‘B’ for Bangladesh

May 19, 2011

‘B’ for Bangladesh

Faizul Khan Tanim writes about how Brand Forum is branding the nation

Goldman Sachs named Bangladesh as one of the next eleven (N11) economies with the potential to become an important player in the world economy by 2050.

Considerable progress has been made in the last two decades, the ready-made garments (RMG) industry and IT solutions lead with exports, and advances in health, education, and agriculture, indicates the country’s potential to become one of the leading economies of South Asia.

However, Bangladesh still lacks initiatives in the public and private sectors that can improve its image globally, and the images that do appear in the international media are often of a nation at the mercy of natural disasters, poverty and corruption.

In this milieu, Bangladesh Brand Forum (BBF) is an initiative with a vision, of transforming Bangladesh’s image by applying branding ethoses, and believes in promoting a positive image of Bangladesh.

Shariful Islam, the managing director of BBF, shares where and how it started, “BBF started in 2007 with the core objective of empowering the corporate bodies to move up the value chain by focusing on marketing, creativity, innovation; branding them is going to be a far richer impact on our economy. And it is not a new thing; India did it and is very successful. Other countries like China focuses tremendous amount of money and investment behind education, design and creativity institutes, and brands. So it’s about time that we transform our economy and the country”.

According to Islam, BBF is the brainchild of three people, himself, Professor Ferhat Anwar, who is the chief adviser, and artist Preema Nazia Andalib, who with various industry leaders from home and abroad kick-started the endeavour.

Speaking of their next initiative Islam said they are focusing on knowledge. “We run few major initiatives to educate, inform and involve citizens with seminars where world leaders, trainers and thinkers share the best practices. A monthly business magazine, in partnership with Harvard Business School, gives a bird's eye view of our business industry. We also have two awards for excellence, the Best Brand Award and the Commward, which recognises excellence in communication”.

The idea is to build knowledge centres with libraries, creative zones, training centres, and the objective is to understand the market and share the knowledge within the industry.

At the same time, BBF promotes Bangladesh globally with the event, ‘Meet Bangladesh – Asia's Next Best Opportunity’. The first one was held last year in the UK. This year, they will travel to New York and Washington DC in October.

At this year’s Cannes Advertising Festival, which will take place in June, BBF will bring Bangladeshi jute products to the forefront with the official bag for the event produced out of jute.

“One of our major initiatives is hosting some of the biggest names in marketing. Philip Kotler is coming to Bangladesh in June. During his stay he will meet CEOs, and hold a session at the Dhaka University for 500 teachers; there will be another one at the indoor stadium with over 5000 students, plus a session with senior government officials on public service marketing and a day-long certified marketing session for professionals”, Islam stated.

He believes that change or transformation is never possible by knowledge only; there is need for inspiration and inspirational speeches. And it is the 40 years independence of the country and there cannot be a better time for Kotler’s visit.

It makes perfect sense to try and understand that branding is not about getting our target market to choose us over the competition, but it is about getting our prospects to see us as the only one that provides a solution to their problem and that is when branding Bangladesh will be harvested in its truest form.