Optimization,
Supply Chain Network,
Supply Network,
Value Chain,
Value Network,
Distribution Resource Planning,
Demand Chain Management,
Demand Chain,
Value Network Analysis,
Production and Manufacturing,
Logistics,
Inventory Control,
Distribution,
Supply Chain Security,
Logistic Engineering,
Strategic Information System,
Supply Management
How much is a strong brand worth? Just ask any
corporate executive. A strong brand can help achieve
price premiums, promote customer retention, and attract
top talent to the workforce. Yet in times of economic
instability there is a temptation for companies to trim
costs around efforts such as brand building. Downturns,
however, can actually present tremendous opportunities
to grow brand strength ' customer buying habits change,
there is often competitive consolidation, and new markets
open. A number of brands will be made in the downturn.
How can your company's brand be among them?
There are many elements that impact a company's brand.
Concentrating on a select few lets you control financial
investment while maximizing the returned benefit. This
SAP Executive Insight focuses on efforts that target a key
set of brand-related opportunities. Further, by answering
the following questions, it describes how companies can
strengthen brand value even in a recession:
- How can companies ensure delivery on their brand
promises to customers in the downturn?
- How can companies respond to growing sustainability
concerns and protect brand value?
- How can companies in this economy develop the type
of workforce associated with a world-class brand?
Executive Summary
At A Glance
Target Your Brand Improvements
Branding is typically associated with
marketing elements such as advertising,
logos, and events. But a brand
is actually defined by a combination
of factors, and like an iceberg, only
a small piece is exposed to customers
(see Figure 1). This paper is not
focused on traditional marketing, but
rather on actions companies can take
to help deliver on their brand promises.
During a downturn, some companies
will lose focus on areas that impact
brand in an effort to control costs. By
making targeted investments in select
areas, however, companies can continue
to improve brand perception:
- Enhance the customer experience.
With increased competition and a
smaller revenue pie to share, companies
must link their brand closely to
customer satisfaction. Strengthen the
brand by exceeding customer expectations
through practices such as the
strategic use of customer information
and supply chain excellence.
- Embrace sustainability. With an
increasingly strong economic argument,
sustainability is a critical
imperative for companies today. Additionally,
incidents related to poor risk
management, substandard employee
safety, and lack of regulatory compliance
can tarnish or even destroy a
brand.
- Commit to top talent. A company
relies on people to deliver the brand
promise. Hiring, developing, and
retaining the best talent can serve as
a market differentiator. Provide the
tools and data needed to empower
your employees and optimize their
decision making.
Leadership Makes the
Difference in Times of Crisis
One thing is for sure: with every economic
crisis comes opportunity.
Some companies will go from good
to great, and others will just fade
away, making room for more innovative
competitors. To be among the
winners, executives should strongly
consider best practices that provide a
balanced approach to moving forward
by including both cost reductions and
smart investments. SAP developed a
series of Executive Insights that highlight
strategies your business can use
immediately to run more efficiently
and improve the customer experience
' even in today's economy.
Benchmarking ' The Facts of
the Matter
The insights presented in this paper
are based on decades of experience
in helping our customers become
best-run businesses. An important
tool in these efforts is the understanding
gained from measuring and
comparing the actual performance of
companies across a wide range of
sizes and industries. SAP conducts
benchmarking and best-practice studies
in many business areas including
supply chain, manufacturing, finance,
human capital management, shared
services, sales and marketing, compliance,
and IT. Analyzing the performance
of industry leaders offers
executives the metrics needed to
assess their own company's past
successes and guide today's crucial
decisions.
For more information about the SAP®
benchmarking and best-practices
program, visit www.sap.com/usa/solutions/benchmarking/index.epx
or contact benchmarking@sap.com.
Focusing On The
Customer Experience
Deliver On Your Brand Promise
And Delight Your Customers
Keep Your Customers Close
A brand is often defined as a promise
that companies make to their customers.
Fortunately, there are specific
things that companies can do not only
to keep that promise but to continually
exceed customer expectations.
Every interaction with customers or
prospects influences their perception
of your brand ' a sales meeting, a customer
service inquiry into a call center,
or even an invoice. Yet delivering
a consistent, high-quality customer
experience is increasingly challenging,
especially for large organizations with
geographically disparate operations
and customer locations. To do this well,
consider the following best practices:
- Ensure you have a consistent customer
master data strategy in place,
so that you can easily collect and
summarize customer data gathered
across Web channels, call centers,
e-mail contacts, and face-to-face
interactions.
- Provide an integrated and consolidated
360-degree view of the customer
to your externally facing workforce.
Today, customers expect companies
to have their information available
during sales, service, and marketing
interactions.
- Make the 360-degree view available
wherever your employees need
it. Employees in the field should be
able to access relevant information
remotely, through handheld devices
and so forth.
Companies with the strongest brands
truly know their customer and are committed
to delivering an excellent customer
experience at every opportunity.
Take a Holistic Approach to
Customer Processes
Though often overlooked by many companies,
your back-end operations also
tie in closely with the customer experience.
And customer satisfaction issues
such as order accuracy and product
availability definitely reflect on a company's
brand reputation. The ability for
customer-facing resources to quickly
and accurately look across a global
supply chain, for example, enables
companies to promise inventory to customers
with greater confidence.
To deliver the right output to a customer,
it is essential to consider the endto-
end business processes supporting
that delivery. Various functions that
contribute to the process must be tightly
connected. For example, customer
support should be able to check on an
order's whereabouts without manually
contacting transportation management.
When solving a particular back-end
problem, consider the upstream and
downstream effects of that problem
within the end-to-end business process
' even if they occur in different business
functions. Thinking through such
issues holistically and ensuring end-toend
data integration can have a strong
impact on your ability to serve customers
and drive brand success.
ConAgra Foods
Industry: Consumer products
Summary
ConAgra Foods Inc. is one of North
America's largest packaged food companies.
Among its most popular brands
are Healthy Choice, Chef Boyardee,
Hebrew National, PAM cooking spray,
Egg Beaters, Orville Redenbacher's,
and Slim Jim. The company also
provides food and ingredients to
major foodservice establishments and
commercial customers worldwide.
ConAgra Foods' brands and products
help fill the pantries of 95% of America's
households.
Results with SAP® Software
- Reduced days in inventory (finished
goods) by 7%
- Improved availability in stores (store
in-stock rate) by 0.7%
- Improved forecast accuracy by 30%
- Improved service level (case-fill, ontime)
by 0.2%
Enabling A Sustainable
Enterprise
The Impact Of Sustainability
On Your Brand
A company's environmental, social, and
financial imprint on the world can have
a direct impact on an organization's
brand. So even in a troubled economy,
sustainability remains a top priority for
enterprises around the globe. Interestingly,
companies responding to a survey
about their sustainability strategy indicated
that enhancing brand reputation
was a top objective ' second only to
increasing revenues (see Figure 2).
Focus on Profitable Sustainability
Sustainability is not simply an altruistic
ambition; increasingly it is a necessity
for competing in the marketplace and
running a profitable business. Consider
these examples:
- Compliance with the Registration,
Evaluation, Authorization, and Restriction
of Chemicals (REACH) regulations
is mission-critical for many
companies doing business in the
European Union. Companies in industries
such as chemicals, high tech,
and aerospace and defense jeopardize
their European-based revenues
by not adhering to expanding REACH
standards. Facing potential fines and
penalties for infractions, companies
have a true business imperative to
manage REACH compliance now.
- The cost of carbon emissions is evermore
tangible. A cap-and-trade system
effectively assigning a hard
cost to each ton of carbon emitted
is already live in Europe. Similar
systems are imminent in the United
States, Canada, Australia, and Japan.
Companies must effectively measure
and manage their carbon emissions.
- In many industries, such as oil and
gas and transportation, occupational
safety is a top priority. A commitment
to worker safety and health has been
deeply embedded in most company
cultures for years. However, costs
associated with regulatory penalties
and legal settlements for employee
safety incidents can be particularly
onerous. Companies have strong
financial incentives to manage worker
safety processes for maximum
effectiveness.
Manage Your Risk Profile
Companies face a wide range of risks:
from credit and interest rate risk to supply
chain uncertainty and regulatory
risk. Mismanagement of any can result
in direct and significant financial impact.
Moreover, some organizations have
seen their brands substantially tarnished
by a lack of effective risk-management
processes. Many companies,
for example, have benefited from using
overseas manufacturing resources.
However, incidents such as lead paint in
consumer products, the use of underage
labor, and tainted ingredients in
human and pet foods have ground
some operations to a virtual halt.
Today, companies have no choice but to
adhere closely to accounting standards
and remain as transparent as possible
to shareholders. The consequences of
mismanaged risk on your company's
reputation can be severe. And the
actions required to rebuild customer
confidence can be costly.
Companies must establish a clear and
actionable compliance plan at both the
global and local level. It must incorporate
not only current requirements but
also near- and medium-term compliance
concerns. An integrated plan and support
platform must be in place to execute
effectively.
Growing Your Brand
With Top Talent
Your People Are The Engine
For Brand Strength
Develop Your People, Grow
Your Brand
Ultimately, companies depend on the
strength of their workforce to grow their
brand. Your employees drive the innovation
required to stay a step ahead of
the competition, and they
represent the face of your company to
customers. Even in a downturn, there
are several things a company can do to
grow talent:
- Continue to invest in training and
development. Lower business levels
can create available capacity in
the workforce. Many companies are
using this temporary bandwidth to
invest in their employees. Industryleading
companies such as Motorola,
Coca-Cola, and SAP have invested in
structured training programs to develop
their employees. Training to re-skill
and up-skill employees builds capabilities
and shows a true commitment
to personal development ' improving
morale and long-term retention (see
Figure 3). Often
this training can be delivered via
e-learning to help control costs.
- Establish effective feedback mechanisms.
Measuring and managing
employee performance remains crucial.
Timely and actionable feedback
helps employees' hone their skills and
ensures that talent remains focused
on top priorities. The right feedback
also helps create a culture of continuous
improvement. Integrated HR tools
can remind employees to take action
on review processes and encourage
structured and actionable feedback.
- Use the downturn to acquire the
best talent. Across almost every
industry, companies are trying to
"right-size" their organizations in
response to flat or shrinking revenues.
In fact, some large companies
have ceased operations entirely
' casting their entire employee base
out into the job market. Hiring now
might seem a bit counterintuitive, but
companies have a unique opportunity.
After years of fierce competition
for talent, there is now an abundance
of qualified candidates in the job market.
Companies can acquire talented
employees at lower cost than they
could prior to the downturn.
- Focus on employee engagement.
Make sure employees stay engaged
and informed. Your employees must
be prepared for shifts in corporate
strategy. Knowledge management
and corporate communication efforts
can help on this front.
Provide Needed Insight
Even the most talented worker needs
the right tools for the job. Especially
in times of dramatic change, employees
require reliable data to assess their
operations and make necessary adjustments.
Maintaining the status quo is
not an option, and every decision must
be backed up by hard information. For
example, sales and marketing organizations
must understand changing buying
patterns. Supply chain organizations
need current data to effectively match
supply and demand amid mercurial business
conditions. And development
organizations require insight into emerging
market demand to drive innovation.
Putting the right information in the
hands of your best people also provides
a sense of empowerment and allows
even the largest business to be more
nimble.
Looking At The Road Ahead
Essential Steps You Need To Take
A strong and well-recognized brand is
important in any economic cycle. However,
during the downturn, executives
have an opportunity to make targeted
brand investments that position their
companies for excellence when economic
conditions begin to improve.
There are a number of specific steps
that companies can take to protect and
nurture brand value relative to the topics
discussed in this paper:
- Enhance the customer experience.
A company's customer data resides
all across the organization ' in different
departments and geographies.
Leveraging that data through an
effective customer relationship management
solution is essential to providing
a truly differentiated customer
experience. Supply chain data is similarly
disparate. Information from purchasing,
transportation management,
warehouse management, and manufacturing
must be used in an integrated
fashion to accurately match supply
and demand. Supply chain planning
and execution solutions are key
enablers of a customer-centric supply
chain.
- Embrace sustainability. Technology
can automate regulatory processes
and the management of environmental
issues such as greenhouse gas
emissions. Related solutions help
drive efficiency and effectiveness
of sustainability-related processes
such as employee safety and product
compliance. In addition, technology
enables effective risk management
by providing visibility into global risk
elements. This can ensure, for example,
accurate and auditable financial
statements, as well as compliance
with relevant accounting standards.
- Commit to top talent. Excellence in
recruiting, performance management,
and training can all be technologyenabled.
Additionally, analytics tools
can empower employees to make
the decisions necessary to support
a strong brand. In fact, effective use
of your corporate data can be a key
step in optimizing the value of your
top talent.
Such investments can return tangible
rewards. For example, branding consultancy
Interbrand releases an annual
assessment of the 100 most valuable
global brands. This research indicates a
clear relationship between brand value
and share performance when comparing
the top 100 brands to other broad
indexes (see Figure 4). It pays to stay
focused on this invaluable asset.
About the Authors
Chakib Bouhdary is chief value
officer of SAP AG. He is the
founder of SAP's value engineering
framework. His mission is to make
every SAP customer a best-run
business. Over the past six years,
he has built a world-class organization
of professionals focused on
creating value along the entire IT
investment cycle for prospects and
customers.
Seth Halpern is a senior principal in
the SAP value engineering team. He
helps customers across a wide
range of industries measure and
capture value from SAP® solutions.
Halpern has worked in value-centric
roles in the enterprise software
industry since 2002.