How to Execute a Powerful Brand Collaboration
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To put it to you straight, brand collaborations are a powerful way an entity can prove to its audience that they have mates. Although you can fight your own fight, protect your neck and love thy self, it’s a rule of nature that having a friend by your side makes you stronger, more invincible and provides a sense of being seen and heard. Also, how often have you been introduced to strangers through acquaintances and gone on to establish a relationship that flourishes more than the original? These ideals are the fundamental base that brand partnerships are built from.
In simplified terms, brand collaborations go a bit like this:
- Find common ground
- Join forces
- Share ideas
- Create something great
- Tap into to new markets
- $$$$.
This is the end result that every client wants to achieve, but if we have learnt anything from the U2 and Apple 2014 nuisance, sometimes partnerships don’t quite land. So how do we get it right? We have to strike a happy medium of what our audience expects of us and what we expect from the partner.
So what does the audience want?
1. It has to make sense
What is the initial reaction and understanding of your audience when they see that X has partnered with Y. Does the collaboration make sense? Do the brands share similar values or a common goal? It’s important to ensure the collaboration has the most basic connection with consumers so that they see the names paired together and understand where the brand is coming from without knowing the intricacies of why it works. Otherwise, you’re just left with a rogue Twitter comment section…
Tying together Gen Z’s love of nostalgia and music, we recently executed a successful collaboration between portable speaker brand Ultimate Ears and Australian film camera brand 35mm Co. The collab worked well in aligning the two brands young, fun personalities, and to put it simply, it just made sense. Check out the full case study here.
2. Attraction is key
Whether the partnership comes in the form of a social media giveaway, festival pop-up, or a Superbowl ad—the audience with eyes on the marketing ploy all want different things. Depending on the partnership’s objectives, you need to understand from a micro to macro level what the audience actually wants. If they want to win something and blast all over their Insta Stories… give them a mutual desire to post. If they want to be entertained at halftime, give them a WWE X Budgie Smugglers collab! Understanding the environment and scale within the activation at hand for a partnership (whilst staying grounded) is imperative to attracting the right eyeballs on your piece.
3. Status
One of the core purposes of a brand collaboration is to boost status, value and reach by riding the coattails of the partner. This isn’t an act of shameful piggybacking, it’s brilliant. And you better believe both parties are doing so with one another’s value-added catalogue. Collaborating with a relative brand unlocks an opportunity to leverage each other’s strengths and resources to create something mutually beneficial and impactful, all whilst fusing budgets to shake things up successfully.
Case in point: Supreme. What started in 1994 as an unassuming skateboard shop situated in SoHo, the hub of NYC’s hip-hop scene, has progressed to become THE brand synonymous with underground cool. Supreme secured their status and cult of ‘hypebeasts’ through a roster of groundbreaking and influential brand collaborations, often unexpected but always prestigious and exclusive. Supreme’s consistency in securing and executing luxurious partnerships with the likes of Louis Vuitton, The North Face and COMME des GARÇONS has enabled this humble skate brand to become a pioneer in changing the game of NYC fashion. Their influence and status are proved through fans, known to endure hours of lines outside flagship and pop-up stores at even the mere whisper of a new Supreme drop all around the world.
What do we want as the brand?
1. Responsiveness
This is an obvious one, but we cannot stress enough—communication is key. Luckily, you can tell pretty early on in a potential partnership if the desired partner is ticking your boxes and showing you the love you need to foster a successful relationship. In the early stages of conversations with different parties, always be wary of the time between comms and levels of reciprocated interest, as these factors will likely establish the tone of your working relationship moving forward. If a particular brand you’re pursuing says no, and you still really see the value in the partnership try a different approach, present the benefits of the partnership clearly and be proactive. Nurture the relationship. A no now isn’t a no forever!
2. Eagerness
This is the ethos of it takes two to tango. With a brand collaboration, not only do we want good and timely communications, but we want eagerness! We want excitement! The purpose of a partnership is to join forces, so if one side is an absolute starfish, the union can become a petri dish for deflated creativity and power imbalances. Receiving or expressing eagerness on either side of a partnership through simple communicative indicators like enthusiastic language, showing initiative and literally turning up to a meeting with a smile goes a long way in establishing a prosperous future between the teams.
3. Creativity
If you’ve reached this stage, you already understand the grounds of the brand partnership, i.e. shared values, scope of work, resources and the budgets at hand. What comes next should be the fun part—sharing and bringing ideas to life. Introducing unfamiliar individuals from different walks of life into a collaborative environment is an invigorating incentive for dichotomous teams to foster creative thinking. Being subjected to different perspectives, principles, skills and cultural experiences that aren’t part of the usual innate brand process when working is a massive win for a successful partnership. And if you strike gold by partnering with a brand that pushes your team to think outside the box, then not only is the process fulfilling, it usually comes with success.
4. Audience
The audience of your brand partner is of utmost importance. If there’s a new audience you’re seeking to reach, this should be a key consideration when choosing your partner. Our client Logitech G was looking at speaking to female gamers and so we facilitated a collaboration with global makeup powerhouse Maybelline. This enabled us to reach a new audience for the brand while also heroing Logitech G’s ‘Play for All’ ethos. You can check out the case study here.
All in all, brand collaborations are a powerful tool for businesses to reach new audiences, increase their status, and create something unique and impactful—but they must be used wisely. Choosing the right partner is crucial to the success of the collaboration. You must find a partner who shares similar values and goals, understands the audience’s desires, and is responsive, eager, and creative in order to create something with any impact. It takes two tango.
In the market for a winning brand partnership? We can facilitate that.
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