Facilitating brand integration through a matchmaking platform international expansion strategy for a belgium based start-up an exploratory research project

Abstract

By bringing brands and content makers together through an online platform, Famework recently launched the tinder for brand integration on the Belgian market. The unification is an anticipation on the tendencies of a growing interest for brand integration and the need of additional funding to make ends meet. Online platforms are shaping Europe’s digital future and the Covid-19 pandemic accelerated the digitization even more. Famework contributes to a digital future by providing an innovative match making tool for a specific niche segment. That most of the brand integration opportunities are not fully exploited is already identified within Belgium. Therefore, the objective of the platform is to boost efficiency, increase relevancy, facilitate interaction and tap into the need of funding. The purpose of this exploratory research project is the verification of an opportunity global phenomenon or not: “Is this brand integration platform a tool for international success?”. This led us to develop the following research question: “Should Famework expand internationally? If so, what is the best way to do that within the next 6 months?”. In order to answer this question, different sub-questions need to be addressed. These are the following: “Does the expansion need to happen country-by-country or simultaneously in several countries?” and “With which key brands and content makers?”. Results: Derived from our in-depth interviews with brands and content makers, we determined two key findings. First, a brand integration platform is a tool with a potential international market. Brand integration as part of brands’ marketing is an upcoming trend as the traditional marketing landscape is switching to a more innovative version. Second, the adoption of a country-specific approach is at the core of the marketing strategies for a vast majority of brands. For content makers, country- and media-specific differences across countries are the main reason for their country-specific approach towards the inclusion of brand integration in their productions. However, globally we noticed a roughly fixed structure in the sequence of implementing brand integration deals. Next to brands and content makers we reached out to four start-ups with recent experience in the field of expanding abroad. Their answers provided us with important insights such as the importance of doing extensive market research, building up a network and that local employees are a crucial element for success. It was rather difficult to get in contact with media agencies, but we were able to interview two big ones. However, the findings from these results will be valuable knowledge for Famework, they did not contribute directly towards addressing our research question. As a second path of research, we sent out surveys specifically targeted at representatives of brands and content makers. These surveys were much more concise as they consisted mostly of yes/no questions. They were meant to get a clear and non-dubious overview of their interest in a brand integration platform. The results of these surveys are in line with the interviews. Respondents show a positive attitude towards the implementation of a brand integration platform on an international scale. National and international participants agree on the added value based on the reasons of efficiency, time-saving, relevancy, new insights and exploring brand integration as a new marketing technique. The most important insights obtained from this part of research are the specific geographical directions to expand towards, namely the Benelux and Europe. After being provided with these main results from our interviews and surveys, we conducted a thorough literature research on all countries within the Benelux and European Union, based on the following aspects: (1) the media landscape, (2) innovativeness in terms of technology and (3) an overview of possible brands and content makers to reach out to.