We all love to use marketing buzz words like brand marketing, brand strategy, and delivering on our brand promise. As a marketer, I am always cautious when using these words because they are not to be taken lightly. With the use of these marketing terms comes a tremendous obligation. If we are to take our responsibility, in practical terms not just conceptually, to our company, our employees and our stake holders seriously we must strive to excel all expectations and be true to the meaning of these terms.
Unfortunately, many times we as leaders develop, unconsciously, our own definition of these words and we become satisfied that we are optimally executing because we have (across the organization) adopted the buzz words in our everyday speak. (Say it often enough and we believe that we are doing it).
In many of our businesses we are actively and consistently developing our brand image and hopefully evolving through engagement with our customers. Engagement through all kinds of different formats (i.e. Circulars, customer service, social media, website, community involvement) is one thing but measuring and tracking the results are totally different.
We have to be able to track, evaluate and course correct all along the way for our entire relationship with the brand. Yet, how many of us have tracking tools that we don't believe or at the very least don't review on a consistent basis and/or use as an indicator to tweak our plan? (Think of that last project where you didn't believe the numbers and put your own spin on the data).
Make a promise to be faithful to your brand by:
Not being superficial when exploring all of the brand marketing options
Develop non-conventional ways to get to your end game
Examine and re-examine the data for what it is performance of your brand!
Be open to the data and don't put "your" spin on the numbers
Be honest - if it's not making sense then the approach probably isn't right; dump it and move on
Don't get blindly vested where you can't change course
Yes, when we're not faithful to our brands we are cheating on them - plain and simple. If we are true to our brands, customers will respond with loyalty and yield good returns.
Sonya Ruff Jarvis, is the Managing Member of Jarvis Consultants and Founder of the eRetailer Summit. Sonya has extensive experience in creating original innovative solutions to overcome major business challenges. Sonya has spent most of her career visiting headquarters across global industries and has built strong business relationships across diverse brands.
Sonya has a M.B.A. in Marketing. She is married and has a daughter and they live in Fairfield County Connecticut.