BE440-6-AU Brand Management For the Nando Singapore

Introduction  

Nando’s is a famous fine dining restaurant with its branches all over the globe. This restaurant has made its significant place in world’s best food chain restaurants. It was founded in the year 1987 in Johannesburg, South Africa by Fernando Duarte and Robert Brozin It operates around 1000 outlets in 30 countries with its headquarter in  Johannesburg, South Africa. Rooster of Barcelos is the logo of this fine dining restaurant. The specialty of PERI-PERI sauce of this restaurant distinguishes it from that of others and helps in making a special place in world’s best food chain. In Singapore, it was first opened in the year 2010 on May 9. Later on they expanded their branch in Singapore and it was recorded that in the year 2015 there were 11 outlets of Nando’s in Singapore. Today this restaurant is located in five continents and it has established a well-known brand name in best fine dining restaurant all over the world (Nando’s 2018).

Points of difference and Points of parity 

Strategies for brand positioning Nando’s Singapore 

Strategy 1: Nando’s - A functional brand 

Functional brands are low involvement brands. They influence behavior pattern through promotion, advertising, simplified choice, simplified associations through somatic markers and other peripheral cues like color, shape, size, texture, semantics and habituation and incentivisation.  These brands are used to satisfy functional needs. Nando’s is a functional brand that uses promotion, advertising and many more as a tool to influence the audience (Meisel, 2008).

In order to promote and manage a brand, advertising plays a significant role. It is a non-personal form of communication can be performed by different sources of media. It can be via television, magazine, newspaper, website and many more (Guinn, 2018). Nando’s comes under top 30 hottest brands. All thanks to advertising. Nando is a functional brand rather than symbolic brand that is low involvement brands and in order to attract its customer’s uses behavior pattern through promotion, advertising and many more. Nando’s has introduced a PERI- VILEGE LOYALTY PROGRAMME in Singapore to attract its customers. What a customer has to do is to eat chicken and collect chilly. With every visit, a customer will get a chilly. Further, on their third, sixth, and ninth visit they will see real rewards (Marketingweek, 2013). Nando has launched an advertising campaign in Singapore via radio in order to promote loyalty card.  The tagline used by Nando’s in order to promote this campaign was ‘it only works in Nando’s’ (The Drum, 2013). These loyalty cards help to give boost to the restaurant’s sale and attract potential customers. Registered cardholders enjoy special privilege and get rewards. No physical card is given to the customer instead of that they have to download Nando’s app from Android store and get membership number. Nando’s uses various promotion and advertising strategies to attract the public. 

Strength: These loyalty cards attracts customer as they offer rewards to their loyal and regular customer and at the same time they encourage the customers to visit their restaurant again. The membership given to its customer is lifetime. This helps in enhancing sales and revenue of a restaurant (The Guardian, 2015).

Weakness: To claim Nando’s card reward one must be above the age of 18 years and resident of Malaysia it can only be claimed if an individual’s card is registered in case it is not then only chilies can be earned no rewards can be claimed. Therefore, this may not sound good to a customer. One can get stamp only when he/she has order food no stamp is given on when an individual buys a gift card (Rateyournando’s, 2013). The membership card is non-transferable and employees of Nando’s cannot participate in this programme. In addition, if a member wants to terminate its membership all the remaining awards in membership account will get forfeited.

Recommendation: Though loyalty cards provides customer with many benefits but if they can give stamp on a gift card too then this will be an additional advantage and  can attract more customers positively. The restaurant should give focus to liberal its terms and conditions of membership (Dahlan, et al., 2016). 

Globalization of brand Nando is divergence

Expanding and spreading of brand across the globe or all over the world refers to globalization of brand. Globalization of brands helps in enhancing its goodwill and brand image. For example: Coca-Cola, apple, McDonalds, and many more brands, which operate not only in single country but in many other countries, also are truly universally global brand. The key stages in brand globalization includes defining brand equity, choosing a country, access to the market, choose brand architecture and choosing of global campaign (Clifton, 2010).

Nando’s is a global, divergence and universal brand. It is not only operated in one country but in many other countries also. It was first started in South Africa then spread across the world. This Portuguese theme restaurant chain operates all over the globe. Nando spreads its brand by keeping in mind the country, carefully chooses brand architecture and its access to market. This restaurant adopts strategy according to the culture and eating habits of the people of the country. Like all over the world it is famous for its chicken specialty but when it was opened in India due to its vegetarian population the focus here was given for non-veg dishes as well. To promote it is all over the globe Nando has taken assistance of Firestarters community. Nando’s was able to develop its menu not only in Singapore but also all over the world with creativity with the help of Firestarters community. This community helps in knowing what a customer exactly wants from them, helps in understanding and satisfying their customer better, and provides them with best customer service. The new menu designed by Nando’s has a positive impact in increasing sales. The dine in sale as well as take away sales of Singapore was increased of this restaurant. In creating their new menu, they adopted the combination of fast food as well as fast casual dining services. This community favorably helps the restaurant in increasing brand awareness among the people (The Tab, 2017).  

Strength: This move of the restaurant helps in developing menu of the restaurant attractively all over the world and thereby helps in understanding their customer better and provides them with best possible service so that they can give them a positive feedback.

Weakness: They are dependent on Firestarters community for the development of its menu. If any kind of differences takes place between them then they may face repercussions.

Recommendation: Chances are there that Nando’s may face severe competition from other food chain restaurants so they must be updated about their surroundings and strategies of rivals prevailing in the market. 

Brand equity    

Brand equity refers to the value of a company that it generates from its product with recognizable name. It can be created by making products more recognizable, memorable superior in quality and reliable. Brand equity is further classified as firm based brand equity (value of brands created by firm), consumer based brand equity (value of brand created by consumers) and society based brand equity (value of brand created by society).Firm based brand equity consider brand as financial asset and also brand equity is measurable in terms of intangible assets (goodwill). Consumer based brand equity measure the brand awareness, knowledge, loyalty, and recognition (Aaker and Biel, 2013).

Nando’s has created its brand equity due to its logo Rooster of Barcelos and its specialty in chicken dishes. In addition, use of Peri-Peri sauce in their dishes enhances their brand equity. Nando’s focuses on maintaining its brand value and equity with the use of PERI-PERI sauce. No other restaurant operating globally makes use of this sauce in their chicken dishes. The PERI-PERI Sauce used by this restaurant distinguishes it from that of others. They marinate their fresh chicken for 24 hours in this sauce and framed-in with customers choice of spice from the PERI- meter. According to this meter, a customer can choose wild or mild taste accordingly. This African bird’s eye chilies are grown in dark soil under the burning South African sun. Nando’s uses only fresh chicken and not frozen chicken to make chicken-based dishes. Nando’s has enhances it brand value by using Peri-Peri sauce which helps to maintain loyalty of customers. Here it can be seen that Nando’s brand equity is in use of Peri-Peri sauce along with Peri meter where taste of chilly can also be adjusted. Consumer based brand equity is their loyalty and preference towards Nando’s. 

Strength: Use of this special sauce is the main strength of this restaurant. As the use of it distinguish Nando’s from other popular food chains and use of only fresh chicken not frozen while preparing their dish attracts many customers.

Weakness: The restaurant serves mainly its specialty non-veg dishes in Singapore outlet its vegetarian variety is quite limited.

Recommendation: They should also give focus on including various vegetarian variety foods also so that it can attract vegetarian customers also (Jan-Benedict, et al., 2013). 

Brand Communication   

Brand communication involves transmission of information using various media sources such as newspaper, magazine, social media, blogs, websites, television, radio and many more. In order to gain consumer attention it is important to communicate brand to others. The purpose of brand communication is to create brand awareness, brand preference, and knowledge among customers. This strategy needs to be plan in media neutral and multi- media integrated manner (Jothi, Neelamalar, and Prasad, 2011). However if a brand is not communicated properly then it can lead to serious repercussions also. Therefore, it is important to communicate brand carefully by keeping several important things in mind like it may not hurt the sentiments of any person or community. If a brand communication is taking place through social media then following points need to keep in mind by the promoter:

• Always double-check everything before posting anything online.
• Invest in better security measures if you want your brand to be communicated with the help of social media.
• Use strong passwords and strong security system.
• Deploy elementary security measures two-factor authentication so that no one can take undue advantage.
• In case if a mistake is done on your part then you should accept it and admit it in front of public to maintain the image and goodwill of brand.
• If any kind of rumor is spread due to the hacking of account by the hackers then the respective organization should come forward and give an apt justification for that.

One of the biggest examples of social media failures was In march 2017 a tweet comes from the famous global food chain McDonald’s  that was actually disgracing the president of America Donald Trump. In the tweet, it was written that trump is actually a disgusting president, his hands are tiny, and of course, they would love to welcome President Barack Obama back. This incident clearly shows how risky corporate accounts could be. It was not McDonald that was responsible for the tweet rather it was the hacker who try to criticize the president of America by hacking the account of MC Donald’s. From this, it can be said that this may have affected the goodwill of the restaurant and lead to reputational damage (Entrepreneur, 2017).

For any kind of promotion, it is necessary to attract the audience. Any strategy can be used in order to get attention of the audience. In order to create an identity distinguishes from its other competitors Nando’s has launched a campaign in Singapore to promote its restaurant by the way of public gathering for the festive period. The title of the campaign was The Diversity Platter- uniting everyone with the taste of Peri-Peri. The campaign had got its advertising done via class 95 FM and encouraged their customers to post their pictures while enjoying diversity platter in social media. This particular campaign took place in Singapore from 12 November to 3 January 2012. This campaign not only brought the people of Singapore together but also gains publicity via social media. This particular campaign has encouraged the social media sharing (Marketing, 2012). Until now, Nando’s has no such brand communication failure strategy used in the past. However, to prevent it in future Nando’s have to be careful about its brand communication strategy that need to be communicate among the public  after keeping proper security measures in mind. 

Strength:  These kinds of campaigns promotes public gathering and encourages unity and brother hood via this campaign. In addition, promote their brand through social media by encouraging their customers to post their pictures and give reviews (Digitaltrainingacademy, 2014).

Weakness: These kinds of campaign are not organized on regular basis by Nando’s Singapore. In case if any kind of negative  and  unfavorable reviews are posted or hackers may attack Nando’s site and may viral information any information which is irrelevant and may damage the reputation of the restaurant then Nando’s may face dire consequences of it.

Recommendation: In order to get the audience hook to Nando it is important to organize such events and campaign on regular basis. If Nando’s will organize such kinds of campaign with different themes then large number of audience will keep hook to this restaurant (Schultz and Peltier, 2013). In addition the restaurant have to keep in mind if they want to get promoted through social media then proper security measures need to be taken by them and in case of any mistake committed by them then they have to make public appearance to justify them rather than just covering up the matter.

Conclusion 

Nando’s has made its significant place in the field of fine dining restaurants in Singapore. They came out with excellence. The marketing strategies adopted by this restaurant to attract customers in Singapore affected positively towards the sale of the restaurant and attracts a large number of customers towards them. This restaurant gets itself updated from time to time and uses brand-positioning strategies accordingly. The decision is generally taken only after conducting a thorough study about the environment and surrounding in which the branch is to be established this can be taken as smart move of them. Nando’s has put a good example of brand-positioning strategies adopted by them. In short, Nando is a perfect combination of good quality food, taste, affordable pricing and loyal customers, which helps them in promoting their marketing strategies (Main market, 2013). By introducing loyalty cards and appointing Firestarters community to create its menu, they have used unique and innovative tool for promoting their restaurant. The carefully chosen marketing strategies will take them to the heights and will increase their popularity all over the world. Their main specialty of PERI-PERI sauce differentiates it from its other competitors. Nando’s know how to survive in this competitive market and give tough competition to its competitors or rivals prevailing in the market. This is one of the best food chain, which has established its goodwill since 1987 and will continue to maintain it lifelong (Batey, 2008)   

References 

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Marketingweek. (2013) Nando’s overhauls loyalty scheme to take marketing to the next level. [Online] Available from: https://www.marketingweek.com/2013/08/27/nandos-overhauls-loyalty-scheme-to-take-marketing-to-the-next-level/  [Accessed 2/08/2018]

Meisel, F. (2008) Symbolic use of brand. Germany: GRIN verlag.

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Schulz, D.E. and Peltier, J. (2013) Social media slippery slope. Journal of research in interactive marketing, 7(2), 86-99.

 The Drum. (2013) Nando’s launches campaign to promote new loyalty card. [Online] Available from: https://www.thedrum.com/news/2013/10/17/nandos-launches-campaign-promote-new-loyalty-card [Accessed 2/08/2018]

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The Tab. (2017) A definite guide to every single item on the Nando’s menu and what it says about you. [Online] Available from: https://thetab.com/uk/2017/02/11/definitive-guide-every-single-item-nandos-menu-says-32637 [Accessed 2/08/2018]

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