Raising Awareness of a Global Tax and Audit Brand

To stay ahead in a fiercely competitive industry, a global tax and audit consultancy wanted to set up an annual brand awareness tracking program. Using our years of experience in brand research and competitive intelligence, Phronesis developed a systematic approach to measure and track awareness of the firm’s brand, brand perception and customer satisfaction rates. We combined this with a study that compared its performance against leading competitors.

Objective

The firm wanted to measure awareness of its brand and how it is perceived in the marketplace and compare its performance against other industry leaders over time. It also wanted to measure the impact of its marketing initiatives on the perception and performance of the brand and identify key areas for improvement.

Solution

Our approach involved a multi-step process, including:

• Exploratory phase to gather market context. Discussions were held with stakeholders to gain a comprehensive understanding of the firm’s business needs within the current market context. This included brand perception and the key attributes driving brand awareness and recall, as well as those of their key competitors.
• Qualitative research: in-depth discussions were held with subject matter experts (SMEs) within the firm to identify the key research areas which aligned with the firm’s business objectives.  From these insights, we developed a comprehensive and effective brand assessment questionnaire for use at the quantitative survey stage.
• Quantitative research: we conducted a comprehensive brand tracking survey using a representative sample of senior leaders in 250 businesses with revenue >$100m, targeting either the decision-makers or influencers in the engagement of professional services firms for their companies.
• Advanced analytics.

The final step was to analyze the survey data and gather the resulting insights into key research areas, including awareness of the firm’s services, brand awareness, and brand perception (quality of service, industry expertise and know-how, reputation, innovativeness and on-the-ground presence).

We also investigated brand communication, messaging and recall, and consideration and engagement - examining key factors that drove the intention to retain the incumbent supplier or select a new one.

Lastly, we looked at levels of satisfaction and likelihood to recommend based on experience and engagement with the incumbent firm.

Results

The insights gained from the research helped the firm understand their brand’s performance versus their key competitors, identify areas for improvement and measure the impact of their marketing initiatives.

Based on these findings, the firm was able to increase their brand recognition and enhance their reputation within the industry. This has led to increased business opportunities and revenues.