Innovative product development
The company developed a smart product for a completely new target group: a building element for the insulation of commercial properties and high-rise buildings that saves space compared to conventional insulation solutions, which in turn increases the usable space. In addition, the product offers a new degree of freedom in designing facades.
Focus on the target audience
However, as a supplier of silicone materials and products, the company had no experience with the complex structures of decision-makers in large construction projects. Until this point, the launch of new products was limited to addressing technical staff at trade fairs, so a new approach was needed. As was a communicable brand instead of an abstract product designation. An innovative product for new target groups requires a resilient branding and a sharpening of the USP as a basis for communication. “AIM” was born: The Architectural Insulation Module. We subsequently created a brand for the new product with a name, a logo and a corporate design.
Complex buying center
The analysis of the target groups and their customer journeys revealed a vast variety: countless people are involved in various processes in the construction of a high-rise building. What role do suppliers, engineers, architects play? Who implements what, and when? 35 different roles were considered for the product, which we were able to reduce to 4:
- Design Architect
- Design Manager
- Project Manager
- Lead Architect
Customer Journey
The various touch points from the customer journey gave us a complex picture of the communication processes, with the facade designer as an example here:
Overview Touchpoints
From these analyses, we derived various control instruments for marketing activities:
In the end, a concrete picture of a target-oriented series of measures emerged, which was able to make the best possible use of the available budget by exploiting numerous synergies.
Excerpt
- A personalised microsite as the control centre of the campaign
- A user-friendly product configurator (tested for usability in accordance with ISO standards)
- A digital sales presentation for tablet computers (both for the sales pitch and at trade fairs)
- A direct mail concept with high-quality notebooks including a packaging concept, which also contained helpful information for the target groups
- Brochures to support the networked campaign and communicate both technical data and image messages
- Ad concept
- Support and communicative utilisation of a building in England in which the new material was used
- A well-conceived design approach for a design-savvy target group
Target-group-specific approach
The microsite was tailored very specifically to the needs of the target group and was based on a classic sales funnel: specific benefits, testimonials and helpful information were to interact in order to “convert” the visitor. The 4 main target groups were each taken individually to meet their specific needs.
To design the measures, we took the product's system and developed a graphic language out of it: a mixture of common repeating patterns on modern facades and optical illusion. This unique and memorable approach was able to be used flexibly and in a variety of forms for various media.
An accompanying process of change
Not only did the company have no experience with target groups other than technical personnel, all the problems that can arise in international groups also had to be dealt with: Numerous departments involved were spread around the world, and there were different views and experiences as well as complex communication channels.
Interdisciplinary teams
In a mixed situation like this, strong coordination and interdisciplinary thinking are necessary - from classic business consulting to backend development.
We communicated with customer offices in the USA, Belgium, Germany, India, France and Northern Europe during the project, and combined our strengths to create a central communication strategy for the new product segment. Strategy consultants, UX specialists, designers, artists, frontend and backend developers, CRM specialists, content strategists and advertising experts were involved on our side.
Numerous lessons
The company learned a lot from this joint project. For the first time, a campaign was tailored to completely new target groups. The company embarked on a product launch from start to finish in a completely new format, resulting in a blueprint that is excellently suited for future innovations and launches.
