Strategic e-brand management for small enterprises

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Master's Thesis from the year 2004 in the subject Communications - Public Relations, Advertising, Marketing, Social Media, grade: 97%, University of Geneva (HEC (Haute Etudes Commerciales)), language: English, abstract: This study analyses the reasons and how to integrate successfully the Internet in thebrand strategy of a small enterprise in order to maximise the effects resulting thereof as aneffective brand-building tool. To understand clearly the issues of the Internet integration in asmall enterprise, the study considers a theoretical approach and a practical case of a smallbusiness called Bambino Mio Ltd. This firm is producing cotton nappies and distributing themin the UK and Spain (and soon in Europe). Its channels of distribution are, on the one hand,classic with distributors and on the other hand through Internet, which provides the user detailedproduct information and a limited possibility to purchase online.Before starting the analysis of the different marketing aspects related to the Internet, thestudy exposes the key brand elements being the source of a successful migration of the Smalland Medium Enterprise's (SME) offline brand to the Web. In addition, it appears that the notionof small and medium enterprise is not only a moderator in term of Internet and marketingopportunity, but implies a different approach of the problem due to the particular constraintsrelated to the sector of SMEs. This kind of organisation has to proceed primarily through anevaluation of its situation in term of market position (level of competition, life-stage of theproducts and of the firm) and then define the profile of its target market in terms of geographic,demographic, psychographic and behaviouristic segmentation.The results of this first part will help the manager-owner to define his brand identity,fundamental notion about the products, which will be used to build the Internets brandingstrategy to have a consistent and convenient message. Then the branding section will explainhow to define the 6 facets of the brand identity prism and the tangible aspects of the brand.The study considers then the reasons encouraging SMEs to integrate the Internet. Firstof all, in connection with the previous part, the influences of the Web on strategic branding isanalysed partly in order to identify the consequences of the migration of the brand from thetangible world to the virtual one. Actually this transformation implies several kinds of gainssuch as cost reductions, ability for SMEs to compete at the same level as large companies andimprove the communication (one-to-one and many-to-many models) amongst others. [...]

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