Melboy Christian Pangan, Business Development and Strategy Manager at Asticom, talks about the brand name Asticom, the domain name Asticom.com.ph and maintaining their brand consistency.
What is the story behind Asticom?
We live by the Astiway of Life, this means making each day count by doing the things that we love: it is all about discovering our potentials, and making our dreams a reality by finding opportunities where our talents are optimized for a greater good. Living true to our company’s promise: bridging people, fueling passions.
People will always be our greatest asset. Through the Astiway of Life, we build individuals whose potentials are optimized. Our Astifam are encouraged to look at their strengths and competencies and bank on their capability to take on their ideal careers whether or not they have a functional background or experience. They are empowered individuals who can take action on what segment line they want to further explore. We inspire our employees to dream big and take the leap to make it happen. We foster purpose-driven teams whose top priority is to help our clients and ultimately create an impact in society.
The Astiway of Life defines our leadership philosophy. We grow leaders who are pathfinders. They serve as our scouts of talents. They are our main enablers of growth. They do not bind talent to their current teams that they are assigned to but instead encourage them to take on more challenging roles. Most importantly, our leaders serve as our human capital curator. They ensure that our employees are well taken care of and are provided the necessary support to achieve their dreams.
The Astiway of Life has been our key to success, we were able to grow passionate individuals who are willing to go the extra mile for our customers. We have reached PHP 1 billion worth of sales in 2017 in just three (3) years of our company’s existence and in 2019 we have reached PHP 1.5 billion sales. We strongly believe that our Astiway of Life has been the primary reason why we continue to thrive given our 5 years of existence. We grow our business not just to acquire profit but to create more opportunities for the Filipinos. Within five years, we have promoted 94 employees, and our lateral career growth has reached 793. This simply proves that we have successfully reached our target by bridging the right people to the right business. While we are proud of our sales achievement, we find greater meaning in the achievements of our employees who found opportunities through our company, and it all starts with a simple question of what drives you to go to work? This is the very essence of the Astiway of Life.
We have consistently offered a vast number of opportunities across the years, from entry-level to managerial roles. A total of 2814 opportunities were offered in 2020 despite the uncertainties, a quarter of which were open to fresh graduates, skilled workers, and employees with no prior working experience.
Thus, more than ever, we are prioritizing a holistic approach by upskilling our people and managing business operations to adapt to the new normal.
When did you start thinking about your brand name and how did you settle on Asticom?
Asticom was the brainchild of Globe CHRO, Ato Jiao, and previous Globe Director for HR Shared Services and Asticom President and CEO, Cai Reyes. The goal was to improve the lives of Globe’s vendor employees and likewise also improve the vendor services being provided to Globe. Asticom was to be the first revenue-generating HR arm of Globe.
Asticom was already an established company prior to being bought by Globe. The previous iteration was a company that focused on IT solutions called Ayala Systems Technology Inc (ASTI).
How did you get the domain name Asticom.com.ph for your brand? Why did you select that one exactly?
Truth be told, Asticom.com.ph was chosen as the domain name because Asticom.com was already taken by a Dutch company. With the .ph extension, we chose to leverage our local presence yet maintain and build an international presence.
How has owning Asticom.com.ph affected your business? Do you own any other domain names?
We believe that having asticom.com.ph as a domain adds professional credibility to our business. Our website has had significant positive effects on the company on two fronts: client acquisition and talent acquisition. These effects were augmented once the company rebranded in 2019. It benefits our business by reaching our target market and developing our own brand identity as one of the top professional employer organizations in the Asia-Pacific region.
Who is your target customer and how is your brand name helping in reaching them?
Our target customers are the decision-makers of corporations who continue to strive for extraordinary growth, who are willing to outsource any function, and who require delivery of promised performance targets at the speed and cost they require.
Our brand name has helped reach our clients by being consistent in delivering high quality service solutions, value-driven services and faster turnaround time. We believe that the customer’s feedback is the best way to build a deeper bond to our existing and potential customers.
How do you keep your brand consistent across different channels online and offline?
We keep our brand consistent across different channels by following our brand promise – bridging people, fueling passions. In all our communications, we emphasize and prioritize the growth and development of our people and feature them as our heroes across all our media channels.
Has the pandemic affected your company in any way? What has changed since?
Yes, it was affected in a way that we had to shift our operations to a remote setup in less than 72 hours. Nonetheless, we used this uncertainty to create meaningful solutions that opened up many digital opportunities to better serve our employees and customers. For our employees, we launched work-from-home tools and services to prioritize their health and safety. For our clients, collaboration and innovation was key to providing them with digital platform services and process improvements to help them reach efficiencies and adapt to the new normal. Overall, the pandemic helped us focus on prioritizing our employees and building even stronger relationships with our clients.
What do you do to make sure your marketing is effective?
Measuring marketing effectiveness requires time, effort, talent and the right tools to be successful and to fully understand our target market. We look at ALL possible ways that can help boost the awareness of our company. We assess the long-term and short-term impact by setting clear goals and the strategy for our social media, website and public relations initiatives.
What would your advice be to entrepreneurs who are just starting out, in general and when it comes to branding and naming?
Know your WHY. After you have clarified your purpose, you need to have a unique idea or business model that provides the means to achieve your vision. Know what you want and how to get it. That has been our formula for success ever since we started Asticom.
Where do you see your business in the future and how does your brand name fit into that vision?
Our Vision is to contribute to the economic recovery of the Philippines by supporting businesses and providing opportunities for Filipinos through our diverse business portfolio.
We hope the above information will help you in making informed decisions about your brand. If you want to say hi or have any questions about naming, branding, and domain names get in touch, we’re always happy to hear from you.
Find out more about Asticom
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