Getting model positioning proper is a problem for any enterprise and much more so for these attempting to attraction to a number of audiences.
Bus operator First Bus has been on a journey to make bus journey “fascinating and enticing”, shifting its focus in direction of individuals, reasonably than product alone, and concentrating on two very completely different age demographics.
“One of many issues we’re attempting to get proper is that stability between not being too focused and too area of interest, but additionally not being too broad, as a result of the bus means various things for various individuals,” explains First Bus head of promoting Jordan Kemp.
The UK bus trade has confronted no scarcity of challenges in recent times. Passenger numbers have but to return to pre-pandemic ranges, whereas operators take care of the pricey transition to electrical automobiles and mounting stress to deal with the local weather disaster.
On the identical time, long-held perceptions of bus journey as gradual, unreliable and low-value persist.
“How do you obtain modal shift? How do you get somebody to surrender their automobile and use the bus?” asks Kemp.
“You’ll be able to’t do it in a single marketing campaign. It’s not one thing that may be promotion-led. It’s concerning the full advertising and marketing combine – value, product, place and promotion – working collectively.”
That problem led to the launch of First Bus’s new model platform in December final yr, a part of a wider modernisation challenge that touches each a part of the enterprise
“There’s been a lot improvement in expertise and the way conventional buyer touchpoints have modified,” Kemp explains. “We felt we wanted to modernise.”
The consequence was ‘Transferring the On a regular basis’, a model platform designed to encourage individuals to change from vehicles to buses whereas highlighting the position of public transport in connecting individuals, lowering congestion, bettering air high quality and supporting the UK’s journey to internet zero.
The initiative marks a shift away from desirous about buses purely as a useful product and towards positioning them as a service with social, environmental and emotional worth.
“Trains and planes might be rare, due to the distances and prices concerned, however buses are every single day and for everyone,” says Kemp. “The guts of the transformation wasn’t about altering a emblem or a color palette. It was about how we work together with prospects every single day and the way we make certain we flip up in the perfect kind, every single day.”
That’s the important thing factor for us: having the ability to ship a constant product after which put it up for sale in a significant method to obtain a broader shift in behaviour.
Jordan Kemp, First Bus
Central to this was understanding who the model most wanted to talk to. First Bus recognized two teams whose bus use had declined – under-22s and over-65s – however who rely closely on public transport for various causes.
“So whereas we’re a product for everybody, we’d like to verify we’re related,” Kemp explains. “We recognised there are particular audiences inside our markets we have to speak to in ways in which resonate with them.”
Within the spring, First Bus launched ‘Life Begins at Bus Move’, a nationwide marketing campaign geared toward individuals aged 60 and above. Kemp says the language round older passengers has been due for an replace.
“The terminology has all the time been ‘senior bus go’ or ‘outdated individual’s bus go’. However the stereotypical view of a 65-year-old with a blue rinse and a procuring trolley is totally outdated,” he says. “Many individuals in that age group are nonetheless working, volunteering and positively don’t see themselves as outdated. We needed to mirror that in a method that resonates with them and make it celebratory.”
Extra just lately, the main target has turned to younger individuals. Working with inventive company MadeBrave and analysis agency Savanta, First Bus discovered that value was not the largest barrier for under-23s. As a substitute, it was uncertainty about the place buses went and when. The analysis additionally confirmed youthful individuals had been extra seemingly to make use of the bus for social events reasonably than commuting.
“Historically, within the bus trade, there’s a large cliff edge when individuals get to 18-19, they go off and get a automobile,” he explains.
From that perception got here LFG, quick for ‘Let’s Freaking Go’, a marketing campaign that faucets into the slang and vitality of a youthful viewers. It goals to encourage a brand new technology to rediscover the bus as an affordable, sociable and sustainable method to get round.
As a result of the model is concentrating on two very completely different audiences, the media technique has needed to adapt.
“There’s this assumption that younger individuals solely soak up digital content material, so there’s an enormous development for having a digital-first technique,” Kemp says.
“However our analysis confirmed that out-of-home nonetheless has enormous resonance with this viewers. Bus is an enormous out-of-home media supplier. We simply don’t do it properly for our personal merchandise. With younger individuals, we stated, we’d like to verify we’ve obtained that proper media combine. However then additionally not ignore a few of that legacy stuff.”
For college kids, that has meant promoting alongside college routes; for older passengers, extra conventional placements comparable to linear TV proved efficient, Kemp claims. In the meantime, he describes one of many largest challenges for the bus trade as merely “catching up”.
“Once you boil it down, we’re just like retail,” he says. “We’re promoting seats to individuals. That’s one of many issues that’s all the time been a problem in public transport: how we will study from broader industries. When it comes to having a model platform, key viewers teams after which sustaining a constant model narrative.”
From six groups to at least one
The modifications go deeper than campaigns. Till just lately, First Bus operated six separate regional advertising and marketing groups, one for Yorkshire, one other for Scotland, and so forth, every working with its personal companies. That made for a fragmented strategy.
“We realised we had been speaking to the identical audiences, simply in numerous areas,” says Kemp. “Now we’ve obtained a single nationwide crew, and as a part of that, we’ve reviewed our media strategy and technique. We have to communicate to individuals the place they’re and put our product in entrance of them the place they’re.”
That shift has allowed First Bus to consolidate its company roster and artistic route. MadeBrave, which beforehand labored with the Scottish arm of the enterprise, now handles nationwide model campaigns.
“There was simply no consistency earlier than,” Kemp admits. “Now, once we ship these brand-led, audience-specific campaigns, they’re pushed by a single message. That’s been an enormous change for us – delivering a constant message nationally and getting extra bang for our buck.”
Out-of-home placements for ‘LFG’. Supply: First Bus.
Kemp is evident that advertising and marketing alone can’t change journey behaviour.
“If we wish modal shift and we wish to get extra adults to surrender their automobile, then the bus has obtained to compete with the automobile,” he explains.
Meaning clear, comfy automobiles with air-con, dependable service, and clear info. Traditionally, the trade has struggled with this.
“The rationale why there has not been lots of proactiveness from transport, and particularly bus, is as a result of there’s all the time been this thought that we will by no means ship a constant product that may make it enticing, so why spend on subtle advertising and marketing once we can’t assure the bus will flip up on time?” he says. “However expertise helps change that.”
The rising position of apps and digital suggestions loops means advertising and marketing now has larger affect over product selections. Nonetheless, aligning advertising and marketing with engineering and operations brings its personal tensions.
“Advertising may say the seats ought to look a sure method, or that we’d like temper lighting to create ambiance, and engineers will say, ‘That’s too costly to take care of,’” Kemp explains. “Unexpectedly, you might have this conflict over it needing to be delivered every single day, and in addition having a ‘wow’ issue. ”
Kemp believes bus operators have a shared accountability to advertise bus journey as a gorgeous and sustainable various to the automobile. “We wish to play our half in that – to make it possible for bus is fascinating and enticing.”
For First Bus, which means focusing not solely on communications however on supply. “When somebody suggests to a good friend, ‘Let’s get the bus’, we don’t need the response to be a grimace,” Kemp says. “It shouldn’t be: ‘It’s going to be soiled, it may not flip up, I’m undecided the place we’ll get dropped off.’ It needs to be one thing individuals be ok with selecting.”
“That’s the important thing factor for us: having the ability to ship a constant product after which put it up for sale in a significant method to obtain a broader shift in behaviour.”
