82016MayWhere do we Start? A View of Technology's Role in Building BrandsBy Douwe E. Bergsma, CMO-Consumer Business, Georgia-PacificDouwe E. BergsmaToday's technology-em-powered world has not changed the age-old ques-tion for brand builders: Where do we start? The growing array of new technology-driven capabilities such as analyt-ics, research and communication alternatives that can support brand building leads marketers to ask this question more frequently. In some cases, however, the question is not posed at all, and organizations al-low technology to be the driver rather than focusing on how tech-nology can enable or enhance brand building strategies.At Georgia-Pacific, we believe the role of business is to help people im-prove their lives by providing products and services they value more highly than the alternatives. Brand building is an essential strategy through which we aim to influence consumerWWs, retail customers, employees, and sup-pliers so they act in a way that helps meet our objectives. Even with today's rapidly changing technology, modern brand building is well served by relying on the three requirements for humans to take action, as laid out in the 1940s by Austrian economist and philoso-pher Ludwig von Mises:1. Dissatisfaction with the present state of affairs.2. A vision of a better state.3. Belief that we can reach a better state.Dissatisfaction with the Present State When facing business pressures, it's tempting to start with our dissatisfaction with technology ­ or the lack thereof ­ and constantly consider the latest and greatest platforms, devices, tools and vendors. Instead, we should focus on truly understanding the state of current affairs that matter the most and first develop points of view on the market, industry, competitors, retail customers and consumers, while also understanding internal capabilities. It's from this position of better understanding that we can holistically consider improvement alternatives.For example, Georgia-Pacific was admittedly slow to recognize the shift in consumers' media consumption and shopping habits. As recently as 2011 our brands were spending less than two percent of marketing dollars in the digital space. After gaining a broad understanding of how we were viewed by customers, consumers and compet-itors, these insights helped us recog-nize the need to invest more in digital marketing. Before simply investing in marketing technology solutions how-ever, we engaged internal and exter-nal subject matter experts to evalu-ate the broad spectrum of tools that were available to deliver on our key business objectives.Vision of a Better State Once we understood the dissatisfaction with the current state of affairs, we needed to develop a vision of a better state. This captures where and how to create the most long-term value and an understanding of existing or required capabilities. It includes brand building objectives and strategies, definitions of our target consumer and how to best reach them, and what brands should stand for in their minds and hearts. Once vision and strategies are defined, enabling technology gaps can then be identified.This is easier said than done. For example, across the industry we initially considered "digital marketing" In my Opinion
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