Love thy brand!

February 4, 2016

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A packhouse manager in a plant rejected a freshly delivered packaging material due to ‘imperfect’ printing. When asked ‘why?’ – he remarked ‘if the product goes in that packaging what will consumers think. Won’t it affect the brand’.

Long back, a car manufacturer’s shop floor employee stopped by the road and asked the driver of a parked car manufactured by his company, feedback on the driving experience. He wanted to make sure that consumers love the car and if there is a feedback, it would be great to get it first-hand.

As someone said, only when employees love the brand the consumers will. Truly enough! Brand building and brand following should really start at home. For me the true test of a brand, beyond all the Brand Index scores is how much the company’s own employees believe in it, live its values and preserve it. This is not the job of Marketing & Sales only. Every employee right from the shop floor till the CEO has to be a ‘brand ambassador’. The passion to preserve and promote the brand should be visible in whatever they do. Then and only then, we can truly expect our channel partners and our consumers starting to trust the brand.

The key question is how can you do that? Like most things – there is no magic pill. In fact, it is hard and a continuous exercise.

Firstly involve employees from across functions & hierarchy levels to be a part of the brand building exercise – right from the point of deciding what the brand should stand for and its promise. The promise that we will communicate will have to be delivered eventually by every employee of the company. Hence having a stake in deciding it creates natural buy-in. Involving them in crafting of the brand communication message is also helpful.

Launch any new brand campaign/communication internally first. If you have multiple sites, do internal roadshows at each site. Go around – share with all employees about the campaign. Give them simple messages and communication points. Ask them to talk to their friends, relatives and to even stores in their areas. We pay millions of dollars to media vehicles to create a buzz for the brand. However, we completely overlook the biggest media vehicle – the 1000s of employees within our own company – and this is often free. With the proliferation of social media, these 1000s can reach millions of people themselves, creating a network effect. Remember, when employees talk about the brand it generally appears more sincere than a paid advertisement in some top magazine or channel.

After extensive communication within the company, call employees to join external road shows to channel partners, retailers and even consumers too. Seeing a senior company official, a Plant Manager or even a person from a support staff delivering the key brand messages shows the confidence, solidarity and trust in one’s brand. Consumers are smart these days and they can quickly see that. Having key plant team members even visiting the stores or construction sites (like the employee of the car manufacturer) can even create heightened awareness within the company on what the consumer on the ground is thinking. There is nothing like receiving a first-hand feedback from customer – as there is no bias, twisting of stories and no hidden agenda.

As each employee starts believing in the brand and more importantly, starts living it day in and day out in whatever she/he does, you will quickly see those Brand Index scores and even Customer satisfaction ratings going up.

So for your next brand campaign, before you decide to burn millions of dollars on advertisement, just burn some calories and midnight oil in planning on how to involve the employees to make them your best brand ambassadors.

Contact @marca if you want to build a simple and practical approach to launch your brand ambassador initiative.

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