The portal about marketing and advertising Sostav.ru asked the managing partner of Depot WPF Alexey Andreev to tell about the results of 2016 and prospects of 2017 for the branding industry.
Alexey Andreev, managing partner of the agency Depot WPF summed up the results of 2016. The number of orders for branding services over the past year exceeded the indicators of 2015, but the agency's revenues declined. And as the reason for it Andreev sees in a change of the nature of the relationship between the client and the agency.
Today, agencies with customers form business plans together, develop ranges, channels of communication, etc. They create a product together. But this trust does not always play into the hands of the agencies.
Andreev is confident that in a year's time customers will understand who can really be trusted by the business:"The outgoing year was an exciting test for the branding industry. The doctrine of "selective-savings consumption among Russians" declared at the very beginning of the year was very literally reflected in all spheres of the national economy and provoked chaos in marketing communications. They began to buy less, and at the same time- also very legible. For the owners of brands it cannot be anything worse than that. In addition to the promotion of goods and services, it was also complicated by the fact that in all markets, "marketing stagnation" was literally felt. Over the last decade obsessive advertising has devalued many brand promises, devalued key concepts and people stopped not just trusting mass communications, they ceased to hear them at all!
As a result, the developers of brands had to strain more than usual, trying to come up with new arguments in favor of buying a particular product or service,that this year added work to all branding agencies.
The general situation on the market is the following: the number of orders for branding in 2016 exceeded the indicators of 2015, but the income of agencies, on the contrary, decreased. The reason for the change in the nature of the partnership is the client / agency. Complexity and responsibility of tasks, as well as the now fashionable multi-channel communication format, required agencies to involve more in the customer's project, including the joint correction of business plans, the creation of new products, ranges, sales models, communication channels and content.
Such cooperation is nothing more than a fact of trust and recognition of the value of specialists in the field of branding. And this is optimistic. But this particular trust costs the branding agencies financial losses in the medium term in the end. I am sure that by the end of the next year the picture will be corrected, customers will choose those who can really trust their businesses and then these happy selected branding agencies will be able to "officially" balance their check in such a way as to compensate for their increased costs of providing services and at the same time preserve loyal customers.
As for a brief analysis of the markets, the branding experts observe several main trends. To say it briefly, we do not see dynamics in the trend of "import substitution". Somehow patriotic insights are not so effective.
The second trend - retail rules. It ruled ten years ago, too, but now this process has already became highly professional. To get on the shelf is not enough, you need to be an interesting brand.
Here is another observation: everything in the world loses its individuality. All products are commodities. So the employees of the branding services have to roll up their sleeves once again!"
