With clients operating in the B2C and B2B landscapes, Virginie Regis, group marketing and communications director and member of the Group Executive Committee at Capgemini, knows better than most that increased global brand awareness can be achieved through a multichannel approach. Jess Pike catches up with her to find out how one recent campaign ticked all the boxes
Tell us a little about the Innovators Race and how the idea originally came about.
We were looking to position our brand around innovation, so developed a programme which is a contest between students from universities in six countries to come up with innovative solutions to challenges posed by some of our biggest clients. It enabled us, as a lesser-known brand, to engage directly with our target audience of potential employees as well as key clients – those with an interest in tech looking to develop and deliver cutting-edge solutions to the most challenging client business problems.
What were the aims of the programme?
We wanted to work on the employer brand side of things, which is why we targeted schools and universities, but we also wanted to position ourselves as leaders of innovation and increase brand awareness globally. The latter was achieved with the partnership we formed with CNN International. The media campaign, which started in February, had multiple touchpoints across CNN International’s TV, digital, social and mobile platforms. The campaign was designed to engage potential recruits across key markets like India, help drive innovation with clients in markets like the US, and increase our brand visibility, reach and engagement across key markets. We also wanted to support the integration and ‘one-team’ spirit of all employees, in the context of our recent acquisition of IGATE, a prominent US-listed technology and services company headquartered in New Jersey. It really was 360-degree marketing.
Who was involved from a client perspective?
It was Barclays (for the UK), AccorHotels (for France), Natura Brazil (for Brazil), Reliance Jio (for India), Openbaar Ministerie (for the Netherlands) and the Boys & Girls Clubs of America (for North America). Each organisation came up with a business challenge, which was then posed to two-people teams at universities across each country. A team from Bangalore, who developed an educational learning platform for India, were the eventual winners. The pair won an internship at our flagship innovation lab in San Francisco.
What was the timeline?
The six countries had their local heats back in December 2015, and that’s when we whittled them down to the finalists. From then on it was the global final with one team from each country, and this took place from January to March. All the votes were cast online by the viewing public, which really boosted the visibility of the brand on social media.
How would you appraise it as a global marketing campaign?
It’s been a big success story because it ticks so many boxes for us. It’s linking Capgemini to innovation and it deals with our visibility in key markets. Given the automatic and immediate results – such as the number of clicks on website banners – we’ve also been able to track results quickly.
How did it work as a B2B brand awareness programme?
One way we pushed it out to our target audience was through a LinkedIn ad campaign that spoke to senior business executives in all six participating countries; the results showed a huge amount of interest among business community members. We had nearly 5000 people engaging with our content by watching videos, sharing, liking or commenting.
What kind of results do you expect to see?
In today’s ever-changing world, being innovative is essential to any business. In the IT services industry, which is a change agent for businesses, it’s even more important to be innovative and to be well known for it. But the real value of the project comes through the client intimacy opportunities and in the way we collaborate with clients in addressing their major business challenges. The experience of partnering with some of our most valuable clients over a period of many months invariably leads to new business opportunities for account executives. We’ve also had other clients asking for our partnership on such programmes, which has lead to conversations and new business opportunities.
Has proving ROI been challenging?
It’s too early to link it directly back to sales, but we have been able to track the results in terms of brand exposure. It’s a long-term process – it’s about creating awareness and promoting the fact we’re a global player working with big brands such as Accor and Barclays. Longer-term results will be tracked on an annual basis; despite the fact we’re in fieldwork stage, sentiment analysis has been positive and we know people are highly engaged: the average time spent on the main Innovators Race site was four to five minutes, which is really good.
Did you struggle to get buy-in from the board?
As is often the case with innovative projects, their reservations were about ROI and my job was to demonstrate that. But what’s great about it is that so many of the results are so tangible, particularly in terms of brand image, client intimacy and recruitment – and we got everyone on board by setting multi-dimensional objectives including recruitment and employer brand, client intimacy, brand awareness and image, as well as supporting internal pride.
Were there any challenges involved with working on such a complex, global programme?
The project was challenging because it involved multiple functions and we had to align six countries which added to the complexity. With a company the size and scale of ours – 180,000 people across 40 countries – these challenges are inherent; when something is launched by one function it can be difficult to get other functions on board, and it’s about pushing against a siloed way of working.
Have there been any other unexpected quick wins with this programme that you’d like to share?
Yes. Some of the students have continued to work with our clients even after the formal competition wrapped up, and we may well hire some of the smartest students after they’ve graduated. In addition, we already have a number of great brands willing to participate in the next season.
