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Leading Brands

Jonathan Sanders, Director, Research, GovExec

For any public sector company, there are many ways to measure success. Whether it is winning a recompete, successfully branding after a merger, or diving headfirst into a new agency and winning a contract, the constant growth of the public sector marketplace offers new ways to win and remain competitive. 

For all of those wins, there is one common denominator you cannot succeed without: Customers.

Your customers are ultimately the driver of your brands’ success in the federal marketplace, and if you are ineffectively serving them, your business will ultimately suffer.

Without customers that are willing to go out of their way to refer your business, you end up relying on word of mouth or your historical track record. Sure you may have delivered on your brand promise to your customers twenty years ago, but is that still the same today? 

Creating Customer Advocates

In today’s highly competitive public sector landscape that sees an increasing number of companies vying for contracts YoY, acquiring customers is just the beginning of the journey.

To truly thrive and build a sustainable brand, transforming your customers into advocates can be a game-changer. Customer advocates are not just satisfied clients; they are enthusiastic supporters who go above and beyond to promote your brand. 

Their word-of-mouth recommendations hold immense power in driving new business and strengthening your reputation. 

In a continued effort to dig deeper into what drives customer loyalty, Leading Brands seeks to answer this question by surveying hundreds of public sector employees about what brands can do in order to spur this customer advocacy.

The Public Sector Leading Brands

The highlights of the study provide valuable insight to any company working with the public sector: whether an established player in the market or a company just entering the arena. Serving as a benchmark, the study looks at a variety of factors from how brands are perceived across multiple public sector verticals, customer vs. non-customer information, or the brand’s association with leading concepts such as Cyber, Digital Transformation, AI, and Cloud, and more. It then dives into whether the brands deliver on their promise. 

Learning what government decision makers feel about these topics provides insights any marketing or business development team can leverage.

Join the Conversation

Overall, the Leading Brands study offers a succinct view into the question of brand positioning and tracking. It is the largest government decision-makers study capturing the priorities and perceptions of buying teams across federal agencies. 

On September 21, 2023, GovExec will release the 2023 Leading Brands results with help from some long-time colleagues and leaders in the public sector. The breakfast event will include a panel discussion with public sector leaders. Among other things, they will discuss what marketing can do when the clients do not have a great perception of the brand.

The breakfast event is our gift to the GovCon community. At this complimentary breakfast you will: 

> Learn who the top brands for 2023 in the public sector market are
> Hear about new aspects of the study that give the results more meaning
> Network with the leading brands
> Hear from an expert panel about how brand perception and customer satisfaction are connected… and what that means for you

Registration closes on September 18.

Register today!

By Jonathan Sanders, Director, Research, GovExec

According to GSA, all agencies using Networx, WITS 3, and Local Telecommunications contracts must transition to Enterprise Infrastructure Solutions (EIS) contracts or another vehicle. The next phase of the transition is November 1, 2022 – May 31, 2023 when contractors disconnect agencies without MOUs.

The Enterprise Infrastructure Solutions (EIS) is a multiple award, indefinite delivery, indefinite quantity (IDIQ) contract vehicle. It is a comprehensive solutions-based contract vehicle to address all aspects of federal agency needs for the next-generation of information technology (IT), telecommunications, and infrastructure services. 

It covers services including voice, data transport services, hosting services, cloud services, contact center services, managed services (inclusive of managed security services), wireless, commercial satellite, cable & wiring, service related labor, and service related equipment. In addition, EIS gives agencies and contractors the flexibility to customize task orders to meet unique requirements. 

The most recent contractor to receive an award is BT Federal Inc. The Bureau of Information Resource Management funded the award, which has a potential value of $1.9 billion, representing one of BT Federal Inc.’s largest wins to date. 

BT Federal Inc. joins a growing list of awardees thus far on the EIS Vehicle:

Insights, Research, and YOUR Path to More Awards

As agencies continue transitioning to EIS and other vehicles, GovExec’s Insights & Research Group (comprising Market Connections, Government Business Council, and Leading Brands) & GovTribe can keep you up to date on what is happening in this rapidly changing contract environment. 

GovTribe is a collaborative platform that lends business development teams a hand through research and tracking of contracting vehicles as well as targeted intelligence on GSA Federal Supply Schedules, GWACS, IDIQs, and other multiple award vehicles.

Combining the data, insights, and expert analysis you get at Market Connections with the ease, agility, and usability of GovTribe can help you strategically position yourself right where you want to be for future opportunities.

Questions? Please reach out to Jonathan Sanders at jsanders@govexec.com.

Revisiting the Leading Brands 2021 Panel Discussion

Jonathan Sanders, Director, Research, GovExec

In the B2G space, there are few things more important than understanding your brand — it is the story you tell without ever walking into a room. It is the reaction someone has when they see your company mentioned online. It is the feeling they have when they see your company’s name on the sponsors and exhibitors page of an event.

Most importantly, it is what runs through the mind of agency leadership when they see your company has submitted a bid for a large-scale contract. Without a well defined brand, you don’t own that narrative. Internally, your team may have a strong grasp of your company’s positioning and offerings, but thousands of government decision makers, Service members, and the general public may have an entirely different view of your company.

My question for you today is: are you tracking that narrative?

The Leading Brands study offers a succinct view into the question of brand positioning and tracking. Now in its 8th year, Leading Brands is the largest government decision-makers study capturing the priorities and perceptions of buying teams across Civilian agencies, the Department of Defense (DoD), and state and local government (SLG) entities.

In short, Leading Brands allows your team to look under the hood of your brand. It provides a critical analysis of your customers and non-customers, how your company is perceived against its competitors, and market strengths and weaknesses. The goal: to accelerate sales, guide partnership development, and define go to market strategies.

Leading Brands is a great tool to measure your company’s brand and perception over time from key public sector individuals. But it is just the starting point to unlock your company’s overall potential. In May 2022, GovExec’s Insights & Research Group released the 2022 Leading Brands study with help from some long-time colleagues and leaders in the public sector. The study release event included a star-studded panel discussion consisting of Tim Hartman (CEO, GovExec), Tricia Davis-Muffett (Director, Global Public Sector Marketing, Google Cloud), Pamela Merritt (Managing Director, Federal Marketing and Communications, Accenture Federal Services), and Oliver Nutt (Vice President of Marketing, GDIT).

The panel of public sector leaders highlighted the efforts to drive brand awareness in the market and guide overall brand evolution while navigating a turbulent, crowded market. With a dynamic market whose needs are constantly evolving, it is increasingly important to note not only where your brand is, but where your brand will ultimately go. In order to peel back some of the key takeaways from this discussion, the Insights & Research Group is pleased to walk you through what our experts had to say.

The Importance of Studying One’s Brand

The importance of studying one’s brand cannot be overstated. If you are committing to regularly measuring your brand and competitors in the marketplace, you already have a lot in common with the largest companies serving the public sector. If you are not, you run the risk of not knowing how you are perceived, which can impact the company’s ability to win contracts.

When our panelists were asked how they went about measuring their brand, Leading Brands came first. Serving as a great benchmark, the study permits you to do research on incredibly specific market areas, whether it be how you are perceived across multiple public sector verticals, customer vs. non-customer information, or your brand’s association with leading concepts such as Cyber, Digital Transformation, AI, and Cloud, and more. This informative tool allows your team to zero in on a full-spectrum viewpoint of how they are broadly viewed across the public sector — knowledge the panelists value.

While it is massively important to know how your customers feel and interact with your brand, it is equally important to have insight as to how those inside your company view the company, too.

Tim Hartman, GovExec’s CEO said “Your brand only really exists in the hearts and minds of your employees and customers. People who are familiar with your brand, or have a relationship with your brand, really are what are driving the brand the most.”  

GDIT’s Oliver Nutt noted that internal conversations with employees are a great tool for understanding the internal brand perception. 

Accenture’s Pamela Merritt had one of my favorite insights during this discussion. She said that to measure a dynamic market, you need a dynamic market measuring tool and strategy. Underpinned by constant change, the public sector market is one that needs to be frequently studied and measured, which is exactly what Google Cloud’s Tricia Davis-Muffett and team are doing. “We’re doing more rapid measurement on a regular basis.” Studying and measuring one’s brand is a critical first step in developing go-to-market strategies that resonate with the broader public sector, but it is the first of many. 

Aligning to the Core Brand

Another critical topic in the B2G space the panel discussed is that of alignment to the core values. Identifying and maintaining a set of core brand values and ideals and intentionally adhering to them in every move within the market is a necessity—this is what brings the brand to life. 

All of the public sector agencies have one thing in common: People run them; ordinary people who have their own perceived notion of your brand. When you continuously align the company to its core brand values, it will be easier to understand how the people may view you in the marketplace. If your core brand values are inconsistent, it becomes difficult for individuals to understand what you stand for. 

One of the most ancient axioms, “You’re only as good as your word,” feels just right in this discussion. If your company is not being intentional with its core brand values in the moves you make across the marketplace, those paying attention will begin to have doubts about your brand. This is particularly true for the public sector market that faces a barrage of new trends and buzzwords daily. With an ever-increasing scope of new widgets and tech trends, being able to authentically harness the energy of a particular marketing moment in a way that translates positively for your brand, yet celebrates and rings true to your core branding, is no easy task.

Merritt said: “If you want to move the needle on something, you need the entire company to be all in.” The closer you are able to align your company’s core values with the brand, you don’t only win from a brand performance perspective in the broader market, but you also win from an employee perspective. As Hartman noted, with a brand only existing in the hearts and minds of your employees and customers, who would be a better steward to go out to the market and share in the brand’s alignment to its core values? This panel is steadfast that going to market without knowledge of, or alignment to, the core brand is a recipe for disaster. 

“If you want to move the needle on something, you need the entire company to be all in.”

— Pamela Merritt, Managing Director, Accenture Federal Services

Continuous Presence in the Market 

Once your team has thoroughly studied your brand inside and out and has developed a strategy to move intentionally in the market that is aligned with your core brand values, a critical next step is to foster a continuous presence in the market overall. 

When we say a continuing presence, we are not advocating for a response to each new trend or focus area, as there will be many. Rather, it’s understanding that different sectors have varying needs. Davis Muffett noted how important story-telling in the SLG space is. She said the SLG market wants to see something that is repeatable—a prospect in Kings County wants to know how this piece of technology solved the exact same problem for Los Angeles County. This is an incredibly powerful way to resonate with that audience. Sure there may be some differing elements, but what worked for one large county may be repeatable at another. 

Conversely, every Federal agency is different. Their technical sets, organization structure, buying capability is all different, making each sale custom. It’s imperative to help them find their own vision rather than telling a story of how your brand helped a different agency through a similar solution. 

Granted, these two small examples oversimplify the massive task vested with B2G marketers— each subsection in the public sector community has their own needs, their own challenges, their own opinion of your brand. That core brand has to be able to meet these unique needs in order to remain competitive. 

Don’t Chase the Shiny

Keeping an ear to the ground on what’s going on in the market is a must for any marketing team in the B2G space, but that does not mean jumping on every new trend, tempting as that may be. The public sector space is rife with technologies, trends, and solutions that can be transformative for all levels of government. The ever popular trend of digital transformation lay dormant for much of the beginning of the 21st century, but springboarded off of the back of the Covid-19 pandemic, and is now the common lexicon for most large-scale modernization efforts. 

But if your brand doesn’t do digital transformation, it is disingenuous to use the term when it couldn’t be further from what your brand does. Does familiarity with a certain trend make your company more viable, and more familiar to the customer?  

Being intentional and transparent in the market is a powerful brand tool. Focusing on your brand promise and core values will pay dividends for you and your customer base. Not giving into the noise can ensure your brand’s messaging isn’t lost in today, or tomorrow’s trend. Too often brands reach to be current with trends or offerings that are not aligned with their value proposition, and in those moments they run the risk of alienating their current customers and reducing favorability in the coming years. Listen to the markets, identify the relevant services you provide, understand how they coincide with the core values, how they fold into today’s trends to solidify your offering. 

When it comes to something new in the public sector, make sure your brand isn’t chasing the shiny just to remain current because you may just lose what originally made you shine. 

The Bottom Line…

The importance of brand measuring and tracking cannot be overstated. Our panel of experts agree that if you are unfamiliar with how your brand is perceived, you may be missing out on massive opportunities to sway perception, create positive outcomes, and most importantly, winning contracts. 

GovExec’s Insights & Research Group is your go to source for brand measuring and tracking. Whether Leading Brands, or a custom brand tracking tool, we are here to help guide all of your brand perception and tracking needs.

Questions? Find out more by contacting jsanders@govexec.com or research@govexec.com

According to GovExec’s Leading Brands and Market Connections’ Content Marketing Review

Our friends at GovExec recently released their report, Leading Brands in Government 2021, highlighting those companies who are navigating the federal market space. The study tracks brand sentiment and associations in the public sector including federal, defense, state and local.

First and foremost, we would like to congratulate all the companies who were recognized as leading brands in the government including our current and past clients:

  • Amazon Web Services
  • Cisco
  • Dell EMC
  • Lockheed Martin
  • Management Concepts
  • Microsoft
  • Verizon

Just as we do at Market Connections, the Leading Brands study also notes some of the latest trends in the government market and the shifting market dynamics that could affect the contracting community. Their findings reminded us of the results from our most recent study.

Research and White Papers Are Key to Public Sector

The GovExec team shared that six out of ten (60%) government respondents relied on research, such as white papers, to help stay abreast of what contractors are doing. This data point reinforces what we found in our own 2021 Content Marketing Review (CMR):

  • Throughout the buying process, research reports and white papers were extremely valuable. Their value was even higher at the very beginning of the process when public sector IT professionals were determining needs and potential solutions—a critical time to get your offerings in front of buyers.
  • Regardless of the delivery format (white paper, research report, webinar, etc.), on average – data and research (e.g., facts and figures supporting the claims) – made the piece of content in their hands more valuable (and more relevant).

Both studies suggest that to influence government decision-makers – from the federal to the local level – successful government contractors should provide fact-rich and research-laden content such as white papers to educate their government customers and prospects.

Learn more about how you should prioritize your content marketing efforts for the public sector. Purchase the overview report and watch the on-demand presentation