New Momentum recently interviewed Joshua Greenbaum, the founder of Enterprise Applications Consulting to learn more about the latest threats and solutions when it comes to brand protection. Greenbaum is an industry analyst and award-winning columnist with over 25 years of experience in the industry.
Q: In your opinion, what are the greatest threats to a company’s brand in today’s market?
A: The greatest threats to a company’s brand can be categorized into three main components –consumer/retailer publicity, product quality, and brand dilution. All three can be the result of activity that occurs at any given point of the life cycle. For example, your team may not fully understand the threats involved with the multiple points of the supply chain combined with the geography of where parts are created. The global market and the speed at which negative information is shared compounds the complexities. A lot of problems start at the supply chain level. These problems have been ignored for years.
Q: Do you think companies are doing enough to protect their brands?
A: In honesty, no – there are too many examples of companies that are not doing enough to get a better handle on the challenges and complexities in their supply chain. Today, we have seen many high profile cases of toys that contain lead, manufacturers with security threats, and medical solutions that don’t go as planned. The good news is that more and more companies are realizing that the supply chain issues have vast, unanticipated effect on their brand.
Q: What are the major trends in brand protection?
A: One of the key trends is harnessing the power of the Internet to improve brand protection. It is no longer an option but a necessity. The fact is that there is so much going on globally in so many locations and time zones that we must use technology like the internet to be able to combat such a widely spread problem. Some may say that many of their problems are being caused by the internet – it is key to understand that the benefit of using internet technology to protect your brand outweighs any challenges caused via the internet.
Q: What is your perspective on the various brand protection solutions?
A: Despite the technology available today, many companies take a mildly automated, classic investigative approach to brand protection. As we have seen, this type of approach misses a lot. The solutions are normally not automated enough and with so many languages and the vastness of the problem, you need more than an investigative team to make a dent in the challenges you are facing. At this time, law enforcement is not equipped to go after the sophisticated technology problems we see today.
Q: Would you consider a software as a service (SaaS) solution like New Momentum to be a valuable tool in the battle against counterfeiting and other threats to IP?
A: Absolutely – the on demand nature of the high tech solution allows New Momentum to accumulate a tremendous amount of information – on-demand. Since it is a web-based solution, it doesn’t require your IT department to become brand protection experts. In an on- demand environment, the functionality becomes richer. Unfortunately, with an on premise model, the system never is going to include inputs and outputs of the individual customer. Solutions like New Momentum continually become smarter and smarter and customers can benefit from what is working for other customers – this is invaluable.
Q: Where is the status of brand protection likely to be in 15 years?
A: Branding is a trend that’s been growing increasingly in the last 10-15 years. I believe brand protection is going to become imperative for both every size organizations– even the small ones. Attacks will become more individualized and pervasive and brand protection will be almost synonymous with personal security – everyone is going to have a brand and threats will accumulate at a large rate. We have to protect our brand outside of the walls of our company. We need to get better and smarter at protecting ourselves. We need to start laying the groundwork today. High profile cases have brought awareness and some of the market leaders are starting to apply sophisticated solutions that actively deal with these problems.
