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| Green Point, Cape Town - South Africa |
I proudly introduce: Mr. Solly Moeng, an experienced consultant in branding and communications, former President of the Public Relations Institute of Southern Africa (PRISA) and founder of DonValley – Brand, Marketing
& Communications. DonValley is the exclusive
partner of the World Communication Forum – #WCFDavos in SA.
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| Solly Moeng |
Solly Moeng is an
experienced consultant with specialisation in holistic Brand Management
and Strategic Marketing & Communications. His professional career so far
has taken him to Canada, USA and France, where he completed his French MA
Degree. He was the South African Tourism's Marketing Manager in Canada, based in
Toronto, before getting appointed to lead the organisation’s operations in the
USA. As Country Manager, based in New York, he managed the roll-out of South
Africa’s Tourism Growth Strategy both in the US and Canada.
Solly has also worked as Business
Development & Marketing Manager of Mesure, a South African subsidiary of
the French multinational construction company, “Bouygues Travaux Public, and Basil
Read”; a position that enabled him to act from the company head office in
St-Quentin-en-Yvelines, just outside Paris. He has also occupied the Marketing
& Communications Manager positions for CapeNature and the South African
Biodiversity Institute. The latter, is in charge of the world famous Kirstenbosch,
Cape Town, and eight other National Botanical Gardens in South Africa. Solly
completed the IMM’s Post-Graduate Diploma in Marketing and attended courses at
the respected Vega School of Branding. He currently lives in Cape Town, South Africa, and is now enrolled for a PhD at the University of Cape Town (UCT), focussing
on how the nuclear industry integrates media in its crisis communications.
From Amsterdam, I
conducted this insightful interview with Solly in Cape Town by phone and email in the first
couple of weeks of November 2014. Below you will find his enriching input on
how communication is undertaken in South Africa and his views on branding, leadership,
communication and PR.
1.
How much do Communications
& PR differ in different regions? I mean, do you see much difference in the
successful PR efforts done in South Africa from the other regions you have
worked at such as Europe and North America?
We live in an increasingly
connected world. Many practitioners in South Africa are also members of
professional organisations that are located elsewhere, especially the US and
UK. Participation in their activities is often online. They are therefore aware
of industry trends elsewhere and tend to emulate them. In some cases, local
practitioners will initiate and lead discussions on certain topics. However,
entry barriers into the profession in South Africa tend to be too low. It seems
to be different in other countries.
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| Stunning Cape Town |
2.
How do you evaluate
communication and PR done in South Africa? How do they differ from other
regions?
There is not much difference,
in my view. Here in South Africa, one of the latest big issues has to do with
measurement; determining how PR/Communication contributes to the bottom-line.
There seems to be increasing awareness about the need to shift measurement
focus from ‘outputs’ to ‘outcomes’. This is a good move.
3.
When was DonValley founded
and in which areas does it specialise? What are DonValley's main areas of expertise?
Could you mention some main projects you have worked so far?
DonValley was founded in
2006 and we specialise in the provision of reputation management services. We
help brands protect and enhance their corporate reputation.
Exact ‘tools’ to be used for each intervention are determined on a case-by-case
basis. We first conduct a thorough analysis /diagnostic of existing
strategies/practice in order to determine what each brand needs. Our services,
therefore, range from assessing and / developing strategies for corporate
communications, media relations, influencer relations, stakeholder mapping and
stakeholder communications, issues/crisis communication management, etc.
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| Solly Moeng, founder of Don Valley |
In terms of recent project,
we were called in as contractors by South Africa’s premier retail giant,
Woolworths, with me being contracted to act in the position of Head of Corporate
Communications & PR and to lead internal teams and help protect and
enhance corporate reputation. What started as a 3-month appointment ended-up
lasting almost 2 years. My leadership contributed in helping Woolworths regain
previously lost positions as the most respected corporate brand in the South Africa
retail sector, on one hand and, on the other hand, in the general corporate
sector.
We have also been helping
another giant brand, Imperial Logistics, develop a new corporate communications
strategy, including media relations, internal communications, influencer
strategy, crisis/issues communication strategy.
In addition, I write weekly
columns for a weekly online financial website, analysing corporate behaviour.
Below are examples of recent articles Solly has written:
http://www.fin24.com/Tech/Opinion/Something-is-terribly-wrong-at-Eskom-20141112
http://www.fin24.com/Companies/Health/Discovery-beats-PnP-20141105
http://www.fin24.com/Tech/Opinion/HCI-Cool-heads-must-prevail-20141030
http://www.fin24.com/Companies/Advertising/What Cell-C-should-learn-20141119
http://youtu.be/0FeDUYVj4V8
http://www.fin24.com/Companies/Health/Discovery-beats-PnP-20141105
http://www.fin24.com/Tech/Opinion/HCI-Cool-heads-must-prevail-20141030
http://www.fin24.com/Companies/Advertising/What Cell-C-should-learn-20141119
http://youtu.be/0FeDUYVj4V8
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| Astonishing South Africa |
4.
Would you consider cultural
backgrounds when crafting communication/PR/branding strategies?
Yes, cultural background in
the broader sense, not so much in the ethnic sense. But where the latter is
strongly followed, it would be better to have it in mind when drafting
communication strategies. It is
generally wise to consider local values and norms in order to shape
communication practice, otherwise proposed solutions might, at best, not be easy
to implement and, at worst, be rejected outright. For instance, in South Africa
we have 11 official languages and there is a considerable influence of
English, this is important to have in mind when crafting messages for
recipients in this country. Culture determines the way things are done in a
country, so it is significant to take cultural differences into account when structuring e-messages in a way that e-recipients will understand and interact.
6.
Branding and Public
Relations – are these areas connected? How?
The Public Relations function supports
brand. It can be used to help raise awareness about brand or as an ongoing tool
to help position the brand, and grow goodwill and affinity to the brand. It is one
of the tools, but not the only one. It is all about stakeholders’ relationship
and engagement.
In today’s, 'reputation
economy’, brand identity and brand image are two increasingly important factors
to consider in a PR strategy. Brand
identity is “how an organisation wants to be perceived by its audience”, while
brand image is “how the organise is
seen by its stakeholders”.
7.
You have been responsible
for managing the growth strategy of South Africa Tourism in US and Canada. What
are the main branding strategies you have developed during your time in North
America? Which would you mention as the most effective plan/programme for
destination marketing/branding?
Americans believe other
Americans easier than they do foreigners. Our most successful strategy was to use
Americans to help tell others about our product. We did this through a consumer
advertising campaign, both in Canada and the US, through which we worked with a
number of outbound tour operators to promote two types of travel packages to
South Africa. One was cheaper, lasting about a week in South Africa, and the
other was slightly more costly, lasting ten days or more.
The first one, dubbed
“Upscale
Wonderlusters” targeted potential first long-distance travellers and
the second one, dubbed “Next-Stop South Africa”, targeted
Americans/Canadians who were used to long-distance travel, possibly having been
to Asia, Australia, New Zealand, etc. and disposed of both time and income to
travel. We believed that the latter were predisposed to consider South Africa
as their next travel destination.
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| Cape Town |
We had a special campaign
website themed “My South African Story” on which those who returned from a trip
to South Africa were encouraged to share their South African stories. Many of
them were happy to do so, and thus encouraged others to also travel to South
African, telling them that South Africans are very friendly and welcoming to
(especially) Americans (because of widespread fear to travel soon after the 9/11
attacks on the World Trade Centre). African-American travellers were particularly
interested in the historic aspects of travel to South Africa, visiting places
like Robben Island, where Nelson Mandela and other political prisoners were
incarcerated for many years, and his home in Soweto, as well as other related
sites. White-Americans are generally interested in wildlife and general
sight-seeing experiences. These considerations always informed tour content.
8.
How have brand architecture
and strategy evolved along the years? Is there a global branding strategy
programmes you have worked in?
At a high-level, we still
follow the “Branded House” or “House of Brands” approach, or some
slight modifications here and there. Solly explained that a branded house is a
brand like Mercedes-Benz which has many brands under the same umbrella brand
while a house of brands is a brand such as Coca-Cola that is owner of other big
brands like Sprite or Fanta but with very distinct separation between them –
some people do not even know Sprite and Fanta are from Coca-Cola, for instance.
These are still, by and
large, the brand architecture options that make sense to consider. I led
processes to develop a new brand strategy for organisations like the South
African Oil & Gas Alliance (SAOGA -www.saoga.org.za), a new Corporate ID for
CapeNature -www.capenature.co.za
(formerly known as the Western Cape Nature Conservation Board),
Eastern Cape Tourism Board - www.visiteasterncape.co.za, etc.
9.
In general terms, how would
you define the difference between local branding strategies from global ones?
In South Africa, too many
people still confuse branding with corporate identity (the look and feel –
usually the logo - part of a brand). One has to keep reminding people that a
brand is made up of what I refer to as the ‘invisible part of the iceberg’ (value proposition, strategic intent, etc) and
the ‘visible part of the iceberg’ (colours, logos and other look-and-feel
aspects). South Africans also seem to like rebranding over and over again,
usually whenever new leadership takes over. People elsewhere seem understand
that a brand is like a slow growing tree that should be nurtured over time.
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| More of Cape Town |
10.
In 2015, you will be
speaking at the World Communication Forum about communication and leadership,
how do you see these two areas? Is communication essential for good leadership?
Or vice-versa, communication could only be well executed if led by a strong
leader? Could you please develop on this?
Indeed, no leader can
expect to be effective if he/she communicates badly, or doesn’t communicate at
all. But, communication goes beyond internal communication to company
employees; it has to extend throughout the organisation’s entire value-chain
and stakeholder groups. Increasingly, all organisations should map their
stakeholders, identify them, group them, and determine the most appropriate way
(media platform, tone, regularity, etc.) to communicate important information
to them. They should also put in place appropriate platforms for
two-way/multilateral communication with all stakeholders, informed by a
thorough understanding of each stakeholder group, as well as the issues that
matter to it.
These could be rights issues: human rights, workers’ rights,
children’s rights, women’s rights, environmental rights, etc., or pure shareholder
related issues.
I will also address
structural matters in many organisations. Few organisations have Chief
Communication Officers or similar positions at the most senior leadership
levels, e.g. EXCO, or even board members who understand strategic communications.
This lacuna often results in the
‘juniorisation’ of the communication portfolio and denying it crucial
opportunities to make strategic input at the right level. Communicators are
turned into ‘runners/messengers’ who simply take instructions, often from
bosses with little understanding of the strategic role that can be played by
seasoned communicators. If positioned correctly, seasoned strategic
communicators can help organisations avoid finding themselves on the back foot
in terms of reputation management.
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| Solly Moeng |
I also refer to this as “upstream integration for better downstream
delivery”. Where strategic communicators are integrated at the top echelons
of organisational leadership, they become better prepared to foresee threats
and weaknesses, and prepare their organisations deal with potential media
issues that might embarrass the organisation. The opposite might also be true,
as they might see opportunities ahead of time and, through clever
communication, help their organisations take advantage of them through clever
positioning.
I concluded the interview by asking how Solly defines the term 'Public Relations', as I intend
to ask this to all PR professionals whom I will be talking to in the coming weeks. In the end, we should be able to have a global definition when combining all definitions.
A huge thanks to Solly Moeng and Jessica Jones for the time and efforts... Your
time, kindness and attention were highly appreciated!
Keep an eye here for future interviews with C-level PR executives from around the globe.
Join us in Davos on 10-11 March 2015 for the VI World Communication Forum - #WCFDavos - www.forumdavos.com.
Join us in Davos on 10-11 March 2015 for the VI World Communication Forum - #WCFDavos - www.forumdavos.com.
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