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Randstad£1bn UK business... multi brand to mono brand model
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A classic business change role...
Randstad is one of the world's leading recruitment and HR services businesses. Holding significant market share positions in some 40 countries, with 28,000 staff and annual sales excess of €15bn. They principally trade under the single Randstad brand.
Having acquired a group of 24 very successful UK recruitment businesses, with combined sales of £1bn, they wanted to merge them together under one UK operating board and all trading under one brand - Randstad. Whilst clear business advantage could be gained from this the challenge, in an industry where the people are the assets, was how to do it whilst keeping the management teams, staff and clients onside.
A UK operational board was put in place and a number of business change workstreams were created - I joined the UK board and led the marketing change management stream. This consisted of a number of activities:
Randstad is one of the world's leading recruitment and HR services businesses. Holding significant market share positions in some 40 countries, with 28,000 staff and annual sales excess of €15bn. They principally trade under the single Randstad brand.
Having acquired a group of 24 very successful UK recruitment businesses, with combined sales of £1bn, they wanted to merge them together under one UK operating board and all trading under one brand - Randstad. Whilst clear business advantage could be gained from this the challenge, in an industry where the people are the assets, was how to do it whilst keeping the management teams, staff and clients onside.
A UK operational board was put in place and a number of business change workstreams were created - I joined the UK board and led the marketing change management stream. This consisted of a number of activities:
- Working with the board to design and implement the target business operating model
- Creating and implementing the UK brand proposition and communications strategy
- Launch a new UK group website designed to channel clients and candidates into the operating companies
Creating the UK brand
In most markets Randstad is primarily a staffing business. The UK was a 70:30 mix of professional and staffing, which meant we had to fit the brand to the UK market but stay true to the Randstad brand. We conducted extensive research in three areas - clients, candidates and our employees. Working with Interbrand, a high level draft UK model was developed. My task was to then turn this theory into a living brand.
Using the knowledge and insight we had of people and market sectors, we took a thought leadership approach. At the time this gave us clear differentiation from our competitors. This we wrapped it up in the proposition "Shaping the World of Work" and the campaign theme "True Talent Shapes Business... True Knowledge Finds It" building our marketing around this true and simple fundamental. 
new UK web portal
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Using B2C tactics in a B2B worldOur objectives were simple...
Success in recruitment is about being top of mind. To do this we adopted B2C FMCG and direct marketing type tactics which created the cut through we wanted in the B2B world  national press campaign
Network brand building TV and targeted business leader PR were complemented with a national press campaign. At the heart of our activity was the question 'What's keeping business leaders awake at night?". This we answered by inviting business leaders to pre-register, via our website, for a copy of our exclusive and authoritative World of Work Report, thus generating the leads the OpCos wanted. Because of the high profile B2C campaign we had no problem attracting the high quality candidates either.
The glossy, high quality and comprehensive 56 page World of Work Report, has now become a standard in many Randstad global markets.
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Leveraging our marketing assets
Randstad own a number of high value marketing assets, but in the UK we weren't making good use of them. I changed this by incorporating them into our campaign in a way that both added value and allowed us to punch above our weight
Randstad are a main sponsor of the Williams F1 Team and as a global brand F1 is literally an ideal vehicle for Randstad. We did a large scale take over event in London's Canary Wharf, which was so successful it is now an annual client event.
We also sponsored the Sky News programme 'Sportsline' which allowed us to further activate the F1 linkage and extend the TV airtime campaign. 
To leverage the knowledge of our people we made series of 'vox pop' infomercials broadcast through a sponsorship with the Bloomberg business channel.
Finally, if all that wasn't enough added value... we brought Randstad's clipper ship to London and used it as a prestigious floating conference centre to host a number of thought leadership networking events.
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marketing campaign video
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network TV advert
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Sky News sponsorship
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Bloomberg TV sponsorship - one of eight vox pops we made using our own experts
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Williams F1 Team sponsorship activation
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