Wednesday, 22 February 2023
Going live just before Christmas 2022, Close Brothers Asset Management's (CBAM) new bethebrand system delivers a timely step change in digital asset management at a time of change for the company's marketing.
CBAM is an established provider of financial advice and investment management services and works with professionals, business owners, individuals, families and their advisers, who are looking to preserve and grow their long-term savings and investments. CBAM is part of the Close Brothers Group plc, a FTSE 250 leading UK merchant banking group, providing lending, deposit taking, wealth management services, and stocks and shares trading.
Named MABLE (Marketing And Brand Literature Ecosystem), CBAM's bethebrand system was brought online from 'green light' to 'go live' all within Q4 2022.
Prior to the introduction of the new system, CBAM had been aware for some time that they needed a new approach to digital asset management. The previous digital asset management system was created on proprietary software, with a separate internal system for certain parts of the process. This resulted in two separate job numbers for the same job. What was needed was a complete remapping of all the workflows to lay the groundwork for a single integrated system spanning the needs of the company.
With a rebrand already underway and important industry developments in process, such as the FCA's new Consumer Duty legislation, CBAM needed to complete the workflow mapping rapidly to configure the new system and bring it online quickly.
The bethebrand team was able to step in and take on the workflow mapping project for CBAM. This greatly accelerated the deployment timescale, allowing the CBAM project team to expertly project manage the system deployment and identify specific system configurations, whilst simultaneously managing, and dovetailing in, its immediate major marketing projects.
Stage 1 of the bethebrand system is now complete. The business now has one end-to-end system, with one set of job numbers and all of its digital assets supported and managed in one place.
In addition to the formal user training, bethebrand also ran regular drop-in sessions for the team during January 2023 to help everyone acclimatise quickly. This hands-on style training was greatly appreciated, as it meant that the team could come in with real questions as they got to grips with using the new system in a live situation.
Stage 2 of MABLE is in planning. This will make the business's brand guidelines and brand assets, such as logos and photos, available to the wider team as a tool kit.
Thursday, 17 November 2022
We are delighted to announce that Co-op Funeralcare's new bethebrand system is live.
The Co-op is one of the world's largest consumer co-operatives with interests across food, funerals, insurance and legal services. Owned by millions of UK consumers, the Co-op operates 2,500 food stores, over 800 funeral homes and provides products to over 5,100 other stores. Co-op Funeralcare is the UK's leading funeral provider for funerals and pre-paid plans.
On 29 July 2022, the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) began regulating pre-paid funeral plans following legislation passed by Parliament. The FCA has authorised 26 providers, who collectively hold approximately 1.6 million plans, making up 87% of the market.
Regulation has boosted consumer protection, with new rules in place relating to areas such as cold calling and a ban on commission payments to intermediaries. In addition, customers of authorised providers have access to the Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS), so their money is protected if their provider fails.
Co-op Funeralcare sought a digital asset management system to ensure it could evidence good consumer outcomes with absolute clarity and deliver first class insight with regard to its sophisticated compliance and financial promotion processes.
bethebrand has been working with other Co-op organisations for some time. This gave Co-op Funeralcare deep insight into the capabilities of the bethebrand system and an opportunity to engage with the team quickly for a rapid deployment.
With an absolute deadline for regulation, Co-op Funeralcare required the bethebrand team to hit the ground running over the summer to undertake system configuration and train the team in time for the new system, nicknamed BABS, to be 'business as usual' by 29th July.
bethebrand rose to the challenge, with the timeline from initial decision to 'go live', including full training for the team taking just ten weeks.
Co-op Funeralcare is already seeing tangible benefits in having a single asset store and a system driven approval process.
Regulation is constantly evolving and a solid system-based approach is of paramount importance in managing change. With preparations for the new Consumer Duty, being introduced by the FCA on 31 July 2023, in full swing across regulated financial services firms, Co-op Funeralcare's step change in digital asset management ensures it is ahead of the curve in preparing for such regulatory changes.
Monday, 20 June 2022
It is a pleasure to announce that the Post Office's new bethebrand system is live
United to the same cause - 'Helping you get life's important things done' - the new system is set to offer a host of operational advantages across the organisation.
An anchor of UK communities for centuries, Post Office is a commercial business driven by a strong social purpose: to be there, in person, for the people who rely on it. Thanks to its extensive network of over 11,500 branches, the Post Office brings essential services within reach of communities and businesses alike - whether that's posting parcels to loved ones, depositing cash at the end of the working day or topping up the gas meter. 99.7% of the population lives within 3 miles of a post office and 93% live within 1 mile.
The Post Office's extensive range of services, including a range of financial services such as banking and personal insurance, means that governance, compliance and sophisticated project management lie at the core of its marketing operations.
With its current digital asset management system contract due for review, a comprehensive tender process was initiated which saw bethebrand chosen as the new provider.
The brief encompassed four key areas:
The onboarding showcased the extensive configuration capabilities of the system. With hands on project leadership from bethebrand CEO, Adam, the Post Office had every query, question and quandary overcome with timely solutions to deliver a new system that opens up a host of opportunities through 2022 and beyond.
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, 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
People's Partnership offers a great example of one particular capability of the bethebrand suite, to provide a sophisticated, mass, document management system.
People's Partnership 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. People's Partnership created more financial products and substantially grew its membership.
Today People's Partnership 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, People's Partnership 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), People's Partnership's bethebrand system incorporates tiered access across the organisation. Amongst the People's Partnership 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 People's Partnership.
The sophistication and size of the operational communications to five million savers is vast. It allows People's Partnership 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 People's Partnership'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.
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.
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.
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.
Friday, 01 March 2019
To help Coventry Building Society's marketing teams meet the demands of continued business growth, they identified the need to automate and streamline what was a very manual production of their Financial Promotions.
“My Campaign will have a hugely positive impact on the way we store, create, seek approval and deliver these jobs, namely customer communications and marketing campaigns. It makes us easy to use, improves transparency by keeping stakeholders better informed and helps keep us safe and secure by providing a better control environment for our communications.”
The ability to have all marketing collateral in one accessible portal where all stakeholders can review and participate in it's creation, as well as having access to the library of all collateral was central to the decision making. They wanted the process to reflect their strategic principles of being transparent, secure and easy to use.
be the brand were selected from researched market leaders and chosen because of their proven track record in the Financial Services sector. The system (MyCampaign being the name of the Coventry Building Society system) was scoped, configured and launched (with user training) within a 3 month window.
“Be the Brand have helped us to streamline our processes, meaning we can deliver work in a more efficient, joined up way. It provides an extensive audit trail, and the reporting functionality allows us to really get to grips with the work going through our team, understanding pinch points, resource requirements and spotting potential issues before they occur.”
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.
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.
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.
Thursday, 16 March 2017
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