What Australian executives value from brand consultants

When it comes to working with brand consultancies, Australian brands are spotlighting core brand refinements; meanwhile global competitors are upping the ante with analytics and innovation. As expectations rise across both marketing and customer experience, local leaders need to adopt a more holistic approach to brand—maximising cohesiveness and impact from end-to-end.

There is a strong recognition of the value of partnering with a brand consultancy in all three markets. This sentiment is particularly pronounced in Australia where a brand consultancy's services are more valued than in both the UK and United States.

74% of Australian executives believe a brand consultancy’s services are a must-have for building a best-in-class brand strategy, compared to 69% in the United States.

The general expectations of a consultancy’s value are similar across the three markets (see Figure 1). The main areas of service can be grouped under six buckets – Brand refresh, Marketing strategy, Growth opportunities, Experience design, Customer engagement, and Employee engagement. While Brand Refresh and Marketing Strategy are globally consistent, each market harbours interesting nuances.

At a headline level Australian executives are in line with their global peers in terms of where consultancies add value. However, Australian executives put greater emphasis on the role of brand within their businesses, over-indexing on internal communications and internal programs compared to their US and UK counterparts.

When diving deeper into the detail, the data suggests that while brand positioning work is most critical, UK and United States executives are looking for a consultancy to bring a broader set of capabilities around brand management, brand analytics, operating models, and loyalty strategy (see Figure 2). Developing a strong brand voice is also becoming more top-of-mind in the US market; partly driven by the proliferation of AI-enabled digital interactions.

In contrast, Australian executives were less likely to see broader transformation capabilities like brand management and governance and loyalty strategies as important consultancy offerings. This suggests Australia is a market where core brand refinement and activation outweighs experimentation. As global players raise the stakes on analytics and innovation, Australians brands will likely take a fast-follower approach—for now.

While all three markets prioritise core elements like “Product, service, and experience strategy,” Australia over indexes on both “Campaign and creative strategy,” and “Customer experience design” (see Figure 3).

This demonstrates a demand for high-impact marketing and activations, as well as user/customer experience. In short, Australia’s brand executives are seeing the need to reimagine prospect and customer interactions, while focused on doing the basics of brand marketing brilliantly through brand consulting partners. There is an opportunity – like that being seized in the UK and United States – to identify partners that can extend the role of brand through to customer and growth strategy; as well as the other way around.

This suggests leaders in Australia need to continue to see their brands comprehensively. For today’s consumers in Australia, a campaign means nothing if the actual experience does not deliver; this is consistent with our own analysis, which show that brands with strong customer perception achieve 8x long-term revenue growth vs. commoditised, replaceable brands. The combination of top-of-funnel cut-through and bottom-of-funnel adoption poses the challenge for executives to coordinate a cohesive and compelling end-to-end branded experience. The brands that win will connect these dots - simultaneously helping customers make progress with what they’re struggling to achieve and driving a personal connection in the process – ultimately establishing meaningful customer relationships.

For further insights on the Go-to Brands for Australian consumers, head here.