Dominos Pizza & Brand Resets
Posted on | January 17, 2010 | No Comments
The marketing world is buzzing atwitter over the very public decision of Domino’s Pizza to overhaul its core identity through a massive revision to its pizza recipes.
The decision is bold: The pizza chain, notorious for being consistently rated in the lowest-quality ranks of consumer preferences, is changing everything, from crust composition to sauce flavor to cheese selections, in an attempt to win over new customers and improve its public perception.
The marketers, however, are studying the impact; as with New Coke in the 80s, an established brand essentially changing everything is a risky venture. The new recipes, despite focus-group testing, may not resonate well. Plus, some people do enjoy the current pizzas; a radical change may not win over new customers, and it may prompt former loyalists to switch allegiances.
So, yes. Risky. Rather, gutsy.
Irrespective of how this very public change will work for Domino’s, the idea of a brand reset should be taken very seriously by small-business owners. Sometimes, a person goes into business doing one thing, only to find a niche market in another. Or, a bold vision is darkened by the blinders of reality, forcing a strategic reassessment.
In any case, resets are good when there is a good business sense to doing it, and bad when it is an exercise in flavor-of-the-month branding.
Case in point: Last weekend, Gillikin Consulting — after a brief hiatus for the holidays and illness — conducted an offsite retreat with a colleague to work through business-development strategy. One key realization is that the “freelance writing and communication services” tagline is too restrictive; this firm is capable of providing far more than that, but our brand has pigeonholed us into the “writer” category.
Easily changed — the new tagline is “business development, writing & ethics services” to emphasize our competency at professional-ethics consulting, outcomes evaluation, and other quality-related topics in addition to the writing and editing services we have offered over the years.
Risky? Surely. Sometimes, being a jack of all trades can be met with skepticism by those on the hiring side of a consultant’s contract. This is where finely attuned marketing, with materials specific to each delivery channel, becomes increasingly important. You may have a shotgun approach to service lines, but your intended customers should only see what’s relevant to their business needs.
Bottom line: Domino’s is probably doing the right thing. Hitting the reset button on a less-than-successful business enterprise, or to re-focus on new and improved business lines, carries some risk, but is usually worth it in the long run.
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