What happens when you want to introduce a superior, clinically-proven product into a mature marketplace?
Let’s start at the beginning.
We wanted to go beyond the scientific platform and create a deep emotional connection that got at the heart of why concerned parents and their children would not only want to participate, but to spread the message far and wide.
The Schneider Children’s Medical Center of Israel is a remarkable institution. It’s open to every child in Israel and the Middle East, irrespective of religion, race or nationality. Every year, pediatricians at the Center receive over 20,000 visits from children who have issues relating to short stature. For years, world-renowned scientists, doctors, and researchers from the center have focused on nutritional growth retardation.
This wealth of information and research lead to the creation of a nutritional formula intended to help children of short stature grow. The formula was shown in a prospective randomized clinical trial to assist children three to nine years old grow in height and weight, with no increase in body mass index (BMI).
With the US market for pediatric nutritional formulas over $2 billion, the challenge was how to create a compelling position in the U.S. that would appeal to both children and their parents and take share from larger competitors. Jason Zinn, president of NGS North America, was tasked with seeking out the right brand strategy partner for the U.S. market. He turned to Pure Branding for a full engagement: Brand Opportunity, Brand Strategy, Market Research, Content Strategy and Visual Strategy.
“Jason understood that he needed to build a compelling brand platform and story,” said Yadim Medore. “We wanted to go beyond the scientific platform and create a deep emotional connection that got at the heart of why concerned parents and their children would not only want to participate, but to spread the message far and wide.”
Assessing the American Market Opportunity
But first we needed to understand the market and its obstacles. Two seasoned strategists on Pure Branding’s extended team have deep expertise in the pediatric nutrition drink category. With their insights, we developed a comprehensive American market opportunity assessment for NG Solutions. We shared our findings with Jason; Professor Moshe Phillip, Founder and CEO; and Liron Fendell, Head of Business Development.
“This was a critical step for us,” said Jason. “We were able to realistically understand the challenges and how we could succeed by looking into the market’s history, analyzing the channels of distribution, comparing our product to the competition’s, analyzing secondary market data and psychographic research on parents’ concerns for their children of short stature, and determining the category white space where we could prosper. We realistically understood the challenges and how we could succeed.”
With the in-depth assessment completed, next were the collaborative brand workshops. We overcame meeting distances (Jason was on the West Coast, Prof. Philip and Liron were in Israel, and we were on the East Coast) by conducting several remote whiteboard workshop sessions. The first was a Brand Opportunity workshop, where we defined the key opportunities in relation to the 5 Forces™. The second was a Brand Strategy workshop, which was used to develop the Brand Center, Communication Platform, Brand Attributes, Visual Language, and Brand Voice.
“Our process honed in on the ‘why’ of the brand,” said Yadim. “In turn, the ‘why’ became the brand’s mission: to give children inspiration, hope, strength, and courage so they can fulfill their unique potentials.”
The core strategic elements were now in place. The next step was creating the Communications Map, a succinct tool that outlines the brand participants’ journey through the brand story and architecture. Here we identified both the fears and needs of parents with children of short stature — and the corresponding promise and solutions.
Bringing a Brand to Life
Everything was ready for the next stage — bringing to life the verbal and visual elements of the brand. That included not only all of the visual elements, but also the brand name of the product and the product story.
“Liron and I understood that we would have one chance to get the naming, story and design right,” remembered Jason. “As a startup, we recognized the value that investing in market research would have on a successful launch.”
Pure Branding developed the research and conducted 602 online quantitative interviews of parents having a child or children between the ages of 3-12 years with short stature. From that research we:
- Identified “Healthy Height” as the optimal brand name, specifically in relation to key attributes
- Determined a more emotive and playful packaging design that tested best against the competitive set, and had the highest likelihood to steal market share
- Analyzed product positioning in relation to parental sentiment on short stature
- Identified parental sentiment towards growth hormone therapy
- Identified psychosocial concerns and the benefits desired from the product
- Identified the product delivery format with the highest purchase intent
- Defined the optimal brand positioning and communication hierarchy
- Discovered the best way to connect the brand to Schneider Children’s Medical Center
- Determined the degree of influence that physicians have in the purchasing decision
- Proved what the key drivers were to engage parents and their children
With these insights in hand, we moved into execution of the first-of-kind packaging design, product story and visual elements.
“With these final elements, we were able to develop our ecommerce website, finalize our package design, develop our marketing brochures, and position ourselves in the market, all with the confidence that comes with having our brand strategy verified by consumer research,” said Jason. “We were grateful to have an expert partner like Pure Branding provide us with the guidance we needed for a successful launch into the US market.”
Healthy Height was introduced to the U.S. market in the spring of 2018. “The product has been met with immediate success, and the work Pure Branding has done is clearly resonating with consumers and medical professionals alike,” said Jason.
