Building a Global Vision for Brands Global Branding Richard T. Minoff President, Dorland Global Health Communications Dorland Global Corp. The convergence of markets and media across international lines provides rich opportunity for healthcare companies to achieve new levels of asset optimization, cost-effectiveness, and overall brand value. But the lion’s share of the effort to transform a new compound into a global brand often is focused on a single endpoint: the creative campaign. This is an overly tactical mindset, concentrated more on image than on the need to definitively establish the brand’s core values, benefits, personality, and positioning. The creation of a true global brand must begin well before the market conditioning, pre-launch, and other external marketing efforts commence. The collaboration between a highly involved global brand team (GBT) and an agency team whose members are experienced in asset optimization, commercialization models, and the development of unified core messaging can lead to a strong global campaign with appropriate local platforms. Ensuring a Universal Win Achieving this end result is far from simple. Internal stakeholders at both the client and the agency must shelve individual agendas in favor of a multidisciplinary, multicultural effort to support the GBT and ensure a universal win. Global brand development is, by its very nature, a front-loaded process: GBTs should help design the ball, not just be asked to run with it. Only through high-level collaboration can assets truly be optimized to create a blockbuster, a critically important niche brand, or a higher and more sustainable sales peak. Involve Key Affiliates When upper management mandates the early involvement of strong global partners — key affiliate listening posts — in establishing a brand’s vision, a shared sense of ownership and pride can be instilled, and the potential for discordance between global and local campaigns is minimized. Affiliates’ input must be sought — and their challenges encouraged — not only in defining the global brand, but in defining the brand-development process. Is there cost and effort involved? Of course, but it’s a very wise investment. Global Teamwork a Necessity When working on a global brand, self-importance and national pride can never take precedence over strong, clear marketing sense. It’s critical for the GBT and extended team members, including senior management, to be reminded that none of them, as individuals, truly has the capability to think globally. This is the global-local paradox: no matter how much a single player tries to think globally, thoughts and perceptions are always guided by the culture that one lives in and the culture one was raised in. So, strong teamwork is not just an ideal, it’s an absolute necessity. The ability to facilitate constructive teamwork and collaborative thinking should always be a key factor in a client’s choice of an agency partner to launch a global brand. While a network of affiliates with feet on the street — as well as the rue, calle, and strasse — around the world may be helpful, agencies — just like their clients — can be hampered by tenacious local points-of-view. The mark of an agency up to the task of optimizing a company’s assets is one that is able to develop genuinely global perspectives within its own ranks as well as internally at the client. Marketers should look for seasoned agency personnel whose experience with globalization and commercialization will allow them to draw on past successes — and mishaps — to offer strategic consultation, build consensus, and drive positive results from the earliest possible point in the global branding process. Marketers should look for seasoned agency personnel whose experience with globalization and commercialization will allow them to draw on past successes — and mishaps — to offer strategic consultation, build consensus, and drive positive results from the earliest possible point in the global branding process. Dorland Global CorP., with offices in Philadelphia and San Francisco, is an independent advertising and public relations agency specializing in healthcare, pharma, biotech, and medical devices. For more information, visit dorland.com. March 2006 VIEW on Advertising

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