Below is an interview conducted in 2010 with Simon Rowell, branding expert and founder of Brand Intellect, Australia’s top brand design firm. Brand Intellect creates world-class brand strategies, brand identities and brand management solutions for clients in Australia and globally. Simon Rowell is a Certified Practicing Marketer (CPM) and an Associate Fellow of the Australian Marketing Institute. He is the founder of Brand Intellect and has, over the past 20 years, worked with brands across categories such as healthcare, financial services, retail, manufacturing, consumer goods, online, professional services, not-for-profits, government, education, performing arts, visual arts, leisure and transportation. Simon is a Director of Trésor Reward and Recognition, a sales incentive and employee reward & recognition consulting company. In addition, Simon features regularly as an expert media commentator in all areas of branding, brand consulting and marketing. He can be contacted by email at simon.rowell@brandintellect.com.au or by telephone on (03) 95535552 (if outside Australia +613 95535552).

What is your background and why were you attracted to branding?

I have always had in interest in branding and advertising, even from a young age. I seemed to have a knack of looking at a business and its proposition to the market and understanding innately if the business would be a success or a failure. This extended to the way that the business was positioning itself, through its logo design and marketing communications, and whether its promise was being met day-to-day. Although I wasn’t thinking of it in terms like positioning and propositions, it was an interest of mine from when I was about ten years old.

One of the reasons that I started a brand design firm is that our work is about the long-term focus around our client’s most valuable asset, their brand. Ad agencies tend to focus on the short-medium term, with regular campaign revolutions to maintain their earnings, whilst we as a brand agency focus on creating brand platforms designed to be evolved and extended for at least the next 15-20 years.

Interestingly enough, my family’s first experience in branding was a brand identity developed for the Royal Automobile Association of South Australia (RAA) by my Great Grandfather’s Jewellery company, S.Schlank & Co, in Adelaide in 1929. That brand identity lasted through to 1950, a period of 21 years.

How would you define a ‘great brand’?

A great brand will generally have a number of key traits that allow it to succeed. It will have a clearly defined brand strategy that is understood across the organisation by all key staff. It will deliver on their promises, doing what they say they will do. There will be something about what they do, or how they do it, that is better than their competition. There will be clarity about what they stand for, and, of course, they will be relevant and visible to their customers. If a brand has all of these traits, becoming a great brand will be far more likely.

What are the secrets to producing great work?

To succeed as a brand design firm you definitely need good, commercially minded people working on your team. I have been fortunate over the years to work with some really talented people. You also need a good strategic brain that goes ‘beyond marketing’ when thinking about brands. Clients who are open-minded and outcome-focused are obviously also very important.

Added to this you also need the team to be passionate about what they do, and a real sense of collaboration between all members of the agency’s and the client’s teams. All of these elements have been in place for successful projects we have worked on such as the Burnet Institute and VicRoads rebrands.

What are some of the projects that you have loved working on?

The brand identity for the Burnet Institute was one highlight. I am particularly proud that our brand definition process allowed us to identify that the Institute was globally unique in combining medical research with practical public health programs around the world. Prior to this simple truth being uncovered, the Institute was a complex multi-disciplined organisation researching a wide variety of diseases, and conducting a large number of public health programs around the world, with nothing bringing the organisation together. This uniqueness was then developed into the positioning line “Medical Research. Practical Action”, which was designed to provoke people to ask the question “just how are you practical?” and start a brand conversation. The fact that this branding won an Australian Marketing Institute award was also gratifying.

I loved working on the refresh of the VicRoads brand. VicRoads were an excellent client to work with, very opened minded and outcome focused. This was a large project, with a relatively tight timeframe, and we were very happy to develop such a creative solution with time to spare.

There have been many other projects that I have really enjoyed being involved with. Mostly this has to do with the clients I am working with. When they are come into the process with a positive attitude and an open mind, things tend to go very well.

What keeps you motivated?

The specific challenges of each project keep me excited and enthusiastic. To stay motivated you really need to love what you are doing, whatever that is, and I am passionate about branding.

What do you see as the future for branding?

The digital medium and social media will continue to grow, allowing for more dimension to the branding experience . Social media has been beneficial for a branding design firm like ours because it highlights to the broader marketing community what we have accepted for years, that brands live in the minds of customers and you need to pay attention to what your customers are saying. The amount of information that is available to people through online channels has really allowed for a far higher degree of transparency and, for organisations who understand this, an opportunity to ensure they take no customers for granted.

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