With only five months to develop and launch an estimated US$100 million worldwide global rebranding, Andersen Consulting says it might not be as daunting and complex as it initially appears. The hardest part may be as simple as finding a new name - a task Andersen Consulting is tackling by running a competition among its staff.
On August 7 this year, after a two-and-a-half year battle, Andersen Consulting was allowed to split from its accounting sibling Arthur Andersen. The arbitrator, appointed by the International Chamber of Commerce, required that Andersen Consulting surrender its name by the end of this year.
Andersen Consulting has already completed much of the legwork for the rebranding, or "renaming" as Jim Murphy, Andersen Consulting`s global managing director of marketing and communications, diligently prefers to call it. "In many ways this was a fortuitous decision," says Murphy. "In the last 18 months we`ve taken a whole new direction for the firm."
Murphy is referring to the establishment of AC Ventures, a joint venture with Microsoft, plus some deals swapping service for equity in client businesses. Andersen Consulting has become more than simply a consulting firm. Brand consultant Brent Wallace, from Galileo Brand Development, says the biggest challenge for Andersen Consulting will be how well it manages the rebranding. "Andersen has been very deliberate in its attempt to create a difference internally and externally for the Andersen Consulting brand," he says.
Andersen Consulting has hired US-based brand and design consultancy Landor, which has created identities for Federal Express, Dunhill, General Electric, Hilton Hotels and Hang Seng, to handle the rebranding. Andersen relaunched its brand two years ago, which Murphy describes as a "rehearsal" for the latest rebranding. At that time, his team trained 1,000 people to become "brand champions", backed by a US$50 million global advertising campaign. The company has spent an estimated US$1 billion globally on its brand since its inception.
"In many ways we`re well prepared," Murphy says. "We`ve already completed work on a new positioning that we`ve tested in 20 countries around the world, which covers the personality and classic brand characteristics."
Andersen Consulting believes its people and intellectual capital underpin its brand value. It is a matter of transferring that brand value to the new name. "For those who study branding, the name is just superficial. It`s how you act every day that makes the brand," Murphy says.
The major challenge now is finding a name. As well as the legal complexities of registering a name around the world, there is also the issue of finding one, which will not offend or amuse when translated into different languages - a common problem for global brands. When Coca-Cola, for example, translated its name into Chinese characters in phonetic approximation, the result actually translated to "bite the wax tadpole". The other issue is the explosion of business name registrations as a result of the internet. For example, 99 per cent of dotcom company names using three letters are already registered.
"It`s a really interesting challenge because the new name should reflect the positioning," Murphy says. "The more descriptive the name, the less opportunity you have to protect it and it can carry baggage. That`s why there are so many made-up names."
Murphy wants one thing: for everyone to know the company`s new name from January 1, 2001. Until then, AC has suspended its pure brand advertising, which represents 10-15 per cent of its total marketing investment, but will continue with recruitment and specific business area advertising. "The challenge for us as the company formerly known as Andersen Consulting is to strategically manage the transfer of brand value into the new name and carry the brand equity from the old name to the new," Andersen Consulting spokesperson Lesley Anton says.
An advertising campaign to alert the world to the impending name change could begin as early as October, says Murphy. "Our media commitment can`t change, we have to manage it and indicate that our name will change. We will communicate more about the evolution of our business strategy, which would be done regardless of the name change."
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