To be successful in today鈥檚 business environment, modern brands must focus on their perception among consumers. This perception points to the brand鈥檚 energy, which drives outcomes that stimulate positive customer behavior that benefits the company in both the short term and the long term. The best way to harness a brand鈥檚 power and energy is to appeal to and then activate your target market鈥檚 emotions. From there, marketing teams should engage in brand tracking measurements to steer the campaign towards success and ROI.
To satisfy all the demands of their unified marketing strategy, CMOs need to lead from the front. To better understand what makes a brand valuable and resonate with customers, modern brands need to fulfill a few essential components of brand value:
For today鈥檚 consumers, trust is at an all-time low. Due to concerns regarding privacy and data security, public expectations for brands to be trustworthy have shifted 250 percent - a huge outlier from previous years where these expectations typically creep up by 25 percent or less. Its clearer now more than ever that trust connects the brand to customer loyalty. Breaching a customer鈥檚 trust can be hugely detrimental to success, but properly recognizing and reacting to this need for trust can prove to be an amazing opportunity to grow awareness and loyalty. In today鈥檚 environment, customers don鈥檛 want to buy what you do 鈥� they want to buy why you do it.
To seize this opportunity, your organization should focus on building brand trust. Interacting with customers on social media is no longer enough 鈥� brands must now focus on creating a believable brand character with strong values. These values should help orient your organization around emotional thinking, which will speak to their subconscious and allow a greater connection. To facilitate this kind of thinking, mix emotional equity frameworks with statistical analysis of your target market. Once the correct brand personality has been determined, distill your brand data into a simple story. For example, YETI has strong customer loyalty with hunters, tailgaters, and beach goers alike by touting an image of ruggedness, quality, and an unbridled love for the outdoors. When deciding which story is best to tell, be sure to engage in brand tracking to measure what is and isn鈥檛 working. Don鈥檛 forget to utilize person-level data to ensure you鈥檙e targeting the right people in the right way. This will help your organization create strong brand energy which can protect against competitor pressure and result in tangible financial returns.
To communicate your brand鈥檚 values, your organization must show 鈥� not tell 鈥� their customer that they have the customer鈥檚 best interest at heart. There is no better team to facilitate this trust-building mission than your organization鈥檚 front-facing customer service teams. The best brands in today鈥檚 business environment are able to work towards customer interests while delivering empathetic service. Their personnel are friendly, helpful, and properly represent the brand鈥檚 image. By empowering your customer service teams to be helpful, friendly, and foster a customer-first attitude, your customers will be more likely to look forward to engaging with your brand in the future.
An example of this is . Conventional marketing knowledge will tell marketers that the bottom line of all business is turning a healthy profit. Southwest Airlines has a different perspective, as they believe that profit is the byproduct of exemplary customer service. Meanwhile, some of their competitors that focus on efficiency have a brand image bogged down by public relations scandals. By giving customers an airline experience that is centered around them, Southwest Airlines establishes intense customer loyalty. As a result of this loyalty, they can continue to focus on the customer鈥檚 needs as a selling point, instead of focusing on undercutting like some others in their industry.
To build brand value, it is vital that your organization participates in all three of these priorities. However, determining whether or not your brand strategy is effective demands a strong, metrics-based approach to brand tracking. A brand tracking initiative should use marketing attribution to track brand perception, and determine how these perceptions impact brand equity and lead to conversions. Once these metrics have been analyzed, your organization will be able to continuously identify where strategy can be optimized 鈥� providing a competitive advantage in your industry.