IS IT EASY TO BECOME A BRAND?

With Azerbaijan's integration into the international economic community, it is not only the economic regulation of the country that has changed, but also our vocabulary.  "Business," "consulting," "marketing" and so on - a large number of neologisms have entered our speech, and not simply because it has become "fashionable" to utter them and to know what they mean.  Some of these terms define notions which were hitherto entirely unknown to us.  One example, the word "brand", is a symbolic concentration of different types of information relating to one or another product or service.

According to researchers into marketing, a brand is rather like a guarantee, a notional contract between the manufacturer and the customer, a promise that any product manufactured under the given name, logo and so on will be of good or, to be more precise, the "expected" quality.  "A brand becomes a brand when people begin to take it into account when they make decisions," reads the research material.

From the main to details

However, there is no special need today to explain to Azerbaijani customers what brand means.  The country, and its capital in particular, is virtually flooded with branded goods made by foreign manufacturers.  Their market specialists know very well that as the population grows more prosperous, their expectations of the quality of goods increase and, therefore, the chances are greater of selling them a "famous" product which is a little more expensive.

What is pleasing is that Azerbaijani manufacturers have already adopted this unwritten rule.  In a matter of just one decade, we have effectively developed our own brands in all sectors of the economy.

The main brand in Azerbaijan is, of course, AzeriLight, the oil extracted from the Azeri-Chirag-Guneshli deposit by the Azerbaijani International Operating Company.  Its density is 34.9 degrees on the API scale and its sulphur content is 0.14%.  This brand is successfully sold today on the international oil exchanges, it is in high demand because of its good quality, and it earns the country considerable financial revenues.

But let us repeat the already overused statement:  although oil is the aorta of the Azerbaijani economy, it is not forever, which is why the non-oil sector is developing at full speed today, thanks to both large manufacturing holding companies and small enterprises.  So, every self-respecting factory or plant already has in its arsenal at least one "well-known" brand, and some of them exemplify miracles of competitiveness by rivalling their world-famous, decades-old, foreign "colleagues."

A question may arise:  how is a brand created? In other words, how can international recognition be achieved for a product which seems ordinary at first sight, in the current situation in Azerbaijan?  "A product has guaranteed quality.  And a brand has guaranteed quality plus guaranteed emotion.  Every time we buy a brand product, we willy-nilly expect to experience the emotion it promises us.  This is one of the main characteristics of established brands and brands which are developing in the right direction:  to the high quality of the product is added emotion, which the buyer must experience in the process of contact with the product.  Added emotion is one of the reasons why brands as such exist," maintain the researchers.

Red victory

The main factors transforming a simple product into a brand are quality and marketing inventiveness.  "If you do what everyone else does, you will never achieve significant results.  This is one of the conditions for successful business, which is very closely connected to the organization's brand, its corporate culture and spirit," says General Director and creator of the O'Grae brand, Zeynulla Qurbanov.  After all, you can achieve success and earn a reputation by simply changing the packaging in which you market the product - it must be comfortable and uniquely original at the same time, so that the customer cannot take his eyes off it.  This is the emotion we spoke of above.

In addition, emphasis must be placed on quality and consistent advertising - this is the driving force behind every brand, it should simply and advantageously stress the characteristics of the product by the particular manufacturer, which make it different from similar goods.  "The entrepreneur who skimps on advertising skimps on his business," is one of the main rules of the head of O'Grae.

And the ability to risk is also important.  "A successful businessman knows that, without taking risks, he risks much more," said Mr. Qurbanov.  Well-known competitions and awards are examples.  So what if a brand began to achieve success only a few years ago and among the nominees are manufacturers with a 100-year history?  Confidence that your product is high-quality helps dispel all doubts.

Here is a good example:  Just recently, in April 2009, a gala ceremony of the EFFIE-2009 Brand of the Year awards was held at the Manezh Central Exhibitions Hall; this has been the most important award in the field of business and marketing strategy of brand development worldwide for the last 30 years.  More than 33 countries select the winners!  And this time around, the highest professional award in Russia for the field of brand development, the Gold Prize, was given to the Azerbaijani O'Grae brand.

Speaking at the award ceremony, Gurbanov said that for several years, the O'Grae company had been trying to produce a high-quality freshly squeezed pomegranate juice which could preserve, and even restore, the most valuable thing a person has, his health.  "Thanks to the Organik high-technology manufacturing process, vitamins and microelements are preserved in all of our juices, and O'Grae selects the fruit for processing very carefully," the businessman noted proudly.

However, this high award is not the ultimate dream for O'Grae, and its head knows that he who stops is taken over and the conceited lose out.  The desire not to be satisfied with success and to move on despite all obstacles is yet another important factor on the way to the creation and maintenance of a brand.

Star of Azerbaijan

So, trust in one's product is the main drive behind brand development.  The manufacturer of another widely known Azerbaijani product, Ulduz chocolate, has also realized this.  Risking entry into a local market which was literally flooded with imported sweets, enduring competition with Azerbaijani customers' traditional favourite, Russian chocolates, and launching exports of its product to Russia - this is audacity in the real meaning of the word!  And all this in just eight years of work, starting from a small workshop and evolving into a plant fitted with the latest technology and equipment.  The plant director Vusal Sharifov admits that entering a saturated market was not easy.

"But we made it, furthermore, the products of the Ulduz plant were awarded a gold medal at the Prodekspo-2009 exhibition in Moscow, ahead of 1,850 companies from 57 countries!  Our victory is a clear indication that even the small production sector in Azerbaijan can be successfully developed and transformed into an international brand.  Our country has great prospects in manufacturing thanks to its rich natural resources and geographical location.  Yes, being part of the Soviet Union for many years, we were separated from international markets, which is why we must make up for lost time at an accelerated pace.  We want to transform Ulduz into a worldwide brand, which is not easy but quite possible!"

- How do you intend to win the markets?

- First and foremost, by our quality.  As I said, there are many brands of chocolate in the world.  We decided not to emulate them from the very outset and, instead, began to manufacture a new type of chocolate, calling it Tango.  It is different from the sweets of local manufacturers in terms of its taste, quality, safety to health and other qualities of chocolate.  Thanks to these qualities, Tango has already become popular, not only in our country, but with foreign customers too.

- But what about packaging? - This is considered an important component of a brand....

- Indeed, it is quite difficult to surprise the customer these days.  Many people think that to become established in the market, making cheap, good quality products will suffice.  But this is not so.  Although it is also wrong to believe that you can conquer the market with pretty packaging alone.  To develop the product to a level which will satisfy customers and even make them love it, it is necessary to conduct many marketing studies and to take into account the entire range of demand.  The Ulduz plant conducts its operations using precisely these marketing principles.

-Does the Ulduz plant have certificates of quality?  Do you plan to obtain international quality certificates, for example, the ISO?

-The products of the Ulduz plant have the Azerbaijani certificate of quality and the Russian certificate of compliance (30 January 2009-30 December 2012).  I agree that, today, to enter the international market, you need to work to international standards which confirm that the product meets standards of hygiene, is safe to consume and so forth.  These principles are very important for the Ulduz plant too, which is why we are working to bring our products into line with ISO and HACCP standards.

Thorough success

All of the above shows that the short life of a company does not mean that it cannot manufacture branded products.  Yet another example is Agroazerinvest Ltd, a young and dynamically developing company in the field of viticulture and winemaking, which has already developed a dozen brands.  Established traditions of taste in combination with modern packaging design all help Azerbaijani-manufactured wines and brandies, together with the famous Agdam port wine, to sideline rivals, not just in the domestic market, but also far beyond its borders.  Agroazerinvest Ltd's products have already won a level of popularity in Russia which confirms the quality of its products.

Having entered the market with its Qabala and Nazli wines, which are manufactured from 100% natural raw materials, the company currently produces the Samaxi, Madrasa, Sahdag, Abasli, Aqstafa, Qabala Valley, Staryy Dvornik and Domashneye Vino brands.  Just a few days ago, three more wines were launched - the Bahar dessert wine (Cahors), the Land of Fire dry red wine, and the Bay of Baku semisweet red wine.  These wines are made with the best types of grape, such as Cabernet Sauvignon, Saperavi and Grenage.  The wines from these grapes have a particularly attractive flavour and taste, and they acquire a subtle bouquet as they mature.

In what is perhaps a very short time, the Agroazerinvest Ltd began to produce three popular groups of brandy, the Gold Baku (8-, 10- and 12-years old), Vizier (3-, 4-, 5- and 6-years old) and Sindbad (8-years old), which have already won firm positions in the Russian market.  It is important that these products are manufactured using classical technology, in accordance with long-established traditions of the manufacture of Azerbaijani brandies, based on cognac spirits which are extracted from high-quality elite types of grape.

And its Hayat brandy, which is manufactured using cognac spirit of 3-, 5-, 6- and 8-year maturity from elite types of grape, stands to become a real hit for the company.  Contracts have already been signed with the leading importers of alcoholic beverages to Russia for export of Hayat brandy to that country.  It will be "ushered in" to the market with all the attributes of an elite brand. Suffice to say that the bottle for the Hayat brandy (Touareg) is manufactured exclusively for Agroazerinvest Ltd by the French company Raoul Domec, which specializes in the manufacture of glass, decorative items and so on, and the label, attractive in its fine, original design, was developed by the Version Original design studio, a French company of international renown, which manufactures labels for leading international brands like Hennessy, Courvoisier, Camus, Martell, Remy Martin and others.

What catches the eye when you look at Agroazerinvest's strategy is its patriotism.  All the brand names immediately tell the customer that the products are made in Azerbaijan, which is important for the promotion of our goods abroad.  After all, when the foreign customer tries an Azerbaijani wine and sees that it is high-quality, his trust in other goods which read "Made in Azerbaijan" will increase.

In short, brands are not just a showcase for a particular company.  They are a symbol of the country, and their promotion has a great effect on the trading potential of the economy.

The examples cited above demonstrate that good marketing can bring success.  We know that there are quite a few brand manufacturers in the country.  And although not all of them are willing to share the secrets of their popularity (for example, a representative of the Palsud brand, which has begun to conquer the market, refused to talk to us about his vision of brand promotion), their existence and success makes us proud of our country.