A fervent seeker looking for customer minds for corporate
As CEO, Rarely does Nguyen Thanh Tan sits in his office. He is always “wandering” to other companies … or teaching about marketing, branding. His beginning day is usually to starts with the latest updates of the partners. That is understandabl, as he is CEO of BrainMark, which specializes in marketing consultancy, marketers and marketing training.
In 1999, Nguyen Thanh Tan had a group of close friends who are marketing directors working for local and foreign companies. They often meet at the weekend to share their work experience. At this time, consulting and marketing training in Vietnam has not been paid attention, enterprises have not seen the role of consultants in the operation of enterprises. “At the time, we were working for different businesses, so we know better than anyone we know about the importance of applicable marketing in Vietnam.” In 1999, brand BrainMark officially was born according to the demands at the time
Before founding BrainMark, Nguyen Thanh Tan had a strong background with 8 years as marketing director at Thai Tuan, one of the first Vietnamese companies be very aware of the importance of marketing, PR …. from 1998, Thai Tuan knew how to make a press conference, communicating effectively to the press; knowing how to organize and sponsor competitions to develop their brand and connect businesses with the benefits of the community. A board of directors very enthusiastic and fierce, a brand owner is willing to invest in brand development, an ideal environment for marketers like Nguyen Thanh Tan putting all his heart and strength day by day. The time working here has brought confidence to Nguyen Thanh Tan for starting up his own career. “The thing that I learned when working in Thai Tuan is that if the Vietnamese brand owners believe in their strength, passion for building a strong brand, determined to work with a dedicated and professional team will have a brand sustainable development for their companies”
22 marketing specialisits who mostly are the CEO of local or foreign companies creating a strong group of professionalscoming to businesses to share, listen, providingthe best solutions for companies in VN, helping them by practical experiences accumulated overtime by these experts
According to you, inviting 22 marketers who are currently the “bosses” in the companies to provide consulting BrainMark customers, is it effective and attractive to customers?
When deploying a project to a customer, we assign only to one person in charge and the support team of two. In this way, every project at BrainMark is deployed very quickly. It is also our strength that 22 experts working from different fields will be assigned to one who is strong in the field. In addition, it is common for businesses to hire a professional marketing manager with high salaries, while through us they can reach professionals with a more affordable fee. For our customers the solution is efficient.
Most importantly, BrainMark’s top priority is to keep information confidential, the problems that customers are encountering. We pledge to each customer that we commit to keep their information confidential lifetime. On the contrary, we also need to receive the information in a “honest way” from our customers, considering us as a front-line friend rather than just a working partner, because of lack of information can lead to mistakes and misadvice from us.
When you provide advice to VN companies of branding, what do you recognize is lacking in these companies?
The biggest thing that Vietnamese businesses are lacking is “unclear objectives” or on the other hand, they do not understand themselves. Many businesse, we have consulted, do not have the mission, vision, or even though what brand they want to be … Next is the lack of money and lack of thinking using money effectively. Then there is a lack of development way, and lack of personnel … generally lacking in many things. Say in general, there is never enough for anything. So we will take responsibility for our customers, learning to know what they need for their sustainable business development.
When mentioning to this issue, it should be added that many businesses do not currently have the proper thinking about the brand, so often thinking that branding must have a lot of money, we often share thisthinking on forums for Entrepreneurship: It is recommended that businesses should understand accurately the concept of branding and building a brand is not beyond the reach of small and medium businesses.
*Have you ever tried comparing BrainMark with other competitors in this industry?
Currently in Vietnam, there are many companies operating in consulting and training, but many business customers now complain that most consulting companies just provide consulting without accompanied by corresponding actions: “ It is easier said than done”. We used to be business managers so we understand and share with businesses about these adversities. With BrainMark, we focus on applicable consulting, which means that we will strictly copperate with companies to implement the projects. When we provide counseling for a brand, it also means that a commitment is made with specific and measurable targets, so after projects completed, it means we transfer our whole knowledge, specific plan, a detailed process, both neccesary supplier relationship and the other supports to our customers, which we temporarily call the application marketing technology. All are delivered so that when we complete projects, our customers have a professional marketing department.
