Elections

A Brand Guide To Marketing Communications During Elections

Elections provide an important opportunity to advance democratization and encourage political liberalization. It is therefore an important time for citizens to decide on the future of their country and communities by voting for their preferred political candidates.

However, elections also provide a strange moment for businesses and put brands in a really difficult position. Act or behave in a certain way and your brand can be accused of being out of touch and/or exploiting the election to push your products/services.

Therefore, caution needs to be taken because Communicating during elections is akin to walking on eggshells thanks to the tense consumer landscape that has been created after weeks and months of active electioneering.

Here, therefore, are some tips on how to go about this sensitive but momentous period of time.

Adjust Your Tone

Tone of voice is essential to building a brand and engaging your target audience. It is advisable to change your communication/advertising tone from a sales-focused / promotional one to a neutral one.

Manage Your Media Spend

Planning to launch a new campaign, product, or service? Hold your horses and postpone this for another one or two months until the elections period is over. As election fever hits a crescendo, you may end up wasting valuable advertising spend by communicating to an audience that has diverted their attention to the current matters.

Understand Your Target Audience

The better you understand your target market, the more you’ll be able to relay relevant information to them during this election period. What are their concerns, pain points, and challenges during this time? How can your brand help them overcome it?

Keep Customers Updated About Your Operations

The election period can disrupt business operations as employees/staff are given time to go and vote. Keep your customers abreast of any potential breaks in service and give them alternatives on how customers will be served or when the business will resume in case of any closure. Remember – the customer remains King!

Stay Neutral

Prevailing wisdom denotes that brands need to stay out of politics. Ensure your organization remains neutral and avoids jumping into the electioneering fray, no matter how tempted you are to join in. Protecting your brand reputation is your primary goal during this time.

Be Positive & Uplifting

Most elections can be deeply polarizing and potentially toxic thanks to the divergent political views of everyone concerned. From staff to suppliers, customers to clients, family to friends, everyone has a unique opinion about matters concerning parties and candidates. If you have to communicate, best to communicate something that is positive, uplifting, and ultimately builds the national spirit of peace, love and unity to the whole country.

We wish all Ugandans a peaceful election.

Knight Frank Uganda Teams Up With Capital One Group To Train Staff​

Knight Frank are the market leaders in property consultancy, management, valuations and letting in Uganda. They offer three core services: Property valuation and consultancy, Residential and Commercial Agency and Property management. 

They have pioneered methods of marketing property in Uganda since its inception as EAPA Ltd in 1997, at which time methods and tools standard in Southern Africa and the West were rarely, if ever, seen in Uganda.

 As Uganda’s property markets continues to evolve, Knight Frank Uganda lets premises both in sole-occupant and multi-tenanted buildings to high-profile corporate, aid and diplomatic institutions in and around Kampala. Their aim is to improve clients’ operations, boost profitability and add value to property transactions.

In February 2019, Knight Frank Uganda – which is part of Knight Frank’s global network of offices – contracted Capital One Group to conduct a Media Training for Knight Frank Uganda’s key management and operational team. The training was aimed at ensuring key staff can be able to respond to media queries and act at spokespersons for their departments.

American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists Works With Capital One Group To Improve Maternal Health​

Founded in 1951, the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) is the speciality’s premier professional membership organization dedicated to the improvement of women’s health. With more than 58,000 members, the College is a 501© (6) organization and its activities include producing the College’s practice guidelines and other educational material.

Fellows of ACOG are board certified obstetrician-gynecologist (ob-gyns) whose professional activities are devoted to the practice of obstetrics and/or gynecology, who possess unrestricted licenses to practice medicine, and have attained high ethical and professional standing.

ACOG has been operating in Uganda since 2015 with a vision of training Ugandan medical personnel in 14 hospitals and medical schools around the country thereby scaling up its current efforts and bringing more competent surgical providers to the district level.

In September 2018, ACOG contracted Capital One Group to manage the media relations as they launched specialized training in operative obstetrics at the Makerere College of Health Sciences (Mulago). The training – entitled Essential Training in Operative Obstetrics (ETOO) – was created to save the lives of thousands of Ugandan mothers and babies.

RUFORUM Selects Capital One Group To Build Capacity Amongst PROs of Member Universities​

The Regional Universities Forum for Capacity Building in Agriculture (RUFORUM), established by ten Vice Chancellors in 2004, is a consortium of 85 African universities operating within 35 countries spanning the African continent. RUFORUM is coordinated by a Secretariat hosted by Makerere University in Kampala, Uganda.

The organisation evolved from its predecessor, the Forum on Agricultural Resource Husbandry (FORUM) program of the Rockefeller Foundation. RUFORUM is registered as an International Non-Governmental Organisation (NGO) and has mandate to oversee graduate training. 

In October 2018, Capital One Group was contracted by RUFORUM to conduct a two day communication training at the Nairobi Safari Club in Nairobi, Kenya. The aim of the communication training was to build the capacities of RUFORUM member universities PROs with regards to their marketing communications skills especially around information sourcing, sharing and dissemination information to stakeholders, improvement of website content, traffic flow and visibility, increasing media access to research done at universities as well as engaging with more stakeholders.

Capital One Group Assists Africa Logistics Properties Spread Their Brand In The Region

In September 2019 Africa Logistics Properties (ALP) – a specialist integrated property investment company that develops, acquires and owns class-A industrial and logistics properties in principal cities across Africa – hosted a Supply Chain Networking Breakfast Forum in celebration of it’s second anniversary since the completion of phase one – ALP North at Tatu City’s Industrial Park. The event brought together key stakeholders in the Logistics and Supply Chain sector with the aim of generating industry solutions.

Since setting up operations in Kenya, ALP noticed various challenges in East Africa’s Supply Chain ecosystem. The first supply chain breakfast event was, therefore, a way to create dialogue to solve some of the key challenges many business’s experience within the Supply Chain ecosystem as well as align key international best practices that are relevant and can be applicable to the East African Region.

Capital One Group was engaged to support ALP spread the news in the East African region and in extension provide information on how the brand can tackle current logistical challenges in the East African Region.

Jubilee Insurance Company of Uganda Selects Capital One Group To Develop Campaign Targeted At Mothers​

Jubilee Insurance Company of Uganda is a subsidiary of the largest and strongest insurance group in East Africa, Jubilee Holdings Ltd, which, through its subsidiaries, transacts all classes of short-term (General and Medical) and long-term (Life and Pensions) insurance business.

Jubilee Insurance Company is listed on the Uganda Securities Exchange, the Nairobi Securities Exchange and Dar e Salaam Stock Exchange. It is an affiliate of the Aga Khan Fund for Economic Development; an international development group which holds interests in the financial sector, media, tourism and aviation among others.

Between August and October 2019, Capital One Group was contracted to support in the development and execution of the plan to launch the Jubilee Mum’s Club under the theme “Natural birth, the safer option”. The Jubilee Mum’s Club is a designated free space where all mothers – aspiring, new and active – share their maternal moments at all extremes of the motherhood journey, from the hurdles to the treasures.

AC East Africa Ltd Contracts Capital One Group To Handle Strategic PR and Media Relations For Road Safety Training​

MAC East Africa Ltd, a subsidiary of Mansour Automotive Group and General Motors (GM), holds a wealth of experience in automotive sales, after-sales and exceptional customer experience gained over time from operations in North West Africa & Middle East marketing GM products since 1977. 

MAC East Africa is the automotive dealer of choice to Uganda operators truly looking for adaptable competitive Isuzu and Chevrolet brands, priding itself on being a company that insist upon a robust after-sales support structure. MAC East Africa believes that the relationship with the customer does not end with the sale, but that the sale is the beginning of a relationship destined to rapidly grow over for a life time. 

In November 2019, Capital One Group was contracted by MAC East Africa Ltd to oversee the PR and Media Relations as it trained over 650 Ugandan bus drivers and 100 Administrator’s & Technicians over a 5-day period to observe road safety regulations and save lives ahead of the festive December season. 

Capital One Group Supports Raxio Data Centre Brand Positioning As It Builds State Of The Art Data Centre

Raxio Data Centre is building and will subsequently operate Uganda’s first enterprise grade Data Centre facility. Raxio was established by First Brick Holdings (“FBH”), a Roha Group company, to build the foundation of the digital economy across Eastern and Southern Africa. Roha is a US greenfield investment company that builds and develops new businesses across Africa.

Raxio believes that with the growth in data usage and storage and the broader digital transformation of businesses and the public sector in Uganda, Raxio Data Centre will be a centre-piece of infrastructure supporting the growth and digitalisation of the Ugandan economy and the goals set in the MoICT Data Strategy

Set to open in Q 1 2020, Raxio Data Centre will be the first of its kind in Uganda, operating as a carrier-neutral facility, and meeting the international Tier III standard. From June 2019, Raxio Data Centre contracted Capital One Group as its lead marketing communications agency to support its brand positioning during the pre-launch and construction phase.

Group picture after a successful session

Capital One Group Trains Communication Officers from IUCEA ACE II

The Inter-University Council for East Africa (IUCEA) is an institution of the East African Community responsible for coordinating the development of higher education and research. The objective of ACE II is to support selected higher education institutions in eight Governments in Eastern and Southern Africa to deliver quality post-graduate education and build collaborative research capacity in the regional priority areas. 

The higher order objective of the project is to meet the demand for skills required for Africa’s development while strengthening best African universities in education and training in agriculture, industry, health, applied statistics, and education. Eight countries in the region – Ethiopia, Kenya, Malawi, Mozambique, Rwanda, Tanzania, Uganda and Zambia are participating in the ACE II project.

 As part of capacity building support to ACEs to effectively communicate project results, IUCEA contracted Capital One Group to conduct a communication training for ACE Communication Officers from 18th to 22nd March in Nairobi, Kenya at the Hilton Hotel, Nairobi – Kenya. 

C.O.G trainings - RUFROM PROs in Nairobi

Why You Need Marketing Communications in your Company.

A strategic marketing communications plan is a key determinant for the success of any business. It is therefore important to understand your overall brand, the set targets and your optimal customers with special attention to their habits. All this should be done in addition to thorough study and understanding of the current trends in your industry of operation. One of the many roles of marketing communications is to generate brand awareness which is intended to result into sales.

First and foremost, your target market needs to know about the existence of your company and services, this can only be achieved through marketing communication tools like advertising and promotion strategies.

Marketing communications is important because strategic and successful branding establishes your business and service offering in the minds of customers& prospects. In relation to this is increase in customer loyalty. While in execution of any plan, it is necessary to try as much to keep your branding messages and visuals consistent on all marketing, advertising and promotional materials.

Through Marketing Communications tools you are also able to educate your customers extensively about your company’s products and services. This can be done through website-based product demonstrations or instructional videos. In return to this is direct customer feedback and sentiments.  “Amazing things will happen when you listen to the consumer.” Jonathan Mindenhall an influential marketer was once quoted.

Through marketing communications there’s an opportunity to establish your business/company as an authority or leader in your industry of operation through tools like having a webpage to factoids or Q&A about your business, thought leadership pieces or interviews on a particular topics of interest regarding a particular offering.

Email blasts and direct-mail campaigns to distribute information concerning the company like adverts of an ongoing or upcoming events are another tool to increased brand awareness.

Through marketing communications, you definitely experience a connection between your business and customers. Platforms like social media are helpful when it comes to exchange of ideas, understanding customers & prospects alongside constant customer/client contact.  This in the end increases brand loyalty, customer sustainability and referrals.

The major target of marketing communications is to increase product sales, service or business success. You therefor need to cultivate a strong foundation for profitable long-term relationships and business through marketing communications.