Convey consistency when you have multiple sub-brands

How do you convey the consistent message that you are one brand when your company is composed of multiple sub-brands? Donna Smith, director of marketing and communications at Forum Energy Technologies, shares how they've built their external messages to demonstrate their unity.

Robin: Hello and welcome to this edition of Brandonomics, an inside look at top brands and their marketing strategies. I’m Robin Tooms, vice president of strategy at Savage Brands. And my guest again today is Donna Smith, director of marketing and communications at Forum Energy Technologies. So Donna, welcome back to Brandonomics.

Donna: It’s good to be here again.

Robin: Well, I want to talk today about how you’re communicating brand messages externally, if that’s okay.

Donna: Yes.

Robin: So with Forum itself, it obviously started as a company that was formed through mergers and acquisitions.

Donna: Right.

Robin: So how is it important that you’re conveying the brand to your external audiences?

Donna: It’s important to convey that we’re one company, and we’re not just a house of brands. I’ve seen other companies do that, and that’s not what we’re trying to do. We’re one company. We work together, and together we can solve our customers’ challenges, but we’re not trying to go out there and just be a parent company that has all these other brands underneath them. We’re one company.

Robin: Absolutely. So how are you using that kind of idea to shape your communications approach?

Donna: Well, we’re really careful and make sure we’re sending the same message across all media to get across to all stakeholders. And this became especially important because not very far in our branding process, we went public less than two years after the company was formed. So we had another major stakeholder, and it was especially important to that stakeholder for us to be one company, one brand. So that’s what we try to convey in all of our advertising, all of our social media: that we’re one company, one brand with some sub-brands – some sub-product brands, but we all work together to solve our customers’ problems.

Robin: Yeah. And that makes sense to me. So obviously, taking that one message out and communicating it consistently is what’s important.

Donna: Consistently, yes.

Robin: Well, thank you. That’s very good advice.

Donna: Okay.

Robin: This has been another edition of Brandonomics, an inside look at top brands and their marketing strategies.

 

Forum Energy Technologies is a global oilfield products company, formed in a five-way merger between leading technology companies and serving the subsea, drilling, completion, production and infrastructure sectors of the oil and natural gas industry. Its legacy brands represent some of the best known in the business.

https://www.f-e-t.com/