European Enterprise Awards 2021

28 EU BUSINESS NEWS / European Enterprise Awards 2021 , Nov21577 Change Management Champion of the Year 2021 The world of brand and marketing communications has entered demanding times which are quite challenging for leading multinationals to adapt to. These demanding times have resulted in a combination of factors, starting with globalisation which has generated so many interdependencies, private labels with more competitive pricing putting brands under financial pressure, and digitalisation which calls for constant learning and adaptation to changing consumer habits. Not to mention the purpose of content being more and more geared towards enriching brand platforms and brand exposure, the shift from paid to earned or shared media and its impact on ROI, and the increasing need for technology in order to strengthen workflow efficiency and facilitate the collaborative process. These demanding times have resulted in a major disruption to the creation and development of content with “always on” strategies which have become the norm and thus have driven the need to rethink the marketing organization. As a result, the brand communications supply chain as a whole has been impacted, and this is an unstoppable force which agencies must deal with and work with - both for the benefit of their clients and for their own sake. Within a multinational advertiser different stakeholders will have different expectations; some will focus on cost efficiency, others on brand metrics or sales objectives, and some of their colleagues will prioritise quality acceptance and short SLAs. However, beyond these different expectations the most important factor – local relevance – is often addressed too little or too late. Indeed, local relevance is the most important factor for the simple reason that 80% of international campaigns are implemented through localised assets; therefore success at an international level lies in the capacity to best resonate with local audiences and to generate superior brand metrics and sales at a local level. To achieve these goals, there are two key requirements: to master language management so that transcreated copy is locally relevant, and to have at-scale production capabilities so as to deliver a large number of assets across channels and formats in no time (which has become an increasing media and non-media challenge for local markets across the globe). Hercules offers top-notch transcreation services as well as at-scale production services. Firstly, with a network of more than 300 in- market copywriters who all have a minimum of 12 years of experience in global agencies and working on global brands, we can tap into unmatched resources who possess category expertise and are cross-channel savvy. Secondly, our AtScale technology enables us to cost-effectively produce thousands of assets within a very short period of time, hence ensuring our clients receive fast delivery of a high number of assets for all channels and in all kinds of sizes and formats. This combination of language management command and at-scale production fire power is at the core of the relationship between multinational advertisers and their decoupling agencies. However, we are already talking about delivering assets to local markets which is somewhat of an advanced stage in the localisation process. What prevails and will make or break it is the very first milestone, which is the successful transformation of the marketing organisation itself. It is a prerequisite which requires efficient sustainable change management for the client’s entire operations worldwide. And when it comes to transforming communication (which is at the heart of Hercules’ knowhow and offering), there is the strong need for a solid transformation consulting competence; the latter is at the core of our expertise and has successfully helped advertisers well beyond bringing management efficiency to their international campaigns or optimising their delivery systems. Indeed, our transformation methodology ensures that all client business needs are clearly identified prior to addressing the ways of working, governance, processes, tools, and all pieces of workflow that are essential to smoothly run brand and marketing communications around the world. Our methodology has helped our clients become more efficient and competitive at a global marketing level, and we are strengthening this methodology year after year by building more transformative value over time with custom business models that have increased the flexibility and agility of their organisations. Our approach brings our clients quantitative benefits such as greater ROI, reduced costs, decreased time to market, and better resource utilisation to name but a few. There are also qualitative benefits from an advertising point of view, such as a greater consistency with brand values, brand messaging and brand tone of voice, and a streamlined collaborative process facilitated by leading-edge technology, which ensures seamless work across channels. Transformation is one of our core competences and areas of expertise, which is why our corporate motto reads “Hercules, transforming communication”. Gilles Bérouard Hercules’ Global Chief Executive Officer