Re: Branding and marketing

From: Kristin Zhivago <kristin_at_zhivago.com>
Date: Wed 27 Dec 2000 12:39:02 -0500

Re: Bob Rios' request for ideas about branding:

McKenna's comments on infrastructure and access are
valid. Seybold's comments on the customer's experience
are valid.

However, when you're building a business or trying to
convince your CEO to do the right thing, it is
essential to boil the branding issue down to personal
accountability. This is something that
anyone--regardless of their background--can understand.

Because, in fact, every customer who interacts with
your company--in whatever media/form/vehicle--is just
one human being, having a personal experience with your
company, at that moment. Your company either responds
appropriately or it doesn't, as the interaction
unfolds. Your website, for example, acts as a personal
representative for your firm. As the customer asks
questions and pursues goals, is that rep helpful or
arrogant? Empathetic or pushy? Relevant or clueless?

In spite of the "build it and they will come" website
mentality, and the emerging "grab them where they are"
wireless mentality, the selling process (or, more
accurately, the customer's buying process) always
starts with a message aimed at a potentially interested
audience--people with a need that you can fill. The
message is a promise.

Here's what's important, however: Your BRAND is the
promise that you KEEP. Not the one you MAKE (anyone can
make promises; talk is cheap).

Companies that succeed make a promise that appeals to
their customers. (How do they know? They ASK them!) And
before going public with their promise, they make sure
their "customer experience infrastructure" can keep
that promise.

I see the "customer experience infrastructure"
consisting of your people, processes, products, and
partners.

Whatever promise you make should be supportable by
these 4 P's. If it isn't--if the ball is dropped by a
surly employee, a confusing or inadequate process, a
faulty product, or a partner who hasn't been properly
prepared--then you will BREAK the promise at some point
in the interaction. You will lose the customer you paid
so dearly for.

The customer's one personal interaction with you will
be a failure. You will blow the chance you were given.
Worse, that customer will tell dozens or even hundreds
of others that you broke your promise, and will warn
them to steer clear. And they will. You'll have to do a
lot of broadcasting, groveling, and satisfying before
you can turn that burned customer around or attract any
customers who have been told to avoid you.

If you KEEP the promise you make, your customers will
be satisfied that you kept your word and produced as
promised, and they will tell others you can be trusted.
They will actually *sell* for you, in a believable,
targeted way.

Once a CEO gets this concept, it's possible to
structure the company so that it keeps the promises
that marketing makes. There's a direct,
anyone-in-the-company-can-get-it connection between
what marketing promises and what the company delivers.
The company finally moves, as a unit, in a
customer-satisfying direction. It's beautiful...and
it's profitable.

Bob, I hope this helps you. Sorry for the lengthy post.

Kristin

Kristin Zhivago kristin_at_zhivago.com
Editor, Marketing Technology
Columnist, Marketing Computers (MC) magazine
Also write for CRM and Business 2.0 magazines
President, Zhivago Marketing Partners, Inc.
381 Seaside Drive Jamestown RI 02835
tel 401-423-2400 fax 401-423-2700
http://www.zhivago.com





Received on Wed Dec 27 2000 - 11:39:02 CST