We caught up with Simon Richards, Founder & Creative Director at RichardsDee before he facilitates the interactive workshop ‘What can B2B brands learn from B2C brands?’ at CHARGE Europe on 14th October.
How do you see your clients building the business case for brand investment?
Our approach to helping clients recognise the need to invest in their brand often starts with a realisation from the clients themselves. They understand that their organisation isn’t reaching its full potential, and that brand development can help. However, they may not always know where to begin or how to bring others on board with this vision.
Often, leaders from the CEO, marketing, and business development teams become our best ambassadors, advocating for the value of what we do. Interestingly, some of our strongest advocates have come from procurement and finance teams as well. Several catalysts can ignite the conversation around brand investment:
Recognition of Neglect: A brand that has been around for some time may have lacked the investment and attention it deserves. With new market entrants and challenges, there may be a need to retell the brand’s story and recapture the attention it once commanded. In these cases, the recognition is there, but the challenge lies in deciding which aspect of the brand to invest in—be it the brand story and proposition, brand expression, or the customer experience.
Fragmented Brand Story: Over time, the brand’s story or proposition may become fragmented. There may be a need to refocus and retell the core aspects that made the brand great, ensuring alignment among employees, customers, and investors.
Business Strategy Shifts: When the business strategy evolves, it often requires an updated brand narrative that reflects the organisation’s new trajectory. This calls for the creation of a fresh, cohesive story that resonates with all stakeholders.We frequently work with smaller teams that may not have the extensive marketing resources of large multinational corporations. These teams rely on our expertise to help them communicate the need for brand investment, design effective programs, and provide the evidence needed to unlock the value that a strong brand can bring.
The business case for brand investment often centres around the following key areas:
- Brand Investment and Employee Engagement
- Clarity in Brand Proposition and Customer Understanding
- Brand Building and Commercial Results
What lessons can you share about simplifying complex concepts/technologies for branding and communications?
There is a relentless pursuit to innovate, expand, or add new features to products and services that can sometimes lead to overly complex solutions that confuse customers rather than help them. Also, industries such as energy are going through significant development where the range of products targeted towards the end-user has dramatically increased and requires different skill sets to communicate these.
Simplifying complex concepts and technology problems requires a thoughtful approach that emphasises clarity, usability, and a deep understanding of the customer’s perspective.
Do customers get it?
There’s a tendency within organisations to continuously expand product ranges, introduce new jargon, or add suffixes to product names, believing that each addition will enhance the value or relevance of their offerings. However, more isn’t always better.Each new addition can dilute the core product, creating confusion and making it harder for customers to understand what they truly need.To simplify, it’s essential to step into the customer’s shoes. What do they value? What makes sense to them? How do they navigate the decision-making process? By focusing on what matters to the customer, businesses can strip away unnecessary complexities.Sometimes, the best innovation is knowing when to remove or retire features that no longer serve a purpose, rather than adding layers for the sake of outdoing a competitor’s offerings.
Do customers understand your portfolio?
Complexity can be overwhelming. To combat this, make your products or technology solutions easy to understand. Even simple frameworks like categorising portfolios such as “Good, Better, Best” can help customers quickly grasp how products relate to each other. Defining each product or technology within the context of your entire portfolio—not just against competitors—can further clarify its purpose and positioning.Clear language is key. Avoid industry jargon or overly technical terms that may alienate your audience. Focus on straightforward, and crisp communication that highlights the differences and benefits of each product tier and invest in a naming system that helps customers navigate portfolios.
What are the Purpose and Benefits?
When introducing or refining a technology product, always start by defining the problem it solves. Why does this product exist? What specific benefit does it offer the customer? By clearly articulating the product’s role and purpose, businesses can ensure that customers understand its value and relevance to their needs.
This clarity helps customers connect with the product on a practical level, making it easier for them to see how it fits with their business or solves a particular problem. It’s about the struggle of deciding what is a feature, proof point or technical specification and to emphasise the tangible benefits that matter most to the user.
Are your sales and customer team confident in promoting it?
Complex concepts and advanced technologies can be challenging for sales teams, whether they’re internal or external, such as third party retailers. This often leads to atendency to fall back on selling familiar products instead of promoting new and innovative ones. To counter this, investing in on boarding programs and providing your sales force with the right tools and resources is crucial.
When Marketing and Sales work together seamlessly, both teams feel empowered and better equipped to drive results. This effort is not just about pushing product information, but understanding each departments needs and ensuring both have a shared point of view, support and tools to boost confidence, helping to feel more comfortable building trust and authority when promoting new technologies.
This is also a challenge for customer service teams, where once they were dealing with simple transactional queries, where as they now have to deal with several products, services and technologies questions that previously did not exist.
Is there another way?
Finally, ask yourself: Does it have to be this way? Just because something has always been done a certain way or conforms to industry norms, doesn’t mean it’s the best approach. In fact, questioning the status quo can lead to more straightforward and customer-friendly solutions.
Understanding the lifecycle of your products and services is also critical. Recognising when a product has reached maturity or when it’s time to retire a solution can prevent clutter in your product lineup, making it easier for customers to navigate and choose the right option for them. Always consider the customer’s viewpoint when making these decisions to ensure your product lineup remains relevant and accessible.
Simplifying complex technology problems isn’t just about reducing features—it’s about honing in on what truly matters to the customer. By focusing on clarity, ease of understanding, and challenging unnecessary complexity, businesses can create solutions that not only solve problems but also resonate with their customers. In a world where complexity often reigns, simplicity can be a powerful differentiator
What can attendees look forward to hearing from you at CHARGE Europe?
We will explore innovative strategies to reimagine the customer experience and sales journey for B2B brands. By examining industries outside our sector, we can gain insights into how they’ve successfully built customer loyalty, tackled complex brand challenges, effectively segmented audiences, and aligned sales and marketing efforts. Ultimately, our goal is to learn from these examples and prioritise putting the customer at the centre of everything we do.
Established in 2012, RichardsDee is a world-class strategic and creative branding agency, specialising in brand strategy, design, engagement, and communications. They help multinational organisations navigate change, achieving sustainable, tangible, and meaningful impact by seamlessly aligning brand and business strategy.Whether building brands from the ground up, repositioning them during transformation, or refreshing them for future growth, their approach merges strategic insight with focused creativity. They empower businesses to stand out, connect, and grow through impactful brand-led change.
