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August 28, 2006
The New Language of Branding: Can we (Pillow) Talk?
As the importance and power of brands continues to creep up the scale of corporate awareness, marketers are scrambling to find ever more evocative (scratch that: make it “provocative”) ways to describe the relationships that the buyers of products and services have with brands. I grant you, we agency and consulting types are doing a great job confusing marketers. Now they can’t focus on driving sales through the door until they figure out how to make a “Lovemark.” Customer intimacy is more important than customer relationships, and those are pretty important too.
Throw emotional contagion into the mix, and we’re going to brand-based STD’s next… (are phishing and pharming the equivalent?) Maybe it’s a little too much to ask, but I’m a little uncomfortable with this kind of language. Love, Relationships and Intimacy. Call me old fashioned, but these are all just new ways to describe the same old thing: Build a product that solves a need. Support it with honesty, integrity and quality, and make sure you respond quickly to customer needs. Make sure your market knows that you do this.
I mean no offense, but let's save the sweet nothings for our wives, husbands and significant others. When I want this kind of involvement, I know where I’d rather look to find it.
Comments (0) | Posted by at 11:08 AM | Permalink
August 18, 2006
A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words. Isn’t it?
We’ve heard this for so many years that it seems like it must be true. Homilies, old wives tales, The Farmers Almanac. Yup, good stuff. So when it comes to branding, we think the answer is… yes… sometimes. Certainly there are reasonable arguments for this – and virtually any other popular position. According to Allen Adamson of branding giant Landor Associates. “Visual prompts make it possible to capture an idea so precise in intent it can unite and drive all brand actions and communications.”
In his article Traditional Brand Positioning Can't Last, Adamson waxes eloquent on the subject: “If you look up and see rafters, consider a bit of visual positioning. What you'll discover as you look and learn is that you can't really say what you mean about your brand until you can see what you mean.” Adamson visualizes a drive through (now highly-developed) Colorado, seeing thousands of identical rooftops. “In order to position your brand above the vast see of rooftops, one cannot merely string Hemingway like sentences along a product; one must visually capture the essence of what your brand breathes.”
Yes, brands are driven by pictures. Emotive, captivating, exhilarating, and more; depending entirely on your brand’s position. The fact is, brands are driven by words and experiences as much as – if not more than – pictures. It’s driven, in short, by anything that will help your audience (a marketing speak way of saying your customers, your prospects, employees and investors, in one short word) “connect” with your organization.
To be honest, I kind of wish he’d used a picture for this article instead of all these “Hemingway-like” sentences. I mean, I’ve been reading this stuff (along with student essays) for years. Deep stuff. But don’t forget: Brands also have to get to the point…..
Comments (0) | Posted by at 9:14 AM | Permalink | TrackBack
August 2, 2006
Rage: A New Brand Attribute?
Outsourcing certainly has its proponents as well as its foes. But with call center interaction being such a critical Touchpoint in the overall “post-purchase” customer experience, it pays to understand your customers’ hot buttons.
Apple, Dell and other technology companies are routinely vilified for the abhorrent quality of their outsourced call centers. And it gets worse: as this article from the San Francisco Chronicle points out, call center employees are regularly abused themselves. As a woman from Texas recently told 22 year-old Saurabh Jha – thanks to outsourcing, "You are getting money, food, shelter. You should be starving."
Nobody wants customers like this. But face it. If these are your customers, you need to know what’s driving them. Forcing callers to India and elsewhere, when rage against outsourced tech support or an inability to listen to anyone with a foreign accent is a driving emotion, will kill your satisfaction levels and negatively impact your brand. Psychographic and demographic research can help you segment based on attributes other than recency, frequency and zip code. No, this is NOT a red state/blue state issue, it’s an issue of understanding your customers and what the hard and soft drivers of brand loyalty are. (Hint: Rage at your outsourcing policies does not engender strong loyalty. Maybe somewhere in Alberta is a better choice…?)
After all, if someone is predisposed to get angry easily, they’re going to do it no matter what. You just want to make sure it’s directed at someone else.
Comments (0) | Posted by MCorp. at 8:12 PM | Permalink | TrackBack