Implemented correctly, a new brand strategy helps push a company further forward.

Brands provide a powerful connection between a company and its customers, and if done well re-branding can further strengthen the relationship between the two as well as help the brand owner to continue to grow and prosper.

Twenty-two years since its establishment, the FPT Group, a leader in the field of information technology (IT) and telecommunications, has recently changed its brand identity, with a redesigned logo and a new message - “Energizing Life”. According to Mr Le Trung Thanh, Deputy General Director of FPT, the core value of its brand is that FPT helps energise its clients, partners, enterprises and customers through smart IT solutions. The brand strategy will focus on its development towards being an “e-Citizen”.

On a foundation of IT and telecommunications, the company will incorporate the strengths of all its member companies to provide the market with products and services of high quality at reasonable cost, meeting the all the basic demands of an “e-Citizen”.

Mr Martin Roll, a branding expert, believes the new FPT brand identity sounds energised, powerful and aspiring. “I would imagine it will serve the company well,” he said.

Its key strategy is to “Go mass” in the third decade of its development, focusing on the B2C (Business to Customer) market in addition to B2B (Business to Business). Changing its logo is the first step in this strategy. The new logo was modified to be more modern, more dynamic and friendlier, in order to concentrate on telecommunications, content and IT services as core business strengths. “An FPT label is a quality commitment on all of the company’s products and services,” said Mr Thanh. “Member companies can focus on developing products without having to be concerned about building their own brands.” Changing the brand identity aims at bringing a unified, friendly and reliable image to customers and investors as well as being more suitable with the company’s strategy towards the market.

The company also categorises the logos of member companies into two groups. The IT and telecommunications subsidiaries will use the complete logo with three colours and the F-P-T character set, while the non-IT and telecommunications companies will only inherit the three-coloured sign of FPT. The new brand identity system comprises a redesigned logo and supplementary signs applied on products. This is the result of professional study and cooperation between the company and JWT - the world’s fourth largest communications group.

Mr Thanh said that the results of a survey on its image revealed that public only thinks about FPT in the field of IT. Over the last two years its leaders launched the “One FPT” brand strategy, to unify the whole company. “The old FPT brand still makes sense but we clarify the advantages and are consistent in our strategy through the new brand identity,” he said. FPT brings consumers a clearer image displayed in a diverse range of products and services provided by member companies and associates.

When companies are creating a new brand identity it must be used strategically. Mr Roll said that FPT would benefit from its new brand identity if they work with it strategically across all business decisions in the company, utilising it to build and nurture the company culture, using it as a catalyst for better leadership, and lastly, balancing brand promise and brand delivery.

Source: VnEconomy