It's the same in business, where organizations must deftly use all tools at their disposal to stand out from the herd to ensure their brand is chosen. The essence of strategy is to make intelligent choices about how to compete effectively for specific customer choices.

Consumers aren't going to make several choices; they're going to make one. You want to make sure it's your brand they choose, today and again tomorrow.

At DSG Informatics we define brand in a different way to others. We see the brand as a resource system, rather than an asset or a logo. The business and the brand are two parts of the same system.

Brand Management

The brand is important because it's the focal point of choice for consumers as well as other stakeholders. And as you want to earn customer choice you will also want to earn the choice of the best employees, partners, investors, and other key stakeholders.

We have developed a proprietary framework around Competing for Choice which acknowledges the complexity of business. It enables business to shed light on the brand’s underlying dynamics, inform the choices to drive growth and build the strategy to fight for choice in the future.

It will provide clarity, control and confidence to your organization

Brand Intelligence

DSG's structural and fact-based approach to market intelligence provides clarity on the dynamics of the market, business and brand.

At its core there is a Customer Choice Chain, a funnel, plotting the different stages that a customer or other resources move towards brand advocacy. This approach focuses on the movement of resources over time such as loyal customers or other resources like staff morale. Our Competing for Choice market research approach is customized for each client. First, our consultants map the structural characteristics of the brand and market, which we call the brand architecture. Second, they populate the architecture with facts and data in order to analyze where the brand might hit obstacles. This process usually requires new data to fill gaps in understanding, especially the ebb and flow of resources in and out of a brand, which we call flow-rate data.

The Competing for Choice approach to market intelligence will become embedded into the business to continually monitor brand health and track critical changes. It will give you the clarity to take early corrective action.

Brand strategy

Brand strategy is about making the right choices. The complexity of business is founded on choices; and competing for these choices is the essence of strategy.

When you make choices, you also make trade-offs about what to compete for. Vanguard's approach to brand strategy focuses on an ‘outside-in’ view which evaluates the choices that can be won, and the subsequent path to be followed to achieve growth.

Just as pilots are trained on flight simulators to learn procedures, respond to unexpected events and analyze the effects of their action; so should business use scenario simulation tools to hatch future plans in a safe terrain.

DSG’s approach enables business to develop robust new strategies based on rigorous testing and facts, rather than intuition and assumptions.

Our methodology uses Strategy Dynamics, a dynamic modelling technique that explores and tests scenarios in a risk-free environment, so that brands can confidently roll out tried-and- tested strategy in the right sequence.

It ensures the right allocation of management resources, such as an effective marketing budget; and ultimately delivers superior performance and ROI. Our Competing for Choice approach enables you to control your brand's destiny rather than be swept along by external events and your competitor’s agenda.