Channel or Brand?

SLT-MOBITEL powers Future Minds as National ICT Solutions Provider Importance of Channel Building for brand building

SLT-MOBITEL is serving as a proud sponsor of the ongoing Future Minds Higher Education Exhibition, in its capacity as the National ICT Solutions Provider of Sri Lanka.

In addition to the recently concluded exhibition which took place from the 17th to 19th of March at the Bandaranaike Memorial International Conference Hall (BMICH), SLT-MOBITEL will be providing complimentary SLT Wi-Fi at the upcoming exhibitions at Kandy City Centre from 10th June to 11th June, and in Galle from 1st July to 2nd July.

SLT-MOBITEL’s presence means that visitors will stay connected and enjoy uninterrupted internet access during the exhibitions. Further to this, SLT-MOBITEL’s training arm is also participating in Future Minds, by providing higher education opportunities to all knowledge seekers.

Future Minds is among the most dependable and recognisable platforms for students to bridge the gap in their pursuit of higher education. Future Minds 2023 takes pride in uniting the global village of higher education into one exhibition under the theme “No One Left Behind”. While being the pioneer in career counselling and having the highest footfall compared to any other exhibition in the country, Future Minds holds 16 years of excellence in the educational exhibition industry.

Building brands have always been taken in isolation as a more of a creative act than a rational task. Identifying the right channel/s for any brand will decide how long a brand can go in the journey of its brand life cycle. Without identifying right brands, it will be extremely difficult to grow a brand. Focusing only on the product and its features and also the communication of the brand alone will not assure success. Be it a service or a product it’s pivotal to plan the right channel mix to take the brand through its life cycle. As explained in a previous article under the concept of brand equity building, awareness and consideration can be created through media. But for a brand to succeed it needs to reach out to the customers or it should reach the target audience. This task is an immense task and it will only be possible if the brand is sent through right channels to meet the right TG. Moreover, for a brand to achieve its revenue and market share targets it needs to reach the right audience with the right price.

National carriers (Airline) of certain countries are such examples where the emphasis was placed much on the service delivery and branding but channel development and channel management were not in safe hands and are still not in safe hands when it comes to certain markets. As a result of this, the brands have suffered in the long run and are still suffering. One of the main sales channels for our national carrier is the overseas channel which operates in various countries. We were missing out a lot on local (Sri Lankan) travelers who would travel to Europe as low rates were offered to foreigners and Sri Lankans were offered higher rates in certain countries like France. This was not only detrimental for the brand but also for the country’s economy as most of the locals who would want to travel to Europe and from Europe were pushed to travel with other airlines which would end up leaking much needed foreign currencies on other airlines. It was also evident that for most of the destinations where Sri Lankans would fly often, there were no flights offered. As Sri Lankans we would take the pride of traveling in the national carrier. However due to some reasons these issues have been hampering the growth opportunities.

The same applies to goods manufacturing companies when they select importers and distributors from overseas markets (International markets) based on orders placed or the value of an order initially placed. The particular party/ parties may not have the expertise of channels, channel management and channel building. Therefore, most of the time brands end up limiting them to a distribution company which has no ability to take the product to super market shelves or to other big markets other than the shops in their vicinity. This will limit the potential of the brand to meet a larger audience in a given market and in return the opportunity of sampling or getting segments to try the brand. Mini distributors are important when the brand initially trying to go international at times. However, in the long run, the brand needs a long-term partnership that can take the brand to the next level.

Channels are also not a mere flow of products. It also is a flow of information. Through channel partners, the messages about the brand, POSMs, and other communication material will reach out to target markets through other second and third tier channel partners. In the absence of identifying right channel partners, the brand messages will not reach the market.

One classis example to cite here is, when a particular brand went through a crisis the brand (I wouldn’t mention the name) was taken off from shelves and once the crisis managed well, the brand was made available in the market. But unfortunately, this message was not passed through to the retail partners and as a result retail partners opted out of having the brand in their shelves. The issue was that the crisis had hit the brand so bad that retailers were in shock of what happened. But when the brand proved that they weren’t at fault, the particular channel partner or the distribution partner was not keen to pass this message to the channel partners (Retail network) even though the brand was not at fault.

Therefore, channel marketing, channel selection, channel management and channel relationship building are crucial for brand development. Like any relationship, the brand-channel relationship also should be simultaneously profitable to the brand as well as to the channel partners.