Understanding where to put your brand-building dollars
The Interbrand team role modelled excellent collaboration, innovation and inclusion – all values that PayPal celebrates – and we count this as another breakthrough in our brand journey.
Fiona Naughton,
Senior Director, Global Brand Planning, PayPal
PayPal
Office: London
Following their split from eBay in June 2015, PayPal found themselves in need of direction.
The decision to separate PayPal from it’s long running parent company eBay resulted, internally, in a temporary sense of uncertainty.
PayPal found itself unsure of it’s own identity, unaware of the best market positioning for independent success. Paired with the threat of the ever-growing payment industry, and the growing influence of Fintech companies (total global investment in Fintech has totaled $49.7bn since 2010), the need to identify PayPal’s unique position became apparent.
The solution to this laid in identifying the areas that would allow PayPal to establish itself as a ‘world-changing brand’. A full brand strength analysis across 10 markets, supported by internationally conducted workshops, identified the areas of PayPal’s brand that presented the greatest weakness. Focusing on these areas, a roadmap spanning 18-months was developed.
The roadmap identified the key goals for the future growth of the PayPal brand, and outlined the supporting initiatives needed to make this growth a reality.
The process has set PayPal on a steady path towards growth, driven by the tailored, phased roadmap. It has established a greater alignment between teams internally, united by the common purpose to grow in scale and reverence. And, it has paved the way for PayPal to move towards becoming a more emotional, exciting brand, influenced by a better understanding of the needs of consumers.
Today, PayPal is one of the fastest growing financial brands in our Best Global Brands ranking, and its stock price reached a record high in 2020.
Interbrand London led an innovative grass-roots approach to really understanding how we should create the experiences that will offer consumers, merchants and developers more opportunities to manage and move their money to fulfil their everyday ambitions in the global economy.
Fiona Naughton,
Senior Director, Global Brand Planning, PayPal
It drove a clearly focused outcome in terms of goals, metrics and value that would convince the whole organization that building this brand is their business. It became the cornerstone of our brand strategy.
Fiona Naughton,
Senior Director, Global Brand Planning, PayPal