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Brand Loyalty: 5 Key Steps to Building Your Loyal Fan Base

November 3, 2015/0 Comments/in Brand Affinity, Brand Ambassador, Brand Champions, Brand Collaboration, Brand Culture, Brand Design, Brand Experience, Brand Loyalty, Brand Personality, Brand Promise, Brand Relevance, Brand Strategy, Branding, Business, Social Engagement, Social Media /by Lorraine Carter

“80% of your company’s future revenue will come from just 20% of your existing customers” according to Gartner Group.[1] This means that brands need to devote more attention to building a loyal customer base, and in order to do this successfully they must inspire trust.

Given the number of recent scandals relating to brand ‘dishonesty, and the incredible ease with which the average consumer now acquires information online, it’s easy to see why trust has become such an important value. While many brands strive to inspire loyalty, and in the process develop their ‘customer’ brand champions, very few manage to do this consistently really well.

Here we take a look at the primary benefits of developing a loyal customer base, and some of the most effective brand strategies to do so, together with examples of brands who’ve managed to consistently inspire loyalty amongst their customers.

The 4 Key Benefits of Having Loyal Brand Fans

1. Free Fan-Made Commercials and Other User-Generated Content

Loyal fans will often provide ample content for the brand they love, and this can be anything from testimonials and reviews, up to a commercial with high quality production values. Tesla, the leading electric car brand on the market, is an excellent example of how talented fans can contribute to a brand’s marketing strategy. Elon Musk has always had a notably different approach to marketing compared a lot of his competition, and in the process has managed to build a veritable army of loyal brand ambassadors.

Image via www.tesla.com

A talented fan has even made a beautiful commercial, and this is not the first time something like this has happened – two years ago some fans from Evergeen Pictures filmed a heart-warming commercial likening Tesla’s product to a “modern spaceship”.

In both these cases, the fans were purely motivated by their love of the brand, or rather, what the brand stood for.

2. Loyal Customers can Help Your Brand Adapt and Survive

It’s a given that loyal customers are the backbone of any successful brand. If a brand authentically delivers on its promise consistently its more likely to be forgiven when the occasional hiccup occurs.

The revival of the Hydrox brand is a good example of how consumers will often remain loyal to the brand for decades, help it adapt to the times, and even help resurrect a brand that was near the brink of extinction.

Hydrox was actually the first cookie to feature a sandwich-type offering, with two thin chocolate cookies cushioning a creamy centre, despite the fact that most people in the world now associate this type of cookie with the Oreos brand. Hydrox had trouble effectively marketing their product over the years, and Oreos took the lion’s share of the market, but helped by a number of extremely loyal fans fuelled by nostalgia, they managed to apply a successful brand revitalisation strategy.

Image via www.leafbrands.com

In fact, they were going back to their roots and using the old recipe, so they needed help from their fans who still remembered that signature taste. Some consumers even had decade-old packages in their freezers, which they donated for use in taste tests. That level of loyalty is what keeps a company in business during periods of uncertainty. The question here is, what are you consistently doing with your brand to inspire devoted brand fans?

3. Loyal Customers Engage in Word-of-Mouth Advertising and Give Referrals

Word-of-mouth advertising is probably the oldest form of marketing known to man, but it has immense power even today, as witnessed by the success of Coconut Bliss. It started out as a small ice cream company with simple core values – they offered dairy-free organic ice cream, with coconut milk as the main ingredient. Their first customers were friends, then friends of friends, and, eventually, thousands of people from all around the country.

It was their personal approach to marketing, and that core of loyal consumers that quickly led to significant growth. Most of this initial growth was due to word-of-mouth advertising and referrals from very impressed consumers. Loyal customers tend to be quite vocal about their preferences, and are one of the best sources of referrals.

4. Loyal Fans are Less Likely to be Influenced by Your Competitors

When customers become emotionally engaged and start feeling like they are as much a part of the brand itself as they are consumers, a tribe mentality is born, which makes your loyal fans less susceptible to competitors’ marketing efforts. This can be seen in famous brand rivalries like Apple vs. Microsoft or Coca Cola vs. Pepsi, where customers who choose one brand over the other exhibit fanatical or cult like levels of devotion.

The 5 Proven Strategies for Inspiring Brand Advocacy

1. Create an Antagonist

Some of the most successful brands in recent history have managed to build a veritable army of loyal fans by demonizing the competition or providing their audience with a common “enemy” to fight against. Apple and Tesla are good examples of this. In Apple’s case, it was a sense of elitism that helped them rally a core following of loyal fans under their banner. People who placed their trust in the brand eschewed Apple’s main rival, Microsoft, and even showed disdain for the competition and their “followers”.

Tesla took a somewhat different approach, focusing on the eco-friendly aspect of electric cars, which motivated consumers to take a stand against cars powered by fossil fuels. Tesla was painted as a green, caring and technologically innovative brand. Their route to market was also different and disruptive, yet very much liked by their customers, compared to the more traditional ‘car dealership’ business model. They soon became a brave underdog in the eyes of the public, a car brand with sound moral and ethical values, and one that symbolised progress.[2]

By developing distinguishing factors which are emotionally engaging between two groups, you can effectively inspire not only loyalty towards your group, but also abject disdain for the other group. This all harkens back to research performed by psychologist Henri Tajfel, which has inspired many an entrepreneur to utilise social identity theory to their advantage.

2. Establish Effective Two-Way Communication on Social Media

By solely posting promotional content on social media, you fail to utilise the full potential of this powerful tool. Listening to what the consumers have to say and engaging them in conversations allows brands to perform effective market research and enhance customer experience, but most importantly, it helps establish personal connections.

Companies like Nike, Starbucks and Xbox have effectively used social media for both promotion, and as a means of enhancing the quality of their customer service.[3]

Nike and Xbox both have two separate accounts on Twitter, each with its own distinct purpose: a main account used for providing users with updates and for promotional purposes, and another dedicated solely to customer support. The alternate account allows consumers to ask questions or voice their complaints, and a dedicated team responds to all inquiries in a timely fashion. This inspires trust, helps resolve issues quickly and makes customers feel respected and appreciated.

As we have seen with celebrities like Kim Kardashian, who took social media by storm, it is also important to build a strong online presence on a number of different networks. Ms Kardashian is active on a number of social media networks, and posts diverse content on a regular basis. These accounts are populated with content related to all the different aspects of her brand personality – from fashion, to fitness and pregnancy topics. People can find updates about her daily life, beauty product reviews, and hear her opinions on current affairs and pop culture news.

As of late, a number of celebrities, including Howard Stern and Lady Gaga, have focused on creating unique media hubs for their brands.[4] These hubs are essentially websites, valuable brand assets controlled by the brand, that offer a behind-the-scenes look into their lives and allow these celebrities to post a large amount of exclusive brand collateral content, including videos, images, updates, guides, etc. Owning a unique platform like this enables brands to communicate with their consumers in a very direct manner.

3. Inspire Word-of-Mouth Marketing by Improving Customer Experience

A good way for a brand to differentiate itself is go above and beyond when it comes to providing the best customer experience. No one is perfect, small problems occur all the time, and customers can sometimes have complicated questions and unusual requests.

However, if you can effectively address all inquiries, and go beyond the call of duty when it comes to making your customer happy, you will gradually build a solid brand reputation with a strong customer base of brand ambassadors. Zappos is a great example of how a brand that focuses on exceptional customer experience and word-of-mouth marketing can become incredibly successful.

Of course, user experience is strongly influenced by the quality of your customer support, so your brand needs to invest in this aspect as well. Customers love to share stories of good customer service experiences on social media.

4. Make an Emotional Connection by Developing and Leveraging a Strong Brand Personality Relevant to Your Primary Customer

When we talk about your brand personality this is about developing the overall characteristics of your brand, what it stands for and the way it expresses itself through using a process called brand profiling. In conjunction with this overall concept you can also develop an actual character that expresses your ‘core brand personality, characteristics and values’ by using a character that’s representative of your brand.

Quaker Oats had great success promoting their Cap’n Crunch brand online several years ago, and it was in part due to their consistency in portraying the Cap’n. His unique personality and vocabulary were a relatable extension of the brand used to express of the overall brand characteristics and values, and all faithfully represented in every Tweet. [5]

The Quaker Oats social media team did a good job of consistently staying ‘in character’ using a ‘brand voice’ that appropriately expressed their brand, and the mascot of their brand in the form of Cap’n Crunch, all of which regularly engaged their followers successfully. They provided insights into their mascot character’s past, asked and answered questions, and even had some fun during the “International Talk like a Pirate Day” by voicing Crunch’s disdain for pirates.

This strategy enabled their brand to stay relevant, accumulate over 40,000 followers on Twitter, and connect with their audience on an emotional level. Past research has shown that consumers who feel a strong emotional connection to a brand are far more likely to develop a high level of trust in the brand, which leads to long-term commitment.

One of our key objectives when working with our clients is to develop a deep rooted understanding of their customers, particularly in terms of their needs, wants, loves, hates and aspirations using tools such as brand audit health checks, research and buyer personas. It’s only when you really understand your primary audience that you can develop a solution that meets and exceeds their needs emotionally, functionally and rationally. If you don’t address all these key ingredients through your brand profiling, brand strategy and brand collateral you’re unlikely to succeed long term or achieve the necessary brand loyalty required for your brand growth and success.

5. Reach out to Influencers

Influencers with a large active social media following can become incredibly potent brand ambassadors, as their audience places great trust in their opinion. In fact, research has shown that an astounding 92% of consumers focus primarily on referrals coming from someone they know, and in 81% of cases these referrals where found on the web. A few lines of text praising your brand from a social media influencer with a large and loyal following can garner a lot of positive attention. In a sense, reaching out to an influencer can be likened to hiring a spokesperson who is willing to work pro bono. However, in addition to having a reputable voice to spread the word about your company, back and forth communication with influencers enables a brand to convey genuine authenticity.

Image via www.blogkissmetrics.com

When an audience knows that the ‘spokes’ person, be it an actress or a renowned blogger, isn’t motivated by financial gain, the brand mentions and endorsements on social media are a lot more natural and respected. We can turn to Cap’n Crunch for some excellent advice once more – when famous rapper Ice T tweeted about having the Quaker Oats cereal for breakfast, the Cap’n immediately responded by thanking him for choosing “his” cereal and showing support.

This, in turn, lead to another tweet from Ice T, where he expressed his excitement about being contacted by the Cap’n himself, which was retweeted a large number of times by both the rapper’s and the brand’s followers. Something as simple as this can generate a good deal of social media buzz, and help a brand earn some additional credibility and acquire new customers.

However, you do need a comprehensive brand strategy when reaching out to influencers, so feel free to utilise some of the basic tips outlined in the video bellow and give us a call or drop us a line.

• Rebranding Strategy: Why Your Rebrand Must Embrace Storytelling

• Brand Profiling: Top 6 Components to Creating a Strong Brand Personality

• Brand Sponsorships: The Best Brand Ambassadors Are Already On Your Payroll

• Brand Management: Top 10 Tips for Managing Your Brand Reputation

• Brand Differentiation: 30 Ways to Differentiate Your Brand

• Brand Voice: Differentiating Through Your Own Brand Language and Attitude

• Humanizing Your Brand : Why It is Key to Commercial Success

So, what do you think?

• Have you developed and leveraged a strong brand personality that stands out or a clear antagonist?

• Is your brand approachable on social media and do you answer your customers questions?

• Have you identified what really matters to your customers and what’s your brand doing to create an emotional connection with your target audience? Do you need to give your brand a health check on its performance?

• Have you identified who would be relevant influencers within your brand sphere and made an effort to reach out to those influencers to build social connections?

[1] Alex Lawrence, Forbes, Five Customer Retention Tips for Entrepreneurs, November 2012

[2] Tamara Rutter, USA Today, “Why Tesla has the most loyal customers”, September 2014

[3] Brittney Helmrich, Businessnewsdaily.com, “10 Companies That Totally Rock Customer Service on Social Media”, December 2014

[4] Brooks Barnes, nytimes.com, “Coming Soon: Celebrity Web Networks From the Media Company Whalerock”, February 2015

[5] Socialmedia.org, Quaker Oats: Hitting the High Seas of Social Media, presented by Barbara Liss, September 2011, https://vimeo.com/29063976

Video Brand Strategy: Top 11 Tips for How and Why You Need to Use Video

September 16, 2015/0 Comments/in Brand Champions, Brand Strategy, Branding, Business, Video, YouTube /by Lorraine Carter

The Romans said, “Veni, vidi, vici,” meaning “to come”, “to see”, and “to conquer”. Two millenia later we say, “Video, video, video” in conquering digital marketing frontiers. Your brand’s one, three and five year brand strategy plans should reflect the fact that video content is an increasingly a powerful, indeed essential tool for both small and larger businesses.

Image via Google / YouTube

Orabrush is a great example of how a small start up brand can capitalize on video to achieve outstanding results. They’ve built a small brand from humble beginnings to worldwide distribution using YouTube videos exclusively. In fact they’ve had more online viewers then P&G Crest and every other brand in the oral healthcare sector combined!

If that’s peaked your curiosity then you might want to checkout some more of our key insider tips and brand strategies below for promoting and growing your brand using video.

1. Video is Increasingly Essential for Search Rankings

Remember, Google owns YouTube, so YouTube videos rank high in Google search results and help your brand’s authority for better positioning in internet searches. Smaller brands and newer websites can rank higher on YouTube than on Google, which is no small thing, since YouTube is the world’s second biggest search engine, above Bing and Yahoo.

At the same time, YouTube is the world’s third largest social network, behind Facebook and Twitter. Bottom line, YouTube is an awesome boost for your brand’s profile on the web and an essential part of your brand strategy.[1]

The icing on the cake? Seven in 10 people said they view brands in a more positive light after seeing interesting video content.[2]

2. Long Live Video!

Among the knock-your-socks-off statistics in circulation, research from Salesforce[3] indicates that:

The average consumer spends 88% more time on content with video

People are five times more likely to click on content that contains video

Video is shared 1200% more times than links and text combined

A landing page with video gets 800% more conversion than the same page without video

Video will be 74% of all consumer internet traffic by 2017, up from 59% in 2012

The average lifespan of a video is four years

More than 50% of smartphone video viewers use video to help them make product decisions[4]

Image via www.salesforce.com

3. Social Media Platforms Support Video

Done right, video can be accessible, fun, fast, distinctive, different, memorable… and affordable… as a way to reach new and existing customers. In short, the research indicates that video drives engagement, and we already know that engagement drives sales.

A proliferation of startup platforms dedicated to video have sprung up: Snapchat, Vimeo, Vine, Meerkat and Periscope. Older platforms once devoted to photos have now enhanced with video capability; Instagram and Pinterest make it easy to post and share, allowing smartphone users to record video, upload it or stream it live. Other established platforms such as Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn have introduced video content to their publishing capabilities.

The video leader is indisputedly YouTube. As of 2014, 900-plus YouTube channels had at least a million subscribers each. While the video sharing giant has already turned 10, there’s no question it will be a sensation in its second decade.

4. Yes, Video is ‘Affordable’

The key ingredient of great video content is authenticity, not expensive production techniques. When business owners and their enthusiastic customers speak directly to audiences, the personal authentic connection a brand makes outranks flashy filming, casting and costly voiceovers.[5]

5. Best Practices for Small Budgets

We collected 5 top video tips from a few experts:

Timing is critical and 60-120 seconds is ideal. – Filmmaker Peter Bragiel, In Transit, Los Angeles

Create a bank of photos and videos — they don’t evaporate as quickly as some content does. – Andrew Smith, Chief Funster for Tourism Australia

Don’t be intimidated by the process; you don’t have to be an expert. – Susan Wilson Solovic, best-selling author of “It’s Your Biz”.

For inspiration, look at your top 10 Google searches and answer those questions with your video. – Shaun Aukland, Google, San Francisco

Too much to cover? Break it up into several bitesize videos. – “It’s So Miami” by the Greater Miami Convention & Visitors Bureau

6. “How To” Videos are the Most Popular

Perhaps you recall the old jokes about pitches and promises made by used car salesmen. Now, the rules of the game have changed and hard selling is a car crash waiting to happen. Today’s best practice in content marketing is to bring your brand to life, be authentic, tell a story and share inside tips. Avoid a sales pitch. Explain how to do something.

Searches for ‘How to’ videos went up 70 percent in the first quarter of 2015, according to Google.[6] They’re the best way to share useful information with viewers, which they will be more likely to share with others. Imagine if the used car salesman were to create a video explaining the best way to wash a car or to maintain interior leather seating…that’s the kind of video that will attract views, interest followers, build your reputation and increase customers.

Case Study: How To Tie a Bowtie

When Columbia, South Carolina wanted to promote to holidaymakers, they targeted the destination wedding market. Instead of featuring brides and grooms in wedding venues, the visitors bureau created a how-to video on bow tie instructions that has attracted more than 3.1 million views on YouTube. As the number one instructional video on the subject, they have produced an evergreen video with an astronomical return on investment, and never ending shelf life.

7. Aim for Shareable Videos

You want people to share your video for the widest possible reach, so knowing what to put in and leave out is important.

What are the top three factors that make a video shareable?

Creative directors say:

1) The Unexpected – Show the audience something they didn’t fully plan to see. ‘Surprise and delight’ isn’t new, but it is golden.

2) The Cool Factor – What does sharing this video say about the person who shares it? Does it make them feel like an insider, does it make them come off as a boring professor or does it show them off as the life of the party?

3) The Emotional Quotient – Pulling at the heart strings works, but funny is far more shareable.

Image via Google / YouTube, Think with Google

Case Study: Volkswagen Passat Old Wives’ Tales

When Vokswagen wanted to overcome objections to diesel vehicles, they came up with this brilliant campaign of six falsehoods shot down by three octagenarians. Here’s one:

8. Bring Testimonials to Life

Those written testimonials on your website are great. Turn them into a video by inviting customers to upload videos of themselves using your product or services. Alternatively, interview people at your place of business. There are lots of directions you can take this idea for brand evangelists-in-the-making, which has the built-in benefit of shareability by all those you feature.

9. Take Viewers Behind the Scenes

Film ‘A Day in the Life’ or introduce staff members or take a sneak peek into your warehouse. If you serve coffee, have the barista demonstrate making a cup. If you operate a nursery, make a video about propagation or seasonal window boxes. If you sell furniture, explain how to spot quality construction. Add the personal touch and help potential customers decide they’d love to do business with people like yourselves.

Case Study: It’s So Miami – South Beach

When the Greater Miami Convention & Visitors Bureau wanted to show off their city, they decided on locals for a look around. You won’t find a hotel lobby featured in this series covering real people in real neighborhoods. Take a moment to watch and listen to Morgan to experience what a day in the life of a South Beach local feels like. A caution to viewing audiences: it will make you jealous.

10. Position Yourself as an Expert

Use video to provide commentary on news or information about your industry to build your reputation as a thought leader in the space. Are you an estate agency? Talk about tips for selling a home. Are you a grocer or a restaurant? Demonstrate some great-tasting, nutritional recipes. Are you a fashion boutique? Illustrate the hottest trends for next season or how to update looks in your current wardrobe.

Image via Google / YouTube

11. Incorporate Music

Audio is 50 percent of your presentation, so use music to convey the mood you want your audience to feel so you sound as good as you look. We’ll help you with obtaining royalty-free music clips ready for use by small businesses. There’s no need to spend a bundle.

Case Study: Volvo Trucks Epic Split Feat by Jean-Claude Van Damme

As much as we admire this video, and with the deepest respect for both the feat and the 80 million views since 2013, this is precisely what your small to medium-sized company does NOT have to achieve. Watch it and marvel.

“Within five years, YouTube will be the biggest media platform of any, by far, in the entire world.” – Jeffrey Katzenberg, CEO of DreamWorks Animation at VidCon in December 2014.[7]

We’re here to help you with your video branding strategy and content creation.

• Is video a part of your short-term and long-term content brand strategy?

• Have you already created a YouTube channel for your brand?

• If so, does it need additional content and better attention for search engine optimization?

• Does your website have a video on the landing page, or one that needs a refresh?

• Would your staff love to get involved in a brand video and become one of your brand champions?

• Would you like us to show you how to create affordable video?

Feel free to share your thoughts in the comments, we’d love to hear from you.

[1] Juan Jose Mendez, “How to Make Your Video Rank Number One on YouTube (Case Study)” on JeffBullas.com

[2] Axonn Media (London), “Video in Content Marketing”,

[3] Salesforce, “7 Ways to Incorporate Video Into Your Marketing Campaign”, June 2015

[4] Google/IPSOS MediaCT, “Brand Building on Mobile” study February, 2015

[5] Chris Trimble, Axonn Media, The Guardian, July 30, 2015

[6] “I Want-To-Do Moments: From Home to Beauty”, Think With Google, May 2015

[7] The New Yorker, “Hollywood and Vine”, Dec. 15, 2014

Brand Sponsorships: The Best Brand Ambassadors Are Already On Your Payroll

September 8, 2015/0 Comments/in Brand Ambassador, Brand Champions, Brand Partnerships, Brand Sponsorship, Brand Strategy, Business, Customer Engagement, Online Marketing, Social Engagement /by Lorraine Carter

What is a Brand Ambassador?

Not everybody can be called the greatest tennis player of all time. However, with 17 Grand Slam trophies in a professional career beginning in the last century, Roger Federer has the most impressive endorsement portfolio in sports.

Image via www.moet.com ©Moet

His grace under pressure and winning smile positions him well for a brand ambassador role adding exponentially to his USD 93 million in prize money for hitting the ball. Luxury names like Moët & Chandon, Nike, Rolex, Wilson, Credit Suisse and others align their brands to Roger Federer’s brand for a win-win providing USD 40 million annually to the tennis star.

Brand Champions in the Workplace

The beauty of this strategy is its scaleability for small and medium-sized businesses. You don’t need a big budget to gain endorsements. As evidence, look around in any downtown — people are wearing T-shirts, caps and carrying totes emblazoned with corporate brands and college names.

Image via ©Stanford University Catalogue

The best and proudest brand ambassadors don’t cost millions; they’re on your staff. Frankly, no one is more invested in seeing the company successful and the brand well-liked than the people who work in its name.

Managing Brand Risk

The flip side, of course, is managing risk. Businesses of all sizes know that the impact of social media on a brand’s reputation is an everyday reality. As employees are sharing more and more online, the divide between our personal and working lives becomes ever more narrow. That’s all the more reason to nurture and protect your brand from the inside out.

You can probably name a handful of ways that you already strive to ensure that your employees are fully engaged as champions of your brand. It’s not too difficult to think of new ways all the time…in fact, your employees can probably make great suggestions, too.

Sharing is the Key – 5 Tops Tips to Developing Your Brand Ambassadors

Here are five no-cost and low-cost ideas borrowed from big brands for developing your employees as brand ambassadors. We think they go a long way for small- and medium-sized businesses. Training and sharing is integral to every brand strategy for developing and supporting your employees as the stellar brand ambassadors they should be — and would like to be.

1. Sharing Your Brand Story

Follow the example of Nokia in ensuring that new employees are onboarded with a welcome to the company that presents its proud history. Every brand has an inside story, even if it’s a newly founded enterprise and staff want to know about that history, rather than find it out at a trivia quiz night.

Nokia employees can answers questions like these:

Q: What is the first thing that Nokia manufactured? A: Rubber boots.

Q: When did Nokia sell their billionth mobile phone? A: In 2005 in Kenya.

Image via www.twitter.com

We realize that no customer will ask a Nokia employee for these random historical facts. Yet, they’re representative of the mindset at Nokia. Management educates employees about customer service policies, provides notifications about product rollouts and then shares the logon to Nokia’s customer-facing Twitter accounts as part of the company brand culture.

2. Management Shares Internal Communications

Engaged employees build strong brands. An employer who does a good job of keeping employees informed is one which deepens employee activism in a positive way, say 81 percent of employees surveyed by a leading global public relations agency, Weber Shandwick.[1]

Image via www.webershandwick.com

Employee brand activists defend their employers against criticism, they visibly engage, they lean in both online and off. This is nothing new; it’s human nature. In a 2006 whitepaper produced for the Society for Human Resource Management, Robert J. Vance, Ph.D., states, “The greater an employee’s engagement, the more likely he or she is to ‘go the extra mile’ and deliver excellent on-the-job performance.”[2]

3. Employees Share External Communications

Ivory towers are so yesterday. The Weber Shandwick survey indicates that 21 percent of employees in companies of 500+ employees are brand activists. We can imagine how much higher that percentage may be in smaller companies. And importantly, customers like it that way.

As Eric Nystrom, director of social media and community at Dell points out, “customers are really interested in connecting with empowered employees who are the subject matter experts, not brand spokespeople or brand marketeers.”

Image via © www.dell.com

Even big brands with thousands of employees like Dell and Adobe are providing employees with a voluntary certification program to recognize them as qualified to engage in social media and community activites on behalf of the brand. The Dell Social Media and Community University creates brand ambassadors out of staff through value-added training courses leading to enhanced confidence and a consistent voice for the brand. What happened at Dell?[3]

• More than 16,500 Dell employees enrolled in 28 unique courses

• Since 2010, 8,800 employees in 55 countries have become certified

• Online negative comments about the brand dropped 30 percent

• Every day, 25,000 conversations about Dell take place

4. Sharing Between Personal and Corporate

Buy into the principle of personal plus corporate, not personal versus corporate. Your employees may wear a uniform like those working at the Apple Genius Bar and at Ritz-Carlton Hotels — but the individual must not be stripped of their own personality. “Think consistency, not conformity,” suggests a Forbes contributor to the leadership series.[4]

When it comes to making exceptions for outstanding employees, make them. And share that decision.

When Rocky Mountaineer head office found out that 19-year veteran train manager Janice Bondi was about to depart on a cross-Canada rail journey which meant missing a Mother’s Day tea at school with her 4-year-old, this is what they did about it.

5. Share the Two-Way Street

It’s great when you have incorporated these tips into your company brand culture. Remember, it’a a two-way street. What do your employees think? You’ll want to gather their suggestions — keeping in mind that a company-wide meeting in a formal setting isn’t necessarily the best way to do that. Consider a suggestion box, develop other channels, create an open door policy, recognize employees of the month, have a company day out and look into other ways that positively reinforce. There are lots of ways to develop and reward your brand ambassadors, beginning with asking what will resonate for them.

Image via ©Lindsay Bremner, flickr CC 2.0

• Humanizing Your Brand : Why It is Key to Commercial Success

• Brand Management: Top 10 Tips for Managing Your Brand Reputation

• CEO Brand Leadership: How Does Your Leadership Impact Your Brand?

• Rebranding Strategy: Why Your Rebrand Must Embrace Storytelling

• Brand Profiling: Top 6 Components to Creating a Strong Brand Personality

• Brand Voice: Differentiating Through Your Own Brand Language and Attitude

• Brand Differentiation: 30 Ways to Differentiate Your Brand

• Creating New Brands: Top 10 Tips for Brand Success

• Brand Audit: Tips for Determining Your Brand’s Health – Can it be Improved?

So, what do you think?

• Have you developed a first-day brand welcome and induction programme for your new staff?

• Do you have an employee recognition programme in place as part of your brand strategy? Is is congruent with your brand profile and culture?

• If so, is it one that employees are happy with or does it need brand revitalisation or tweaking?

• Are your employees empowered to use social media on behalf of your brand? Have you given them the requisite training and developed your brand policy and risk management strategy?

• Do you offer employees and family members cool looking branded T-shirts or other appropriate brand collateral they’re proud to use or wear?

• Do you have a suggestion box for employees and is their input actively encouraged?

[1] Employees Rising: Seizing the Opportunity in Employee Activism, Weber Shandwick, 2014.

[2] Employee Engagement and Commitment, Society for Human Resource Management, 2006.

[3] www.slideshare.net/dellsocialmedia/infographic-social-media-and-community-university-at-dell-24818308

[4] Three Steps for Transforming Employees Into Brand Ambassadors, William Arruda, Forbes

FMCG Branding: Going for Gold with Fast Moving Consumer Goods

March 5, 2014/2 Comments/in Brand Champions, Brand Culture, Brand Experience, Brand Loyalty, Brand Personality, Brand Promise, Brand Relevance, Brand Story, Brand Strategy, Brand Values, Branding, FMCG, Global Branding, Packaging /by Lorraine Carter

The fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) sector is one of the most volatile and toughest categories in which to succeed and sometimes considered the birthplace of modern branding. The competition has always been fierce and the fight for wallet share never more challenging then it is now.

Today’s FMCG industry is a multi-billion dollar sector that’s typically dominated by well-established household brands around the globe, from Coca-Cola to Kraft to Henkel. Breaking into that market as a new brand can be a serious challenge, particularly when you’re up against global powerhouses that have ruled their respective niches for decades with deep pockets. Having said that though, smaller brands have more opportunities to make their impact with limited resources than they ever had before, which helps level the playing field a little!

Image via www.kraftfoodsgroup.com

The question is how do you move from a ‘C’ or ‘D’ tier, largely unknown, consumer product to become a recognized household brand? Success in the FMCG sector is no longer epitomized by just ‘nice’ logos and good packaging alone—modern consumers expect far more.

The most successful brands are consistently creating an authentic customer experience around their consumable products, one that is worthwhile and personally engaging. These brands give their core target audience a more compelling reason to buy and create brand perceptions through their brands personality, promise, values, story and total brand world per se, which their customers find irresistible.

The following is an insight into what some of the most successful FMCG companies are doing to maintain consistently captivating brands. What keeps them front of mind in terms of customer preferences, and how you can incorporate these strategies into your own brand building efforts.

Aligning With And Focusing on Your Core Target Audience

While it may seem counterintuitive, the key to becoming a household brand is not to try appealing to a broader audience—it is to be desirable to the right core target audience. You need to know your market, your competitors, and your sector’s environment intimately, so you can focus on developing your branding strategy specifically tailored towards your primary customers – those who are most likely to buy fully into your brand and what it stands for.

Understanding not only what your ideal customers wants, but also how your offering can enhance their lives is hugely important. It’s only when you truly understand their needs, wants, loves, hates and aspirations that you can really craft a concise and focused brand message that cuts through the noise.

Consumers are bombarded with thousands of messages from multiple channels 24/7. Your challenge is to deliver the right message, on target to catch their much sought after attention, at the right time and then, most importantly, to hold their attention. You need to develop a customer avatar which you then use to underpin your brand proposition and profile.

Image via www.johnsonsbaby.com

Your brand should clearly indicate why and how you’ll meet your customers needs and that you understand what really matters to them. If yours is a family orientated brand then broadly speaking it might be important to communicate reliability, safety, and trust. However you need to dig deeper beyond just the general to the specific and identify more detailed characteristics to bring your brand alive in a way that’s meaningful, distinctive and different to your audience.

Millennials might enjoy quirky humor that helps mark your offerings as innovative but you still need to add something more unique to your brand story to help it standout and stick. Overall luxury brands focus on quality and prestige but they still need to develop other attributes, messages and stories that make their brand experience exclusive to them alone.

Developing Brand Loyalty

Returning customers are the heart of every successful company—and this is especially true in the FMCG sector where products are typically consumed quickly and frequently. Brand loyalty is critical to your long term success and you need to develop a brand strategy that helps ensure your customers become tunnel visioned with regard to your brand when they go shopping.

You want them to become blinkered to see only your brand offering so they buy it automatically because they aren’t even open to considering others. When you continue to meet their needs your loyal customers will not only continue to purchase your brand, they’ll become brand advocates encouraging family and friends to switch to your brand too.

How do you create brand loyalty? Many businesses make the mistake of trying to compete on price alone where only those with the deepest pockets can win. Customers aren’t necessarily looking for just the cheapest product. Cheap rarely engenders ongoing brand loyalty. Customers typically look for the right blend of quality and value, and many are willing to pay more for a brand they can trust and meets their needs on multiple other levels too. It’s also important to note that value doesn’t mean just price, it’s the complete mix of what the brand has to offer – your brand promise, brand values, brand culture, corporate social responsibility, customer experience, your way of doing things in your brand world etc. that collectively all add up to enhance perceived brand value.

One strong example of this is Johnson & Johnson, the global leader in baby care products. Johnson’s Baby has been helping parents and doctors give babies a healthy, happy start in life for more than 100 years – what a brand legacy. This company understands what its primary customers want – to give their babies a healthy, happy start in life because ‘every moment with your little one is precious’.

Saving money might feature somewhere in the mix with parents but babies health and happiness is the primary focus, and not at the expense of their child’s care. They are looking for products with safe, gentle ingredients, backed by a company that genuinely cares about the well-being of babies. Everything Johnson & Johnson does is done to reinforce that message, be it through the products themselves, its CSR strategy or advocacy in baby skin care or baby sleeping advice etc. This is an ethical, quality-focused ‘caring’ brand, successfully engaging its audience by pulling at the heart strings through all its communications strategies – which all but the cynical and hard nosed would find hard to resist.

Telling Your Brand Story in a Way That’s Relevant

Storytelling is more than just a buzzword. Creating authenticity with an emotional connection and an element of curiosity is very important to help distinguish your brand from the barrage of the external market. When you communicate your own brand journey, your growth and your message to potential customers, you’re able to connect with them on a more meaningful level.

The Askinosie chocolate brand story shows how its really important and worked for this relatively new confectionary company. Their target market consists of environmentally aware customers who typically shop in organic health food stores. Askinosie sets their brand apart through their packaging and their brand story which really resonates with their customers. Each of their chocolate bar wrappers relates personal stories about the cocoa farmers that supply the company with raw ingredients. The focus is on their relationship with Askinosie as business partners who are well compensated with prices that are higher than Fair Trade.

Image via www.askinosie.com

Great brand stories can help you elevate your products into the top tier and are a critical part of the successful brand mix and keep your customers coming back for more. A note of warning though – the brand values from your story and the promise it articulates must be consistently lived and demonstrated throughout the business at every level of interaction internally and externally every day.

Changing With The Times

The market is constantly evolving, and your brand must be flexible enough to keep up with the changing times. Successful FMCG brands understand how to recognize trends and implement shifts in strategy that will help them continue to stay relevant and meet market requirements over the years and decades.

Image via www.starbucks.com

Starbucks in spite of all its ups and downs has largely maintained a strong grasp of its market combined with a willingness to change, and has managed to remain one of the most recognized global brands. The Seattle-based company began as a local retail coffee store, and grew into a worldwide chain that caters to customers looking for an upscale coffee experience. By combining quality coffee with a diverse range of related products, a pleasant relaxing environment in which to enjoy their coffee and engaging with their customers more personally—and treating their employees better than other coffee chains—Starbucks has dominated its niche.

However, there is a fine line between staying relevant and incorporating new trends versus losing sight of what your brand really stands for by inadvertently ‘muddying the waters’ so to speak with an excessive plethora of confusing brand messages. You must always remain true to the core of what you stand for, whether yours is a well established brand or more recent launch to market.

Image via www.hersheys.com

Hershey’s has seen a decline in recent times compounded by overenthusiastic trend-chasing activities. In recent years, the company’s brand promise of simple, tasty chocolate has been lagging behind in their efforts to anticipate changing tastes. Extreme diversification has resulted in a confusing tangle of confectionery varieties: milk, dark, and white chocolate with a variety of fillings, coatings and new flavours—all of which is somewhat confusing in its marketing to customers who just want an original Hershey bar.

Developing Your Brand Message

Strong branding is a vital factor for long term success in the ultra-competitive FMCG industry. In order to create a strong and compelling brand message, you need to fully understand your target customers, including:

Who they are: Demographics, motivations, trends, and demands
Why they buy: Specific needs and wants (rational and emotional)
What they buy: The look and feel of the products they prefer
Where / how they buy: Channel preferences, point of sale activities
How they consume: Key usage situations for your products

Pinpoint your target audience, and develop your brand strategy to focus on the things that matter most to them. Transform your offerings into an experience that will keep your customers returning, and create brand ambassadors who will recommend you to like-minded customers. Focus on what helps elevate and grow your brand and your customer base will expand with you.

What do you think?

• How does your FMCG brand differentiate from your competitors?

• What message are you conveying with your brand? What should you convey?

• How can you tell the story of your brand more effectively?

• What steps are you taking to create brand loyalty?

• Has your brand evolved to stay relevant with the changing market—without losing sight of your core?

Brand Promises: Are You Consistently Delivering Yours?

February 20, 2014/0 Comments/in Brand Champions, Brand Experience, Brand Loyalty, Brand Personality, Brand Profiling & Positioning, Brand Promise, Brand Story, Brand Strategy, Brand Values, Brand Voice, Branding, Rebrand, Rebranding /by Lorraine Carter

A brand promise is what your company or brand commits to delivering for everyone who interacts with you. Your brand promise is a pledge, an assurance, or a guarantee that identifies what your customers can expect each and every time they connect with your company—whether it’s through your people, your marketing materials, or your products or services.

What makes a brand promise compelling? An effective brand promise must create distinction for your company’s offerings, and connect your purpose, positioning, and strategy. It must describe what customers can expect to receive beyond your product or service. It is more than a purchase—it is an experience, engaging your customers emotionally and allowing you to differentiate from your competitors. When working with our clients to help them develop their brand promise successfully we use our ‘Personality Profile Performer System™’.

Your brand promise presents a compelling reason for customers to buy from you, to return for repeat business—and most importantly, to become brand ambassadors, spreading the word about your company organically and enthusiastically.

Image via www.virgin.com

What Your Brand Promise Should (and Should Not) Be

Organizations often make the mistake of conflating brand promise with marketing. At one end, they may trot out clinically dry descriptions of products or services, on the premise that a brand “speaks for itself.” And on the other, they might make grand and ultimately meaningless statements, replete with abused superlatives such as “best practice”, “world class”, and “market leader.”

However, what truly works as a brand promise is not something in the middle, but rather a presentation that takes an entirely different approach to your offerings. A strong brand promise describes how people should feel when they interact with your brand, how your company delivers its products or services, and what sort of character your company embodies.

Image via www.nfl.com

To illustrate this idea in action, here are some powerful brand promises from highly successful brands:

The NFL: ‘To be the premier sports and entertainment brand that brings people together, connecting them socially and emotionally like no other’

Virgin: ‘To be the consumer champion while being genuine, fun, contemporary and different in everything we do at a reasonable price’

Apple: ‘To make insanely great, imaginative, cool, easy-to-use, cutting edge products that enrich peoples lives’

Coca-Cola: ‘To inspire moments of optimism and happiness’

Typically, a strong brand promise will achieve three key objectives:

It must convey a compelling benefit and emotionally resonate
It must be authentic and credible
The promise must be kept…every time

Any brand can create a compelling brand promise. However, the best and most successful brands will also demonstrate a proven track record of delivering on those promises. A powerful brand does not simply “talk the talk” — it “walks the walk,” consistently and reliably.

The Brand Promise At Work

McDonalds is the brand heard ’round the world. With over 33,000 restaurants in 119 countries, the company has to be doing something right—and the core of their success is their brand promise. They are the first job for many, involved with local communities and always seeking new ways to improve what they do best. When customers see the Golden Arches, they know what they can expect: simple, easy enjoyment with great service, cleanliness and value.

This is the brand promise McDonalds stands behind. Their more recent slogan, “I’m lovin’ it,” is a simple phrase in itself, one that can be translated easily within every international market the company serves. The McDonalds brand promise is effective, because the company consistently delivers uncomplicated fun with value and service to customer after customer.

Image via www.mcdonalds.com

Effective brand promises aren’t limited to the inexpensive and widely available, either. Successful luxury brands are also making a promise—that customers are paying a higher price, and in return receiving exceptional quality, value, and prestige.

European hotelier Kempinski has a stated purpose of “serving guests who expect excellence and value individuality.” As Europe’s oldest luxury hotel group and a five star prestigious brand, Kempinski promises more than lodgings—the company delivers an unforgettable experience for each and every customer by providing “luxurious hospitality in the grand European style.” They believe life should be lived with style!

Start Where You Want To End Up, and Watch Your Brand Take Off

If your brand is already successful, chances are you’re already clear on what you promise your customers—and you’ve managed to consistently keep your brand promise.

On the other hand, if…

You’re in the process of redefining a flagging brand
You haven’t started your branding process yet or developed a strong brand strategy
You want to know more about the reasons behind your successful brand, so you can maintain that success in the future

…then its time to conduct a brand audit, do a little research, and or re-evaluate your branding strategy.

It’s essential to define exactly what your brand promises to your customers. This process begins with research into your market, your target audience, competitors, and business environment. What do your customers really want? How are they getting it now—and how can your offering add even more value to those desires?

Your brand promise should deliver something your target audience really wants, but can’t get elsewhere. Remember, you’re creating an experience for your customers. When you define a unique brand promise first, and then consistently deliver, you’re making it easier for your business to keep that promise and realize branding success.

Earning Your Brand Promise

Once you’ve defined your brand promise, you need to focus on ensuring that you’re delivering on that promise—every time. Every aspect of your business should reflect what you stand for in your brand, from marketing to employee-customer interaction.

A brand that keeps its promises is virtually unbreakable. This is what kept Microsoft from knocking Google off the search engine throne with its “Bing It On” campaign, which attempted to convince consumers that real people choose Bing’s search results over Google.

The campaign failed to make a dent in the search engine giant’s market share—because Google’s brand promise is too strong. Their search engine consistently delivers what people want.

You Don’t Have to be Huge

Many smaller businesses make the mistake of thinking that only large corporations have the resources to consistently keep brand promises. The truth is, great branding is powerful enough to carry any business model successfully—when it’s done right.

Take, for example, The Ginger Pig. This London artisan butchery uses the brand promise of quality meats that taste great due to the care and effort they put forth in raising farm animals. The company emphasizes this brand promise through The Ginger Pig website, which opens with a brief and intriguing story about how they came to be—and their philosophy that well looked-after livestock simply tastes better.

Image via www.thegingerpig.co.uk

Is your company still looking for that perfect branding strategy? Prepare for success by taking the time to really think about your brand promise—and to ensure that you can, and do, deliver. Whether you’re a brand new start-up, a local supplier, or a national or global business, decide what will make your brand distinctive and memorable—something that’s worth talking about—and focus on delivering every time.

When you deliver on your brand promise, you build customer trust. This translates into brand loyalty that markets itself. Word-of-mouth, particularly through social media, will carry your brand promise to an ever-widening audience. As new customers realize they’re actually getting what they were promised, you’ll find more brand ambassadors out there recommending your offerings, all of which will help increase your profitability.

The earlier you establish and maintain your brand promise,

the more successful your branding will be.

What do you think?

How is your brand walking the talk?

Can a brand exist without brand promise?

Is your brand promising something you can’t deliver?

How can you communicate your brand promise to your customers?

Share your thoughts in the comments below, we’d love to hear from you.

Brand Story : The Key Ingredients to What Makes It Compelling

July 25, 2013/0 Comments/in Brand Champions, Brand Experience, Brand Story, Brand Strategy, Brand Values, Branding, Business /by Lorraine Carter

If you were asked to sum up your brand story in a valuable two minute radio sound bite or TV interview could you do it? If the answer is “NO” or you hesitate over your reply, then maybe its time to re-evaluate what your brand story is all about.

Is Your Brand Story

Worth Listening to?

Being able to succinctly articulate a compelling story around your brand, how it came in to being, what its all about, why it matters to your primary customers and where it’s heading into the future is crucial to your success. Stories connect people and your brand story is what gives it meaning and solidity, helps define its values, shapes its destiny and captures your customer’s imaginations, thereby attracting and engaging their ongoing interest.

A brand’s story isn’t a nice ‘add on’ for marketing purposes either. Rather it’s the foundations and inspiration for your marketing strategy – supporting the way you drive awareness and sales for your product or services and ultimately increase your business’s profitability and growth. The more compelling your story, the more powerful your brand.

A great brand story can be unifying (for both customers and stakeholders), motivating and inspiring for your teams internally and give the work they do more direction and meaning, thereby enriching the environment in which they work, all of which filters through to the experience your customers have with your brand through your front line staff – your brand ambassadors.

Brand stories are never static either, they continue to develop over time in order to stay relevant and respond to customer demands and ever changing market dynamics.

Image via Ben&Jerry’s

A great example, amongst many, of a brand with a very powerful story is Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream. The tale of two young men who were determined to set up a company which would embrace sustainability and share prosperity (with employees and stakeholders alike) and, incidentally at the same time produce amazing ice cream, all of which hooked the imagination of the US public. Their story then went global and the rest is history.

Ben and Jerry’s aim today, they declare, continues to centre around finding interesting and unusual ways to improve the quality of life for individuals, produce top quality all-natural, wholesome ice cream and respect the environment at the same time…

Back in the UK, the well-known healthy fruit drink brand Innocent had a great story which, crucially, captured not only the imagination of consumers but journalists everywhere. Three Oxford educated students who wanted to produce drinks which would boost the nation’s health using only natural ingredients went on to succeed where many others had failed.

Image via Telegraph.co.uk

Their commitment to their cause and brand ethos couldn’t be faulted. Their packaging was simple and amusing yet full of character – and their social media channels (they were early adopters) reflected the same brand story and personality traits too. They had energy, enthusiasm and innovative marketing techniques to capture their core audiences attention.

Interestingly their brand has been bought over by global giant Coca Cola yet that move hasn’t dented the brand’s success. Innocent still continues to sell under the ‘wholesome goodness banner’ brand story and to this day it still continues to resonate with their customers. The brand was powerful enough in itself that it didn’t matter who owned the company. Their brand ethos and customer base had already been established to such an extent that the smooth take-over was hardly noticed. The brand has become a living entity in its own right.

Historically Innocent’s engagement with consumers began even before they’d launched. Following a busy day selling fruit drinks at a festival, the three owners asked their customers there whether they thought they should start up in business. The rest is history and a very successful and profitable one at that.

Lego, another long established and much loved Danish brand, with a compelling brand story too used a series of amusing YouTube vignettes in their video The Lego Story which they used to re-tell their brand story when they celebrated their 80th anniversary last year. It tells of their inventor, the company’s values and the commitment to their product both in terms of quality and the education of children around the globe.

The story of women’s underwear brand SPANX is very much connected with its founder and owner, the former sales trainer and stand up comedienne Sara Blakely. Her story of being unable to find tights she liked, then inventing her own, resonates with every woman who has a bulge or two to hide (at least the first part does!). This ‘everywoman’ even had her mum draw the design for the original prototype.

Image via themagicknickershop.co.uk

Today, proceeds from every pair of SPANX sold go towards the Sara Blakely Foundation which helps women in underprivileged parts of the world start up their own businesses through education and entrepreneurship.

Some re-occurring themes, worth reflecting on when reviewing elements of your own brand story, have appeared in each of the powerful brand stories mentioned above – however they must be authentic and real!

Share what you care about to engage your audience emotionally
Localize wherever possible in order to speak directly to local communities and create engaging connections
Encourage individuals to make your brand their own and become your brand champions

When creating your own brand story, be absolutely clear on what you want to communicate and why it’s important to both you and your core target audience. This should centre on who you are, why you’re doing it, why it’s important – so customers care, and what differentiates your brand from your competitors. To be truly engaging it must evoke strong emotions in your audience and ooze personality!

Your brand story must consistently underpin everything you do within your business, be the filter through which all your communications and brand strategy flows, influence the way in which you interact with your customers and shape the experiences they have through every touch point of your brand.

What’s the ‘truth’ or ‘inspiration’ behind your brand story?

What’s significant about your brand story compared to your competitors?

Have you considered how to consistently communicate your brand story and brand values through your fully integrated brand strategy?

Socially Empowered Employees: Are They Key to Building Your Brand Online?

May 29, 2013/0 Comments/in Brand Champions, Brand Experience, Brand Reputation, Brand Strategy, Brand Voice, Branding, Business, Customer Engagement, Facebook, Google+, Integrated Marketing, Linkedin, Online Marketing, Pinterest, Social Engagement, Social Media, Twitter, YouTube /by Lorraine Carter

The demand for Community Managers has steadily increased over the last five years and, with the rise in social media as a business driver, it’s not hard to see why. As brands began waking up to the power of collaborating with online social communities, the role of the community manager was seen as the strategic backbone to a social business.

Community Managers not only manage the online voice of the brand through social networks, they are equally responsible for being the voice of the community to the brand. Their role combines building brand awareness, adoption and customer relationships through online conversations, with careful collection and analysis of customer feedback and online habits.

Some companies have been employing community managers for years, others are exploring it for the first time, but a trend is emerging that might make the current role of community managers slightly less significant.

Socially Empowered Employees

Big brands have become more noticeably proactive over the last twelve months in encouraging their employees to be active on their own personal social networks for the benefit of the brand (they are employed by). The theory behind the strategy is that every employee can become an ambassador for the brand. If you are asking why you would allow or encourage your employees to openly represent your brand, read on…

Top 5 Reasons for Leveraging Your Brand Through Your Employees Online

1. More Eyes, Ears & Hands

Online content that gains attention and drives traffic is hard to create. In many cases the best content just has to be done in the right moment. Look at what Oreo achieved by tweeting their Superbowl message at the just right time. Having one community manager limits the time and potential reach of your brand. There is not always time to seek approval or listen to the concerns and feedback if the responsibility is left to just one person and an opportunity can pass by within minutes. Empowered employees can not only represent the brand online, they can connect with customers at the right time and collectively build online communities that drive meaningful brand equity.

2. Humanize Your Online Brand

One of the most integral parts of social business are the employees in the company itself. In an offline world, employees often humanize the brand experience. They make the customers feel like they are doing business with someone they can relate to, and not just a company that wants their money. Having multiple online representatives extends the brand personality online and gives social business an authentic voice.

3. Trust Is The Real Social Currency

Trust is one of the hardest attributes to come by in the business world. Building strong relationships has become almost more important than transactional communication. If trust is the social currency of the social media age then building strong relationships between employees and the marketplace at large can make a real impact on sustainable sales. Employees who are empowered to represent the brand online can be valuable effective participants in building trust and enhancing brand image.

4. Your Online Brand Deserves A Real Voice

Authenticity and transparency are key to building a strong online representation of any brand. Using automated social media engagement tools instead of actually conversing with customers online can kill the value of social business and negatively effect offline sales. The benefits of socially empowered employees to represent the brand and act as brand advocates can’t be underestimated.

5. Your Employees Are A Reflection Of Your Company, Your Brand

If you are afraid of what your employees would say about you online then you need to question if the real problem lies not with the employees but with the company itself. Are there internal issues that would reflect badly on the brand? Have you a poor corporate culture? Are you hiring the wrong people? In that case the problem then is not what the employees might say, but what the company does.

Community Managers will still have a role to play in a future of socially empowered employees. Their guidance is needed to direct, measure and strategize how the general workforce is and should be using social media to reach the customer.

In order to achieve a tangible business objective, socially empowered employees need to be trained and motivated to represent the best interest of your brand online.

When this is achieved, employees who are trusted with the responsibility of your brand’s online reputation can create greater online content that inspires, that informs and that ultimately adds value to the conversation and consequently your brand. Mobilizing rather than muffling your employee’s online activity might be the key to growing your business in the year ahead.

• Have you considered how you could adapt and leverage your employees social reach for your brand online, within your social business or online marketing strategy?

• Do you need to audit your company’s social media policy and train your staff, with clear guidelines, in how best to represent your brand online?

Brand Heart: Are You Bringing Your Brand To Life In Your Work Space?

April 18, 2013/0 Comments/in Brand Champions, Brand Culture, Brand Experience, Brand Profiling & Positioning, Brand Values, Brand Voice, Branding, Business, Marketing /by Lorraine Carter

Hearing someone say they work at Google seems to have the same effect on every listener regardless of their industry background…Wow!

It’s a true testament to the Google leaders that they have created a reputation of being such a desirable place to work, but lets face it, it’s not just because of the type of work carried out there. With unique, fun, quirky, often bizarre office interiors, which include slides, video games and ski-gondolas, Google lead the way in a trend to change the traditional view of what a corporate office should look and feel like. There is method to the supposed madness.

Google, Facebook, Airbnb and so many of the newer global companies, along with a few of the longer established, understand that the culture and physical experience of your company is a huge part of your company brand. They understand that it is the people and living experience internally behind the brands that help to dictate how the brand is perceived externally.

An office is far more than walls, desks and computers. It’s a recruitment tool, a second home and a place to inspire those who work within. If a leader’s job is to get the best from their employees then part of that responsibility is creating a space that motivates people to make the most of shaping and growing their brand.

If you care about company culture and authentic brand experience then the office space matters. It is an important part of how the employee views their work. But flashy spaces, open plan offices and bean bags are not for everyone. A place without quite spaces can be just as ineffective as grey cardboard cubicles. There are certain elements however that will provide triggers to employees and customers alike about the company culture that may need to be addressed.

• Collaborative Space

You don’t have to be a creative company to have a need for a collaborative space. If people arrive into the office, go to their desk and stay there until the end of the day then the company is not maximizing the benefits that come from employee interactions between the company thinkers and innovators. A dedicated collaborative space that can be used for informal interactions can make employees more comfortable to contribute, to share opinions and develop new ideas.

• Brand Ambassadors

Employees are your brand ambassadors. Creating an office space that reminds them each day of what they and the brand are trying to achieve can be a powerful motivator.

• Reflect Your Core Brand Values

If sustainability is an important ‘value’ underpinning your brand, then this should be communicated using internal triggers as well as external communication. Using and promoting recyclable materials within the office for example ensures that those working to build the brand understand that the company genuinely believes and lives by the values they promote. You are authentically living that brand value and reinforcing it everyday in what you do.

• Recruit The Best

Google and Facebook offices are designed not only to serve current employees, but to attract the best talent. They use their office space to communicate the type of culture they promote internally and to attract ‘like minded’ people who can fit within that culture and become part of the brand family. Both understand the needs of the people that work for them and have been hugely beneficial to the organisation, as employees reciprocate with high levels or productivity and efficiency.

• Create Customer Cues

PR and advertising can support a strategy that communicates a brand’s vision and values, but that can be destroyed at the workplace if the office space doesn’t align with the promise of your brand message. If your brand communicates a sense of community or creativity, but your offices are comprised of people working separately behind closed doors what kind of message does this send to your customers? Internal triggers and experiences can make a significant external impact. Even reception rooms and meeting room names can tell a story that reflects the brand. Think about your customer’s brand journey. How would your offices influence the customer’s perspective and experience of your brand?

Company culture is not something that can be created from blueprints. It is something that is shaped by the people working within. Leaders can influence it, they can coax and enable the desired type of brand culture but even the well intentioned leader can inadvertently establish dysfunctional workplaces by creating a workspace that is at odds with the brand values and messages the employees are working to shape.

Google may have developed a reputation of a fun, goofy place to work, but what it really signifies is a deep understanding by its leaders, that the environment can play a significant role in creating the balance needed to promote problem solving and creativity in an industry that demands both.

If you can’t glean clues about the brand or the people behind it from walking in the door of the office you could be in trouble. Get your office ‘on brand’, and it could play a valuable part in supporting your innovation, productivity levels, marketing mix and consequently profitability coupled with long term success.

• What do you think of some of the world’s ‘coolest’ offices?

• How does yours compare? Is it ‘on brand’ or congruent with what your brand stands for?

• Does your office space encourage collaboration, innovation and creativity?

• Does your office space reflect your brand culture?

The Secret Way to Boost Brand Loyalty and Increase Your Profitability

January 3, 2013/0 Comments/in Brand Champions, Brand Loyalty, Brand Strategy, Branding, Customer Engagement, Innovation, Market Insights /by Lorraine Carter

Here is a question for you: how many loyalty cards do you carry with you in your wallet? If you are like us your wallet will claim loyalty to supermarkets, pharmacies, service stations, the local coffee chain…to name a few. The list of businesses offering loyalty schemes to customers seems to grow year on year, with brands working to increase repeat purchases and enhance customer brand loyalty.

As most of you are well aware, the cost of maintaining a customer is far less than the investment required acquiring a new one. The most valuable customers are not the ones that make the most expensive purchases but rather those that come back again and again over their lifetime. Loyal customers not only drive profitable returns, they are more likely to come to you, buy more often, try new products, recommend you to others, and become brand champions for your business.

Loyalty Schemes

When first introduced, loyalty schemes were intended to inspire customers to become truly loyal to a brand. It was presumed that rewards of discount, bonus points and special offers were enough to encourage repeat purchases from customers. It quickly became apparent however that customers carry multiple loyalty cards and simply collect rewards wherever they shop.

The true benefit of loyalty scheme cards lies in the valuable customer insights they offer businesses: who are the most profitable and least profitable customers, what do they most want and what changes or offerings would be most likely to make them truly loyal. However while the customer benefits from small discounts, traditional loyalty schemes on the most part fail to achieve their intended purpose of enhancing the customer lifetime value by creating a truly loyal customer.

The Secret Society

Cue the emergence of the ‘secret society’ customer loyalty schemes. How would you feel if you were one of the select few who knew about a secret pop-up-shop sale in a retail store? What if you were given access to stock that wasn’t available to the ‘average customer’ off the street?

Giving loyal customer’s exclusive access to items, menus, locations, particularly when they are not advertised to the general public not only develops fierce brand loyalty but also delivers a unique enhanced brand experience, at little extra cost.

Fast Food restaurants and coffee chains have long prospered by making their service a scripted experience, managing costs by offering customers a restricted menu option. Now what if we told you that McDonalds, Burger King, Subway and Starbucks were some of the many brands who have a secret menu known to only fraction of their customers?

These are not simply made-to-order items for the picky customer, these are a list of options known to staff which have been allocated valuable prep time, inventory management, and storage space to make sure they can serve the item. These secret items are based on loyal relationships between the brands and their regular customers.

In–N–Out Burger in the US is the most famous ‘outed’ secret menu story. The company always had a ‘desire to please its guests’ as a core value of the brand. When regular customers began ordering variations of the standard menu with such frequency that they were given names by the staff, the ‘secret menu’ was born.

The Secret Strategy of Special Treatment

The essence of the “secret” strategy is the word-of-mouth by regular customers. The item can’t be marketed through other means or it quickly looses its appeal. Customers like to feel that they have almost VIP access to things their peers cant get. They develop an affinity for the brand and are often willing to share their ‘insider’ information with a select friend who too will be eager to claim access to this secret society of special customers. Nothing boosts loyalty like a little special treatment.

Big brands such as Starbucks can handle when their secret menus are shared publically. Once the item is not on the menu and the majority of customers are not aware, loyal customers still gain a sense of exclusive treatment. The brand benefits from greater customer awareness of the ‘secret’ menu because it lends a fun or intriguing element to the brand image. For smaller brands, having a more tightly guarded secret offering could inspire prolonged loyalty from valuable customers in the know.

Reward your loyal customers with access to special offerings. Make the offering worthwhile; something they want based on their purchase history. Remember, it should be a bonus not a burden for the customer; do not require them to fill in forms etc to gain access. Knowing what to ask for should be enough.

When you let your loyal customers in on the secret make sure they know its not for everyone, but not so much of a secret that nobody knows; while keeping the secret offering to a select few is necessary for its success, the more people in the select group the more loyal customers you develop for your brand.

• Could a secret offering boost brand loyalty with your customers?

• Could a little mystery enhance your customer’s brand experience?

• How could you introduce ‘secret’ rewards for your ‘loyal’ customers as party of your brand strategy in the year ahead?

Celebrity Brand Endorsement: 7 Tips to Getting it Right

October 12, 2012/0 Comments/in Advertising, Brand Champions, Brand Sponsorship, Brand Strategy, Brand Values, Celebrity Endorsement /by Lorraine Carter

Michael Jordan and Nike, Michael Jackson and Pepsi, Jennifer Lopez and Venus. For decades now branding giants have paid big bucks to get celebrities to endorse their brand and it’s not hard to see why. It can be a critical and very profitable part of your brand strategy.

From winning athletes to global superstars of the entertainment industry, the use of celebrities as brand ambassadors offers significant advantages to a company.

Celebrity endorsement is concerned with the strategic alignment of the celebrity brand and the marketing brand. A celebrity brand spoksperson can attract attention and generate emotional affinity with the brand in a way that may not be possible with traditional advertising.

A well-matched celebrity endorsement partnership can benefit the brand when the target audience transfers their admiration for the celebrity onto the brand, thereby allowing it influence their purchase decision making process.

As well as influncing the bottom line, aligning the brand with celebrity gives the brand greater access to more fans. The wider the fan base the larger the spread of the marketing message and the increased profitability of the brand.

7 Essential Tips to Getting the Right Celebrity Brand Match

Celebrity Brand Mismatch

In the same way brands develop a perceived brand image within their market, celebrities develop a public persona based on their professional achievements and public behavior. The closer aligned the brand image and celebrity image the better the return on investment of the celebrity endorsement.

Using a celebrity who’s public image, or what they stand for, which is incongruent or does not align with your brand’s message/image and what it stands for, will cause confusion and largely do more harm than good.

Damage to Reputation

The danger of using celebrities to endorse your brand is that any discrepancies in their personal life can damage the reputation of the brand. Celebrities as brand ambassadors should be looked upon as role models or inspirational people for your customers.

In associating your brand to the celebrity it is intended that their positive public image is reflected on to your brand. An athlete who tarnishes their reputation by using drugs instantly strips value from any brand they were endorsing. Tiger Woods lost millions in sponsorship deals when brands were quick to disassociate with him after his marital indiscretions.

Brands Like Winners

Sporting heroes are admired because of their talent and performance. They are desirable brand ambassadors as they inspire audiences and positively influence purchase decisions, as long as they are winning…

There is a risk to brands when investing in a sporting partnership in case the athlete is ‘off form’ or performs poorly. The value of the sports celebrity to the brand is only as valuable as his or her performance in the field. The ROI often lies in the amount of media coverage they receive. A player who is not getting the pitch time offers little value to the brand.

Personality is also a factor. If the athelete is lacking in the personality stakes then they are of little value as a brand representative at consumer-facing events or brand-focused media activity.

According to a national survey, Brian O’Driscol is Ireland’s most admired sports personality, favoured by one in four irish adults. It is a combination of his performance on the field with his personality off the field that makes him appeal to consumers and the brand alike.

While the use of celebrity endorsers has been shown to improve brand recall, increase brand awareness and help develop brand image, the cost of signing up strong celebritiy role models as brand endorsers is often prohibitively expensive to small business.

Even by Irish standards, IRU players can command €10,000. for a single corporate appearance, never mind the cost of exclusive brand partnership deals. There are however a number of ways to align your brand with a celebritiy ambassador without bursting your budget

Gifting

If you have identified a celebrity that fits with your brand identity and can increase your market penetration or reach with your target audience then gifting your product to that celebrity may be a way of gaining greater exposure for your brand.

Neff Headware is now popular street wear among snowboarders, surfers and other boarding customrs. Unable to pay for celebrity endorsement in their early days the company sent their merchandise to up and coming influencers in the sport. When the audience began seeing the brand being worn by their sporting idols the demand for the brand sky-rocketed with the company enjoying a 300% increase in revenue over the last 3 years.

Equity

There is a growing trend of getting aspirational celebrities on board as brand ambassadors by offering them an equity stake in the company. This allows the company to land high profile endorsement while maintaining cash flow. Furthermore, the celebrity has an incentive to continue their association with the brand and continue to offer promotional support.

Influencers

Traditional celebrity endorsers were those that had wide audince recognition and influence. Some of the biggest influencers of the 21st centuary come not from entertainers and athletes but from those with a large online following.

Frequently bloggers have as wide and significant a reach as traditional celebrities and demand fees of far less to promote a brand. By redefining ‘celebrity’, brands can harness these people with an engaged internet following and use their online voice to fuel marketing campaigns for the brand.

Charitable Causes

Many celebrities rely on sponsorship to suplement their salary. Therefore remaining relevant and maintaing a positive public perception is equally important for their earning potential.

Celebrities that have had their reputations tarnished in some way often look to improve their public image by being associated with charities and non profits. Small companies can use cause marketing to find common ground with potential customers. For every pair of TOMS shoes purchased, the company gives a new pair of shoes to a child in need. This makes the brand attractive to celebrities in public disrepute.

Celebrity endorsement is not for every brand but it certainly broadens the potential customer reach for those that find a suitable celebrity match.

• Have you considered if your brand is suitable for celebrity endorsement?

• Does your brand strategy include elements that would be attractive to a potential celebrity ambassador?

• What do you think of celebrity brand endorsement?

Drop us a line we’d love to hear your thoughts.