Challenger brands aren’t defined by their position in the market, but by their approach to marketing. Rob Grant explores what it means to be a modern day challenger and what all brands – big and small – can learn from 10 of the most disruptive brands in Australia and New Zealand.
Conventional wisdom says the young learn from the old, the child from its parent, the naïve newcomer from the wise and worldly master. In a nutshell, Luke Skywalker and Obi-Wan Kenobi in Star Wars.
Yet, despite being often younger or smaller, challenger brands can flip this logic on its head.
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www.marketingmag.com.au/challenger-brands

After years travelling the world to pursue his love of marketing, it’s appropriate Matthias Schuecking is now the Asia-Pacific marketing director at global travel disruptor Airbnb. He tells Rob Grant how he followed his heart and came up trumps.
The marketing world is awash with heroic tales of extraordinary brands and their exceptional achievements. Marketing books, conference papers, agency presentations and industry articles wax lyrically about companies one can only dream of working for. Not Schuecking. After analysing Airbnb as a case study on a Masters course, he called the company and
asked for a job.
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Rob Grant picks the remarkably busy brain of marketing guru Mark Earls, about how to build brands through the love of the crowd, with ideas you’ve basically copied from others.
Widely known for his 2007 book, Herd, Mark Earls is a thought-leading writer, speaker and consultant on a mission to change the way marketers think. He passionately espouses an approach to brand-building that focuses on the group rather than the self. It flies in the face of Western thinking, yet the evidence for this approach is undeniable, both from reams of academic studies and as demonstrated by countless successful brands. Earls has an uncanny ability to recount them at will...
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At Forrester’s CX Marketing 2016, Jill Baptist, GM customer experience and marketing at IAG, showed how emotional connection radically enhanced company culture.
Asia-Pacific insurance group IAG faced a problem: tonnes of information; little or no customer connection at an emotional level. In her talk, titled ‘How to bring the E word into the boardroom’, Baptist left no listener doubting the challenge.
Read more:
www.marketingmag.com.au/news-c/design-thinking-iag

Few business maxims are as widely known as first mover advantage, despite patchy evidence of its merits.
Rob Grant examines when marketers should bravely lead from the front and when it pays to sit in the slipstream.
Humans love to be first. It’s a seductive, hard-wired notion and the era of social media brings it the fore. Every minute, of every day, people claim bragging rights to everything. First to see the latest Hollywood blockbuster. Ownership of the newest smartphone ahead of their friends. The discovery of a new, exclusive, back
alley bar.
It’s no surprise then that so many businesses strive to be
leaders in their markets. Innovation is the cornerstone of
most strategic plans and there is an implicit understanding that being first is crucial. But is it?
Read more: 
www.marketingmag.com.au/hubs-c/first-mover

Market research is a vital tool in the marketing kit box and in constant flux. Rob Grant examines the drivers of innovation in research and six implications for marketers.
Any market researcher who introduces themselves at a dinner party faces a conundrum: will people think I stand on street corners – with a clipboard – and ask questions of passers-by? It’s an enduring and hard-to-shake cliché, but it no more reflects market research today than a Model T Ford does the car industry.
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Dedicated Follower of Passion
Premium chocolate brand Lindt’s success in Australia is dazzling. Yet marketing director Andrew Curran thinks there is plenty more work to do. Rob Grant examines what drives this true brand believer.
Rich luxuriant chocolate. Exquisite Swiss craftsmanship. A smorgasbord of gourmet flavours and delicious varieties. It is easy to see how a marketer could fall in love with the Lindt brand.
Read more: 
www.marketingmag.com.au/andrewcurran