Are You Asking The Right Questions About Your Merger, Acquisition, or Spin-Off?

Margaret MolloyGlobal CMO Siegel+Gale

Great mergers, acquisitions, and spin-offs begin with great questions…

• How will this new entity create shareholder value?

• Will these companies produce operational

synergy?

• What are the logistical advantages of this

transaction?

• Are these companies culturally compatible?While these are certainly some important questions to ask, they are not the only important questions to ask.

In our experience, some company leaders ignore critical questions about their brand and pay attention to the more immediate organizational ones instead.

Although branding questions may not initially seem urgent, constant curiosity about brand is a key to unlocking M&A business value.

To avoid this oversight, here

are seven crucial questions you should be asking about your brand’s future.

1. Equity Do you know how much the market values your brand and/or the brand of acquired brand?

2. Employee Engagement

Do all your employees embrace your vision and purpose?

3. Positioning Are you seizing this opportunity created by the change to tell a fresh story?

4. Naming How effectively do your firm name and product naming architecture express the mission and scope of your new entity?

5. Visual Identity

Does your identity reflect your new vision, purpose, and promise?

6. CustomerExperience

Are your communications and interactions consistent across all channels?

7. SimplicityPay

How are you using this change opportunity to provide greater clarity, transparency, and utility to customers and all other constituents.

A thriving brand and a successful company are synonymous. By digging into the seven questions and dutifully pursuing answers, both of these goals can be achieved. The curiosity and vision that sparked your merger, acquisition, or spin-off must be present at every stage of the diligence and integration process—including the management of your brand.

Follow me on Twitter @MargaretMolloy

Margaret MolloyGlobal CMOSiegel+Gale

A version of this presentationfirst appeared on thecmoclub.com

www.siegelgale.com

Siegel+Gale is the simplicity company. We are a global strategic branding, design, and experience

firm.