Can your Brand walk the talk?
With consumers getting more demanding by the day and brands battling fierce competition for a place in the sun, shouldn’t we, as marketers, get our priorities straight?
I just finished attending a Marketing and Management Summit whose main theme was “Convergence”. There were amazing keynote speakers that combined years of “hands-on” experience with scientific knowledge and research in what proved to be an amazing space for self-evaluation and calibrating priorities.
It was a space to pause from our day-to-day rush and think about what is happening within the marketing and management landscape. There were some amazing examples of disruptive companies that defied the status quo and others of established companies that knew how to reinvent themselves to compete in an omnichannel world.
During the event, there was one question that loomed through my mind: what was the common link between the successful companies? Independently of the companies discussed by the keynote speakers being part of a giant conglomerate or being an innovative digital native brand that disrupted the status quo, the single most important factor was that they have all kept their promises.
Yeah, I know. Thank you, Captain Obvious! But if you think about it, it was never more difficult to stand out from the competition than right now, as every consumer has an ever-growing list of demands and requirements. If you add an overcrowded marketplace that relies on an always-on media assault to the equation, the task starts to get really difficult, really fast. Now imagine facing an audience that is increasingly doubtful of brand-consumer interactions and promises due to failures like the Fyre Festival, or undisclosed partnerships such as the Missguided and Kim Kardashian debate.
On these recently surfaced cases, and on others that were on the limelight long before, the problem lied on hidden agendas, exaggerated promises and overblown experiences from the brand side that failed to match the actual perceived value that was promised. These examples show that the margin for error is shrinking by the day, if you are a marketer, as any misstep will become viral and generate a considerable wave of discomfort and disbelief in the brand’s legacy. Actually, you can count by the fingers in your hand the number of failed campaigns that have quietly sailed away in the horizon without having their time under the spotlight.
So, what can we do to adapt to this new reality? To put it simply and excluding from this analysis companies that compete through price, I think it will come down to two factors: the ability to keep your promises and the degree to which you can bring consumers to your brand’s world.
It all has to start by delivering what was promised. As I was stating earlier, all the successful companies, big or small, are able to keep the promises they make. By now, it should be undisputed that people want to buy from someone they trust, hence, they value honest, authentic and credible brands. Think about the interest that organic groceries or fair-trade products are getting in the last few years and Dove’s Real Beauty movement.
To successfully compete in an omnichannel world, you have to provide seamless integration between your online and offline channels, a hassle-free purchasing process and an engaging communication and marketing strategy. These factors have been lynchpins in the marketing discussion circles for a while now and have been adopted by most of the companies and, hence, they are not exactly big news. What I really think that can move the needle is the ability to augment your brand and bring its vision to life like Brewdog, a digital native brewery, did with their newly-built Doghouse Hotel in Columbus, Ohio. Despite the example, you don’t need to build a new company or brand to do so as Jack Daniels, the legendary Tennessee Whiskey manufacturer, proved with their Lynchburg General Store tour across the United States. M&M’s has been doing that in the heart of London, right in Leicester Square, for years.
Obviously, there are no magic formulas that will solve the problems that struggling brands are facing. Nevertheless, I think that defining the strategy in order to prioritize these two topics would come a long way towards positioning your brand to compete with any opposition in the future.
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