Wednesday, 06 April 2022
Following an extensive needs analysis, Kensington Mortgages (Kensington) went live with their new bethebrand system, nicknamed KAS (Kensington Asset Store) in Q3 2021.
The new system builds on Kensington’s rigorous approach to compliance and risk management by delivering pan-organisational asset storage and workflow management to further enhance their one team approach./p>
Founded in 1995, Kensington has long been one of the UK's leading specialist mortgage lenders. Kensington serves fast-growing segments such as the self-employed, those with multiple incomes and the over 55s - people the high street is not always set up to cater for. The company’s approach is to look beneath the surface and go deeper than the mainstream lenders where all too often the 'computer says no'.
During the pandemic Kensington undertook a thorough examination of the needs of its teams across sales, marketing, product development, servicing, legal and compliance in terms of workflow and asset management requirements.
Working in a heavily regulated environment Kensington wished to ensure it had the best possible systems approach in terms of aspects such as document sign-off, version control and asset lifecycle management. Being undertaken within the pandemic, the company also wished to ensure that it offered its teams best practice support for hybrid working.
With previous marketing team member experience of utilising the system, bethebrand was invited to tender. Two key aspects of the bethebrand functionality and support won the day:
KAS went from project ‘green light’ to ‘go live’ in just 8 weeks over the summer of 2021.
The initial launch phase saw the system implemented across the business in terms of acquisition communications. The launch took a ‘big bang’ approach, with the complete portfolio of marketing assets going live at once. The second phase brought the servicing teams on board, with customer collateral being added on to KAS.
Achieving great outcomes from an implementation as swift and complex as KAS is testament to the close working relationship, insight and expertise across the teams of both bethebrand and Kensington.
Monday, 28 February 2022
In our continuing series examining the breadth, depth, and possibilities of how you can configure and utilise the bethebrand system, this time we are taking a look at the CommsBuilder functionality and how it creates time savings and cost benefits for marketing departments needing to work their budgets ever harder.
Having a really good creative agency is absolutely key in ensuring that you can punch through and stand out in ever more cluttered and confusing market spaces. But great agencies are reassuringly expensive, because you are bringing premier league talent to bear on your marketing challenges and opportunities.
But there can be a substantial ongoing cost to using agency teams to execute every single outing for the creative. After all, they are time cost businesses, but the cost in relation to the specific application can be out of proportion and consume as much budget as the initial creative development.
But what if your own marketing team could undertake specific execution tasks themselves? Even if they are not trained designers?
bethebrand's CommsBuilder functionality delivers just that. In fact, you could reduce the cost and time spent localising your campaigns by up to 85%, whilst maintaining your brand consistency across all markets.
CommsBuilder brings marketing asset execution and delivery into the hands of the whole marketing team.
By working with your creative teams in conjunction with CommsBuilder, you can create templates that preserve the sacred cows of brand, creative and compliance. But you can empower your team to specify and personalise with the help of easy-to-use design and layout tools within the CommsBuilder module.
Artwork set up as templates delivers complete control over the whole lifecycle of the asset:
Circle Health Group is an award-winning healthcare provider operating Britain's largest network of independent hospitals. Circle's aim is to be the most innovative, patient-focused healthcare organisation and, by equipping its people with leading-edge technology, deliver the highest quality care. It supports patients whether they fund their own-treatment or are supported by private healthcare insurance, and the group also works in partnership with the NHS. Circle Health Group acquired BMI Healthcare in January 2020. The group operates independent hospitals, runs integrated care programmes and rehabilitation services, and has an overseas division which operates in Shanghai, China.
Design Manager, Natalie Bainbridge, said: “We started working with bethebrand in 2016 with a specific objective of helping us with the management of our busy and fast-growing studio. At that time, we were operating an analogue 'ticket system' on Excel as our workflow management approach. I had known bethebrand from a previous employer and we invited them to tender. They stood out from the other participants because of the CommsBuilder module. Combined with Template Builder and the Asset Store, we could see that we had all the ingredients for a seamless, end to end, solution. Onboarding was equally seamless, and our new system 'Kaleidoscope' was swiftly operational.”
Natalie added: “With 50 plus hospitals across England, Wales and Scotland, we need to ensure that our regional marketing teams are fully supported for all their local and workplace marketing requirements. By creating a portfolio of 26 templates covering every marketing asset that could be needed for local adaptation, we are able to empower our marketing teams to create exactly what they need for themselves. Confident in the knowledge that every asset created will be on brand and consistent, our central design team can then focus on developing new core creative.”
Natalie concluded: “In early 2022 we launched our new brand identity. Our bethebrand system was pivotal in making this project as smooth as it turned out to be. But what made an amazing impact was the support we received from the bethebrand design team. They created an amazingly adaptable new suite of template assets for local marketing deployment. We were quite demanding, as we needed to be quite iterative as we went along in incorporating all of the requirements. But throughout it all they were nimble and insightful, with a real eye for detail. They always made us feel loved.”
If you would like to unlock the potential of CommsBuilder for your organisation, contact Chief Executive Adam Hainsworth at adam@be-thebrand.com.
Monday, 17 January 2022
In our continuing series examining the breadth, depth, and possibilities of how you can configure and utilise the bethebrand system, this time we are taking a look at brand guidelines and how bethebrand can not only make their management easy, but also have an impact on your marketing effectiveness.
There are many reasons why brand guidelines get side-lined in a busy business:
The bethebrand brand guidelines module overcomes all of these challenges:
Here’s a handy diagram to show you more, kindly offered by Wesleyan from their live microsite.
The outcomes achieved from the development of this functionality are best summed up by our clients
Founded in 1841, Wesleyan Assurance Society (Wesleyan) is a financial services mutual dedicated to some of the most trusted professions in society and is committed to creating brighter financial futures for doctors, dentists and teachers, so they can focus on the vital work they do.
Brand Executive, Katie Wright, said: “Originally we had a number of storage solutions across the business for our assets and brand guidelines. When bethebrand built our system, it gave us the opportunity to bring everything together into a system that was simple and intuitive. Like many companies we utilised external agency support to keep our brand guidelines up to date. Also, like many brands our guidelines and accompanying asset suite are constantly evolving. The brand guidelines module has completely changed our approach. We can now manage assets ourselves and keep our own guidelines up to date, with no time lag and no additional external expenditure. It has made us more responsive and colleagues, as well as our external agencies, can enjoy appropriate access to all they need to bring our brand to life.
Katie added: “A great example of the benefits of the module can be found in how we have been able to create amazing consistency very quickly in our slide decks. Every company has the same issues with slide decks in that they morph through usage. By having our template decks within the guidelines module, and a template within the assets area of the system, it not only aids presentation quality and consistency, but also supports compliance oversight and ultimately makes it easier for our teams to use the decks.”
If you would like to unlock the potential of brand asset management for your organisation contact Chief Executive Adam Hainsworth at adam@be-thebrand.com.
Monday, 22 November 2021
Going live in 2021 with its new bethebrand system MPAH (Marketing Production and Approval Hub), Quilter is implementing its system to deliver pan organisational support across its businesses.
Quilter plc is a leading wealth management business in the UK and internationally, helping to create prosperity for the generations of today and tomorrow. It oversees £108.5 billion in customer investments (as at 30 September 2021). It has an adviser and customer offering spanning financial advice, investment platforms, multi-asset investment solutions and discretionary fund management.
Quilter started its search for a DAM provider in late 2020, as it sought to bring an internal network of databases together into one system that could support the whole business. The new system’s core objective was literally simplicity itself:
Each Quilter business has its own sets of documents, communications, websites, advertising, social media, and sponsorship programmes. Rather than opt for a ‘big bang’ changeover, the internal implementation team started with the literature suite of one business with a system capable and configured for the whole business.
Closely supported by the bethebrand team, this starter project acted as an excellent blueprint for the rollout and demonstrated the agility of both teams in moving through design, configuration, and implementation in a matter of a few months.
An important element of the rollout is the quality and availability of system training. Quilter’s early adopters, together with the internal trainers and bethebrand’s account team, are able to showcase the system’s capabilities and improved outcomes to the entire business. This close team working provides a controlled yet agile approach with minimal business disruption.
An important insight shared by the Quilter team was that the bethebrand team was always there when they needed them, and they never felt that making a call to them would end up with an extra bill. This transparency and trust is key to every bethebrand client relationship.
Thursday, 04 November 2021
B&CE offers a great example of one particular capability of the bethebrand suite, to provide a sophisticated, mass, document management system.
B&CE Group is a not-for-profit organisation established in 1942 by unions and federations with the intention of providing financial products for the construction industry. Construction workers, who tended to move jobs frequently, needed a way to build up holiday pay.
Its first scheme was simple but effective for workers, and hassle-free for employers. Every week, a construction worker would buy a stamp to stick on a card. They could then cash in the card to give themselves money to live on when they took a holiday. Over time, construction workers needed more than just a holiday pay scheme. B&CE created more financial products and substantially grew its membership.
Today B&CE is perhaps best known for The People’s Pension, a leading workplace pension scheme with more than five million pension savers from over 95,000 employers and £16 billion assets under management.
In 2015, B&CE started a project to find a system to manage the approval and storage of its communication assets.. A thorough examination of the market led to detailed discussions with bethebrand and its appointment.
Nicknamed DAS (Digital Approval System), B&CE’s bethebrand system incorporates tiered access across the organisation. Amongst the B&CE user base are a core of internal trainers and superusers. This allows the organisation the freedom and flexibility to expand, train and develop its user base as required, whilst having a core team of senior system ‘ambassadors’ fully supported by the bethebrand team. This integrated and cascaded to training and support is both highly cost effective and operationally effective for B&CE.
The sophistication and size of the operational communications to five million savers is vast. It allows B&CE the convenience of a single pan-organisational system to safely store all customer communications across every channel.
The system’s document management functionality is configurated precisely to B&CE’s requirements. It is combined with full audit trail and approval functionality that allows users from right across the business, not just marketing, to collaborate, create, comply and control an intricate web of customer communications.
Wednesday, 13 October 2021
The pandemic is far from over, but the summer at least allowed us all to take a well-earned break and recharge, ready for what the rest of the year has in store.
The return to the office process is not uniform. But whether we are at home, in the office, or on the move - or all three in the same day - we need to work together supportively and effectively and we need to get the job done well.
By virtue of our unprecedented business growth in 2020 and 21, bethebrand has shown itself to be the proven UK leader in digital asset management systems. We have seen a record number of clients go live this year and we look forward to sharing more of their insights with you in future newsletters.
Team Changes
Director, Stefan Russell has played an outstanding part in making bethebrand what it is today. For the past 14 years he has helped drive the development of the system with his first-class client insight and supported a who’s who of financial services brands make great strides forward in streamlining and managing their marketing workflow, archive, and compliance systems. As he embarks on a new chapter in his life, with lots of travelling and new adventures, we wish him every happiness and thank him for his amazing contribution.
Joining us is Client Delivery Manager, Karen Shaw. Bringing 27 years of financial services client-side experience, latterly leading Prudential’s internal creative agency, Karen is ideally placed to help clients get the most from their bethebrand system. What’s more, she was a bethebrand client for 6 years, which means she really hits the ground running in her system knowledge from a client perspective.
Wesleyan On Board
We were delighted to welcome Wesleyan on board earlier this year. Founded in 1841, Wesleyan Assurance Society (Wesleyan) is a financial services mutual dedicated to some of the most trusted professions in society. Having developed their own marketing asset management systems over many years and with an ever changing landscape of marketing techniques, channels and assets, Wesleyan decided to look outside for the best of breed.
You can read more of their move to bethebrand here.
In-house, or Out of House?
Many clients come to us after having built their own digital asset management solution in house. What they discover is that configuring an off the shelf project management or database tool can be fraught and that a ‘from scratch’ build has significant hidden and opportunity costs. We explore these challenges here.
Get in Touch, Keep in Touch
If we can be of help right now, or you can see a requirement on the horizon, please do not hesitate in contacting me directly. We would be delighted to look at your objectives and recommend a system solution to suit your exact requirements.
Monday, 09 August 2021
Have you ever seen any of those TV programmes where famous chefs try to recreate much loved confectionary? The branded bar of chocolate that has been loved for generations is deconstructed, the recipe identified as best as it possibly can be and recreated? Each time, no matter how good the chef, it’s not quite the same. The team that has devoted its working life to that much loved chocolate bar wins every time.
It’s quite a good analogy to the specialist application of technology. It’s a sophisticated ‘recipe’, where specific experience gained over a long period of time in delivering one thing consistently delivers the desired outcome.
This is very pertinent to the development of a Digital Asset Management (DAM) system for a particular organisation’s needs. Every compliance and marketing department has a unique way of doing things. Every company has its unique culture on collaboration and idea generation, its own unique marketing communications mix and a particular combination of channels and routes to market.
Every DAM needs to be built around that unique combination. If you decide to utilise an off the shelf project management or database tool you are starting with a system with a multitude of business applications. It then requires configuration. Therein can lie quite a substantial hidden cost in drilling down into the complexities of the user requirements and matching them to the configuration options that are available within the chosen system. This invariably leads to compromises having to be made in terms of what the system can deliver.
It can also take much longer to configure than envisaged. If you have had hundreds of briefs for DAM systems, you can pretty much hit the ground running and quickly elevate above the basics of the processes into the finesse elements that will make everyone’s working day run much more smoothly. But if you are starting from a layperson’s knowledge of marketing and compliance, then the specification process alone can be a steep and risk laden learning curve. There can therefore be a substantial opportunity cost of spending time on learning and developing when there are bigger tech outcomes to create for the organisation.
But the challenges and costs only start with the build phase. There’s updates, fixes, ongoing security and new user requirements to support. With changes in personnel there’s the need to keep an IT team up to speed on a very particular suite of software that has a specific purpose, rather than supporting pan organisational need. Therein lies the most hidden cost of all - needing to relatively intensively support something quite niche on an ongoing basis.
Some of our clients come to us after they have tried to self-build or adapt something from the shelf. Some have unfortunately gone from the shelf straight to the bin because they never worked properly. Others have started out OK but become unfit for purpose because there are greater business priorities to support.
The required intensity of development and maintenance needs to drive an important return on investment consideration to be tackled at the very outset of the project scoping phase. The true lifetime cost of building a system from scratch, or configuring a generic workflow/document tool, needs to be calculated.
This calculation always leads to one conclusion - that it is better for the organisation to purchase a system that is built for the job.
In our case, we have devoted 20 years to building market leading DAM systems for many respected leading names. Before you start your project do give us a call. The economies to be gained and costs/time to be saved could be an eye opener.
Monday, 09 August 2021
Have you ever seen any of those TV programmes where famous chefs try to recreate much loved confectionary? The branded bar of chocolate that has been loved for generations is deconstructed, the recipe identified as best as it possibly can be and recreated? Each time, no matter how good the chef, it’s not quite the same. The team that has devoted its working life to that much loved chocolate bar wins every time.
It’s quite a good analogy to the specialist application of technology. It’s a sophisticated ‘recipe’, where specific experience gained over a long period of time in delivering one thing consistently delivers the desired outcome.
This is very pertinent to the development of a Digital Asset Management (DAM) system for a particular organisation’s needs. Every compliance and marketing department has a unique way of doing things. Every company has its unique culture on collaboration and idea generation, its own unique marketing communications mix and a particular combination of channels and routes to market.
Every DAM needs to be built around that unique combination. If you decide to utilise an off the shelf project management or database tool you are starting with a system with a multitude of business applications. It then requires configuration. Therein can lie quite a substantial hidden cost in drilling down into the complexities of the user requirements and matching them to the configuration options that are available within the chosen system. This invariably leads to compromises having to be made in terms of what the system can deliver.
It can also take much longer to configure than envisaged. If you have had hundreds of briefs for DAM systems, you can pretty much hit the ground running and quickly elevate above the basics of the processes into the finesse elements that will make everyone’s working day run much more smoothly. But if you are starting from a layperson’s knowledge of marketing and compliance, then the specification process alone can be a steep and risk laden learning curve. There can therefore be a substantial opportunity cost of spending time on learning and developing when there are bigger tech outcomes to create for the organisation.
But the challenges and costs only start with the build phase. There’s updates, fixes, ongoing security and new user requirements to support. With changes in personnel there’s the need to keep an IT team up to speed on a very particular suite of software that has a specific purpose, rather than supporting pan organisational need. Therein lies the most hidden cost of all - needing to relatively intensively support something quite niche on an ongoing basis.
Some of our clients come to us after they have tried to self-build or adapt something from the shelf. Some have unfortunately gone from the shelf straight to the bin because they never worked properly. Others have started out OK but become unfit for purpose because there are greater business priorities to support.
The required intensity of development and maintenance needs to drive an important return on investment consideration to be tackled at the very outset of the project scoping phase. The true lifetime cost of building a system from scratch, or configuring a generic workflow/document tool, needs to be calculated.
This calculation always leads to one conclusion - that it is better for the organisation to purchase a system that is built for the job.
In our case, we have devoted 20 years to building market leading DAM systems for many respected leading names. Before you start your project do give us a call. The economies to be gained and costs/time to be saved could be an eye opener.
Monday, 19 July 2021
Wilful blindness is far from a new term. It came to be used in legal circles in the middle of the 19th century and has cemented itself firmly as a concept, not only in law but also in many other walks of life. Not least of these is in business.
How often have we been in a situation where there is an opportunity for knowledge and an opportunity to be informed, but we simply choose not to? We choose to keep ourselves in the dark, blind ourselves to the existence of the facts, look away singing la la la la la la. (If you would like to know more about how we all succumb to being wilfully blind have a read of Margaret Heffernan’s fabulous book Wilful Blindness).
Perhaps the first and most common issue that we see in supporting clients obtain the right digital asset management solution for their financial services business is expiration dates.
Without a system driving a process to keep on top of expiration dates then keeping on top of them is simply a matter of human will.
The problem with human will is that it can be beaten down. Beaten by 101 different demands every working day, restructuring, reorganisation, people coming, people going, and simply ‘Well no one’s going to fire me for letting this slip, so I’ll stick my fingers in my ears and just start singing la la la la la la’.
In financial services, not managing expiration dates represents a significant breach risk. If you let 1 turn into 10, then before you know it you are into the 100s and systemic wilful blindness has well and truly kicked in.
If you are relying on the old ‘excel and email’ solution for document management then you are basically setting a timer for the problem to manifest itself.
If you are relying on an off the shelf document management and storage system, then more often than not you are still going to need to police a system with human beings, with their will to do the job being crushed every day.
Systems are the only answer to their management, because the last place you need to showcase your expiration exasperation is on a regulation audit.
Every financial services business is different, but the system process remains constant. With bethebrand, the system configuration can be set-up so that certain trigger events automatically generate a workflow.
So an asset that is both “Product = A or B and also “Audience = X or Y” and the expiry date gets to Z days, a workflow is auto-generated to start the asset update. In all instances, the workflow auto-adds the asset owner as the deliverable owner and auto-checks out the asset into the workflow. In addition, for example, if a print asset is archived, a stock destruction workflow is auto-generated to ensure that printed stock of that asset is destroyed.
If you are experiencing expiration exasperation, give us a call. You will find a friendly ear and an answer to eradicating the problem.
Thursday, 29 April 2021
Wesleyan’s contemporarily named bethebrand system, MaRS (Marketing and Regulatory System), landed the second week of January this year and has rapidly delivered results.
Founded in 1841, Wesleyan Assurance Society (Wesleyan) is a financial services mutual dedicated to some of the most trusted professions in society and is committed to creating brighter financial futures for doctors, dentists and teachers, so they can focus on the vital work they do. Wesleyan partners with leading professional bodies, such as NASUWT, The Teachers’ Union, and the Royal College of General Practitioners, as well as advising large public sector bodies, such as the NHS Pension Scheme.
Wesleyan had developed its own system approaches, both in-house and with print partners, for a number of years. With the ever-increasing sophistication of marketing techniques, channels and assets, and the associated shift from largely print to mostly digital, Wesleyan required an ever-evolving system application. This delivered a clear understanding to the team of what their system was going to be required to do both today and in the future. It also highlighted a clear opportunity to harness the expertise of a specialist.
The decision was made to look to proprietary systems that could meet the specification. Most of all, Wesleyan were looking for a system that would work for them ‘straight out of the box’ - something that could be configured precisely, but that did not need development time.
The tender process was extensive and intensive. bethebrand stood out because it has a clear and simple approach at its core that can power intricate and sophisticated workflow processes. This is an important consideration for Wesleyan, which takes pride in the rigour of its governance processes. Furthermore, with 20 years of dedicated and focused financial services sector development, and many leading industry names as long-standing clients, Wesleyan was confident that it had chosen a trusted provider who would hit the ground running.
bethebrand delivered an agile and fluid system implementation process which allowed the team to be hands on with the system throughout. The outcome of this was that there were very few snags to overcome at ‘go live’, allowing the team to concentrate on the migration of its extensive asset archive and take the opportunity to audit and rationalise it in the process.
Four months in, Wesleyan is already enjoying improved outcomes; moving through approval processes at even greater speed without any dilution of rigour.
Furthermore, many more assets are achieving ‘right first time’ approval by compliance because of MaRS’ collaborative and diligent workflow systems.
Thursday, 29 April 2021
Lockdown did not slow down Petplan in getting their new bethebrand system from brief to live in just 3 months. The new system, nicknamed RAP (Review and Approval Portal), provides a suite of functionality fully configured for the award-winning pet insurer.
Over the last 40 years, Petplan has helped millions of pets through illness and injury. Today, Petplan insures over 1.3 million pets, more than any other provider, with an outstanding record of paying 97% of the claims received. Petplan is a subsidiary of Allianz Insurance plc, part of the Allianz Global Group.
As the UK’s leading pet insurer driving a market-leading marketing programme, Petplan needed a system that could support its sophisticated multi-channel, multi-media marketing communications mix. What’s more, they wanted to further boost the business’ ability to collaborate, be creative and be nimble.
Petplan reviewed many different systems providers prior to appointing bethebrand in the Autumn of 2020. What they found is that many involved too many workarounds and compromises, or were too complicated. The team did not want to compromise in getting a system that could be moulded to exactly to how they like to work.
A great example of this is the RAP system feature to allow peer review. Rather than a signoff procedure, this allows team members to provide feedback and ideas for the development of new marketing assets. So well before an asset proceeds along a sequential signoff round, everyone can contribute and work together. This not only enhances speed to market, but also delivers the very best solution.
Petplan has built a powerful brand and managing brand delivery across all touch-points is key for success. As part of the build, bethebrand has delivered a brand guidelines and imagery site, all housed within the RAP system, providing an important brand management tool to play its part in supporting the team in driving Petplan’s competitive advantage.
The pandemic created no barrier to getting the system up and running speedily. A series of remote workshops allowed the team to quickly identify how they wanted the system configured, which laid the blueprint for rapid implementation.
Monday, 26 April 2021
“I sang 'Nessun Dorma' twice with Pavarotti, and he told me he'd heard 'Smoke' about five or six times, and every time was different. He was so jealous because if he deviated one jot from the traditional interpretation of the famous arias, he'd be crucified. We have the freedom.”
Some of us at be the brand are old enough to remember when artwork was created and transported in paper form in the last century. It’s hard enough to say ‘the last century’ let alone remember the protracted and time consuming process of marketing communications in an analogue world.
In those days where office receptions saw an endless stream of bike helmets and leather the concept of control was a far off dream. Marketing was far more ‘rock and roll’ in the context of Ian Gillan’s quote above. But the management of a brand needs to be a far more of a classical piece.
We work for many different companies in many sectors. But services businesses are a centre of excellence at be the brand. Brand management in the context of a services business is complicated.
A brand is the heart beat of a services business. It is built and defined by the product of a thousand gestures. Every human interaction either feeds or starves the brand of its desired positioning. So the management of a services brand can be anarchy if systems and controls do not lie at its heart. Because the brand is in the hands of many many people.
Digital Asset Management (DAM) has a crucial role to play in the management of a services brand. The brand identity is the emblem of the brand’s promise. Every marketing communication is the articulation of the brand’s promise, underpinned by systems and behaviours that deliver a customer experience aligned to the brand.
So if a good DAM were music it would be classical. Because a good DAM negates the risk of human interpretation in both the emblem and communication of the brand’s promise. You maintain control of what happens.
The heart of our approach is simple; to deliver DAM systems that revolutionise our clients’ marketing workflow management, ensuring full internal stakeholder involvement and delivering detailed archiving to underpin marketing and business continuity.
There is an important place for rock and roll in marketing, defined by the creative process.
But delivery needs to be DAM driven, to a classical score.
Tuesday, 02 February 2021
We are delighted to announce the ‘go live’ of the new bethebrand system for Just Group.
Named Arc, it is the culmination of a highly successful project that marks the progression (hence the name) of the entire business into a new era of content management.
Just Group is a leading and established provider of retirement income products and services to individual and corporate clients. As retirement specialists, Just seeks to positively disrupt markets and deliver better outcomes for customers. The business has a strong social purpose; helping people achieve a better later life by providing financial advice, guidance, competitive products and services to those approaching, at, or in retirement.
The businesses had outgrown their previous ‘out of the box’ system, which had manual components within many processes. With expansion and transformation came the need to replace the old system with a bespoke solution that would be a strong engine for the continuing needs of the business.
bethebrand’s close alignment to the needs and processes of sophisticated financial services organisations meant that they had the system, expertise and experience to support a major pan organisational change project, which would see the old system swapped out for Arc very quickly.
All the product and service brand propositions of the group timed their content management changes to enable the joint project team to transition the 2,200 plus asset library rapidly across. In parallel with this transition, over 140 team members were trained by bethebrand over multiple sessions right across the organisation.
This approach ensured minimal disruption and was achieved smoothly during the pandemic, when team members were dispersed because of the necessity of home working.
Arc has quickly delivered the improved outcomes that were anticipated, creating even greater opportunity to collaborate and innovate. A good example of this is the way the new bethebrand system has eradicated the linear way in which teams had to interact when changing collateral on the old system. Now, whole project teams can inject their thoughts and ideas holistically, positively impacting organisational agility and speed to market.
Tuesday, 02 February 2021
Since 2009, Aldermore Group has been backing people to fulfil life’s hopes and dreams. The Group has two operating companies; Aldermore Bank plc and MotoNovo Finance Limited. Aldermore provides financing to back UK small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs). They support investors and homebuyers with mortgage finance, while offering a dynamic online savings proposition. In March 2018, Aldermore officially became part of FirstRand, the largest financial services group in Africa by market capitalisation.
Aldermore appointed bethebrand to support the savings team solve a time-consuming process of building and approving marketing collateral. Following an extensive workshop programme involving bethebrand and Aldermore stakeholders, a bespoke solution was launched within the savings team. The pilot proved a great success. It provided the savings team with greater control over approving marketing collateral, faster speed to market and a trackable audit of material such as webpages, advertisements and customer letters. Following the success of the pilot, Aldermore’s business finance team also adopted bethebrand’s procedures.
With the well-established systems in place, Aldermore’s customers have benefited as a result. Bethebrand’s solution freed up resources and allowed Aldermore’s savings team to focus on further enhancing their product offering and service proposition. The efficiency and workflow capabilities of the bethebrand system also helped Aldermore adapt its business to the changing Covid-19 environment without interruption.
Tuesday, 12 January 2021
Utmost International is a life assurance group which provides solutions designed to preserve clients’ assets and safeguard them for future generations. As of 31 December 2019, the business manages over £30bn of assets on behalf of over 130,000 clients. Its propositions provide effective and reliable solutions for clients who wish to control the wealth they have accumulated and manage the proceeds when planning succession.
The business is a leading provider of international life insurance across its core markets in the UK, Continental Europe and the Middle East and it operates in over 15 key markets across the globe.
The principal business lines of Utmost International are Utmost Wealth Solutions and Utmost Corporate Solutions:
The company’s journey with bethebrand started in 2016 with Utmost’s Isle of Man office. The success of the system subsequently saw it launched in the Irish business in 2019.
The expansion of Utmost’s bethebrand system has been driven by the operational enhancements that it has delivered quickly and easily at every implementation stage.
Working extensively in intermediated markets in many countries means that Utmost maintains a very extensive suite of literature. For Utmost this means, for example, one product brochure may have many variations according to country, language and prevailing regulatory jurisdiction. Every piece of literature will have different stakeholders across the business. This creates not only a sophisticated ongoing project management need in terms of changing, updating or communicating new collateral items, but also an extensive and intricate archiving requirement to document the who, what, when, how and why history of every piece.
For Utmost, the key to the success of their bethebrand system is its ability to deliver simplicity. They have been able to harmonise different processes across the business into one best practice approach. It allows the team to focus on the quality of the collateral and the fostering of excellent cross organisational working, ultimately delivering great customer outcomes.
What’s more, it allows the team to react very swiftly to market changes, supported closely by bethebrand’s support and account management teams.
bethebrand expect the relationship with Utmost to continue growing to support the markets outside of Europe from 2021.
Thursday, 26 November 2020
We are delighted to announce that we have launched the new bethebrand system developed for the British Business Bank. It has been 6 months in creation and delivers a bespoke experience to meet the specific needs of the organisation. The system has been named ‘DAhL’ after the well-loved author and incorporating the initials of ‘Digital Asset Library’.
The British Business Bank is the UK’s government-owned economic development bank. Its mission is to help drive economic growth by making finance markets work better for smaller businesses - wherever they are in the UK and wherever they are on their business journey. It is currently playing an important role in helping well over 1.4m businesses across the UK access the government’s Covid-19 emergency loans schemes.
bethebrand is a HM Govt G-Cloud Supplier and supports a number of Government departments. G-Cloud is a series of framework agreements with suppliers from which public sector organisations can buy cloud computing services. 4,200 suppliers have been awarded places on the agreement with over 90% of them small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), like bethebrand.
Over the last three years there have been several major developments within the Bank, the result of which has required a strategic review of the its brand, value proposition, customer journeys and new web and brand architecture to reflect a much more complex organisation, targeting multiple audiences.
The Bank’s products are designed and delivered through the market in order to improve the supply of finance for UK smaller businesses. It also has a strategic objective to deliver information to those businesses, educating and raising awareness around finance options so they are encouraged and enabled to find finance best suited to their needs.
DAhL is not just there to sign off materials. It is there as a strategic control and management system to help drive campaigns and ensure brand compliance within a multi-channel, multi-partner communications and education programme. It also playing a key part in boosting cross function and organisation collaboration even further at an unprecedented time for the UK and its economy.
Along the onboarding journey we have built a really enjoyable and close working relationship with the Bank’s team. Scoping and training during lockdown is not without its challenges. but with lots of lateral and creative thinking on both sides we have delivered something very special. This has included creating a system language style and help text that are immersed in the British Business Bank brand.
It is with great pleasure that we announce that British Business Bank is on board.
Tuesday, 10 November 2020
The past few months have been interesting times for us all. As a SaaS business we consider ourselves very fortunate to have sailed so smoothly through what are choppy waters for so many. We set out from the ‘get go’ to be there at every step for our clients, who have had the immense challenges of instant remote working to master.
Rapid TransitionsWe have heard more than a few times from clients how bethebrand has played a key role in their transition to remote working. Also, many companies that we had been talking to prior to lockdown quickly accelerated their implementation schedule and we have also been adding new departments within existing clients’ systems on a very frequent basis.
Removed from an office environment it can become rapidly clear how much marketing might have been kept moving by personal interaction. But when you can no longer wander up to someone’s desk and ask for a favour to undertake an urgent signoff, everything must be driven by an utterly robust process. bethebrand allowed our clients to have that box ticked so they could get moving quickly onto the job at hand.
One Place of Truthbethebrand offers clients ‘one place of truth’, namely the Asset Store. In there is every live document with the current correct version - forever essential during an audit, but absolutely vital in a pandemic.
By utilising the system’s comprehensive search functions, clients were able to quickly identify all the changes required. That has been no small task, with as many as 70% of documents needing some form of change.
That cannot all happen at once and needs project management. The system stepped up here as well, enabling teams to work together, traffic jobs with efficiency and keep everyone informed as to what was going on in a very live environment.
Eradicating the WatercoolerWithout the proverbial ‘watercooler meeting’, managers needed a new and solid way to know what was going on. Over time we have built up an extensive collection of over 50 standard reports within bethebrand. We have seen a sharp uptick in the usage of these reports as managers help their teams perform the best they possibly can in the circumstances.
Those circumstances we just mentioned have been extensive and intrusive for many. Families in one place, home working and home schooling simultaneously, is very hard. By empowering flexible working, bethebrand has allowed team members to hand over the baton without the ‘straight jacket’ of 9 to 5.
Business As (Un)UsualThough this is all far from over, we have all recently been able to enjoy glimpses of our normal lives. But there is no doubt that we have all been thoroughly ‘stress tested’ and we are bracing ourselves for more.
What ‘business as (un)usual’ has achieved for bethebrand is deliver probably the most extensive stress test anyone could have devised for it.
We are delighted to say it has come up trumps.
Friday, 06 November 2020
2020 has been, and is, a busy year for us.
All of our clients have been through enormous changes in their day to day working and we have been right beside them in making that rapid move to remote working go smoothly.
At the same time, we have been completing our own change project to ensure that our marketing and messaging reflects the business we are today and provides a solid platform for our continuing growth.
We are extremely proud to say that we are the brand and marketing workflow, archive and compliance system of choice for many UK and international brands. We have been at the forefront of the development of Digital Asset Management (DAM) systems that streamline the storage, creation, approval and delivery of marketing campaigns and key assets since 2005.
bethebrand today is the preferred system for over 20,000 marketing professionals, driving in excess of 250,000 workflows and a noted centre of excellence for organisation and companies operating in sophisticated governance and compliance environments, such as Financial Services, Government and Healthcare.
We enable marketers to work even more creatively and effectively together by helping bring teams and their marketing services suppliers even closer together to create and deliver campaigns with outstanding customer outcomes.
We take the time to understand the particular complexities of our clients’ communications environments so they can ensure their communications meet the relevant regulatory requirements by setting up standard processes to review items, create new items, or fast-track items with minor amendments.
bethebrand is proud to be Stage 2 FSQS accredited (the advanced stage of benchmark certification process used by major UK banks and financial institutions when selecting suppliers and monitoring internal governance and control) and be a HM Govt G-Cloud Supplier (a series of framework agreements with suppliers from which public sector organisations can buy services without needing to run a full tender or competition procurement process).
Our new website offers visitors a sophisticated insight into our system’s capabilities in a fun and engaging way. It also offers us the opportunity to provide ongoing updates on system development, deliver handy tutorials on getting the most from the system and news on how the company is growing and developing.
Business is changing at a rapid pace as we all adapt to our new marketing worlds. You can rest assured that bethebrand will always be learning, developing and delivering at pace to ensure that we are firmly at our clients’ side as they explore the opportunities that lie ahead to further their competitive advantage.
Saturday, 01 August 2020
Wednesday, 10 June 2020
Saturday, 18 April 2020
Sunday, 15 March 2020
Sunday, 01 March 2020
Sunday, 01 September 2019
Tuesday, 11 June 2019
bethebrand experience is pleased to announce that as of June 2019 we are now fully FSQS accredited.
What is FSQS accreditation?
FSQS is a qualification system for the financial sector, used by a broad spectrum of financial services providers, including major banks, building societies, insurance providers, asset managers, et al.
It is designed to standardise and manage requests for compliance and assurance data for the financial services organisations that have adopted it.
As the regulated environment becomes more complex, FSQS provides a standard and simple mechanism for collecting and managing supplier compliance assurance information across the sector.
It is a cross-sector collaboration solution which reduces the time, cost, resource and duplication currently needed to provide information to financial institutions.
What does FSQS accreditation cover?
In order to gain FSQS accreditation, a supplier must meet a host of strict criteria in regards to operational policies and procedures. Topics include:
-IT Security
-Disaster Recovery
-Data Protection
-Ethical Business
-Diversity & Inclusion
-Anti Bribery
-Anti Slavery
What does this mean for organisations considering bethebrand experience as a supplier?
In a nutshell, it means that in working with bethebrand experience, you are working with an organisation whos systems and processes have been reviewed and accredited against industry standards as defined by FSQS. This should make it easier to do business with us as a significant amount of due diligence has already been performed via the FSQS accreditation.
I want to know more about FQSQ accreditation:
Further information on FSQS accreditation can be found here: http://www.hellios.com/procurement/fsqs.html
Friday, 23 November 2018
Jes Ongley, be the brand experience's COO has become the 2018 "Champion of the dice", having recently won the 2018 World Perudo Championships held at the Institute of Engineering and Technology (IET) in London.
click here to read more
https://toyworldmag.co.uk/news/champion-of-the-dice-declared-at-2018-perudo-world-championships/
Friday, 21 September 2018
G-Cloud 10 has just launched and be the brand experience are listed. This means any government department can easily start using our solutions by ordering / calling off from within G-Cloud.
Friday, 21 September 2018
Matt McColley, has just started with be the brand experience as our New Business Director. As positive feedback and rave reviews have been received for version 2, and subsequent enhancements, we have started working with Matt to manage and develop our sales pipeline. As a veteran of software sales, Matt brings ideas, structure and enthusiasm to our future growth.
Tuesday, 14 August 2018
One of the best known names in UK life assurance with an illustrious history is the latest new client to deploy be the brand experience's software to help manage their financial promotions and compliance activities - bringing a nearly 200 year old insurance brand back to life.
Thursday, 19 July 2018
We are pleased to announce that we have been selected by a UK government department following a competitive tender process - more news to follow as deployments complete.
Wednesday, 06 June 2018
Be the brand experience are delighted to now have our first client in the Emerald isle. The specialist solutions provider in the European insurance & reinsurance market has just gone live following a speedy 10 week deployment process.
Thursday, 22 March 2018
Our CTO, Guy Hainsworth, is having a well earned rest after the successful migration of all clients to our new hosting infrastructure. To keep up with demand from existing and new clients , we have had to step up the primary hosting site. The new infrastructure offers greater (and easier) future scalability and much improved resilience. Details of the new infrastructure stack are available on request.
Wednesday, 07 February 2018
We are very excited that the UK business of a major American insurer specialising in employee benefits have selected & deployed be the brand experience's configured platform to support their compliance and regulatory activities.
Monday, 15 January 2018
An award winning retail bank which provides financial services to small and medium-sized businesses has gone live with be the brand experience's solution to manage their financial promotions process.
Tuesday, 05 September 2017
After a successful configuration and training we are pleased to welcome another mutual to our list of live clients. This top 5 Building Society has selected be the brand experience as the platform to manage their financial promotions lifecycle on and we look forward to becoming an integral part their marketing and compliance activities.
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