- Hamlet

Bilion: positioning, identity and brand strategy

Bilion had a challenge common to many industrial companies. At first glance, what it manufactures could not be less sexy and more difficult to differentiate.

“Industrial door components” are invisible to the end user: they are at the final end of a long chain of decisions. Anyone who builds a house or a warehouse doesn’t even want to know which door the contractor chooses – what about the springs or hinges that go inside.

But for Bilion, it was really critical to make a difference. Having already won the confidence of automatic door manufacturers in Portugal, where it dominates almost 100% of the market, it now had the challenge of going international. In the larger and more distant European markets, commercial aggressiveness and good personal relationships are not enough. You need to have a digital presence and a distinctive promise.

To complicate matters, the competitors in this market are giant multinationals. How could Bilion, much smaller and producing a typical commodity, differentiate itself?

Called in to help, Hamlet began by trying to understand the market, looking for a loophole. What could only Bilion offer its potential customers, and under what circumstances?

The answer was to look for Bilion’s competitive advantage in precisely what seemed a disadvantage: not being a giant multinational. By working with smaller quantities, and by producing in Europe, Bilion has more flexibility, speed and ease in responding to special requests. Also, being a family business, it knows how to develop strong, personal relationships with customers.

“Your special request is nothing special to Bilion” is the promise with which Hamlet has translated this new positioning of Bilion. To support it, it also created a new visual identity and a digital communication strategy that started, in early 2020, with the brand’s new website.