Corporate Brand

Branding is one of the most important aspects of any business, large or small, retail or service. An effective brand strategy gives you a major edge in increasingly competitive markets. But what exactly does ‘branding’ mean? How does it affect a business?

Simply put, your brand is your promise to your customer. It tells them what they can expect from your products and services, and it differentiates your offering from your competitors'. Your brand is derived from who you are, who you want to be and who people perceive you to be.

Branding in the classic sense is all about creating unique identities and positions for products and services, hence distinguishing the offerings from competitors. A brand promises a result and experience you can count on. Most people understand and accept that companies and products have brands and images, which become part of the mental picture in their clients’ minds. Additionally, individuals in certain professions develop brands (i.e. surgeons, attorneys, authors, sales professionals) and have built client bases around them.

A strong corporate branding strategy can add significant value in terms of helping the entire corporation and the management team to implement the long-term vision, create unique positions in the market place of the company and its brands and not the least to unlock the leadership potential within the organisation.

Corporate Brand is made up of the combination of the thoughts, feelings, beliefs, opinions, and visions people have about you, your products and services or your company.

It is what others think and feel about your business, not what you think or what your sales literature and sales staff say. Your image might precede your actual contact with a prospect, but it will certainly follow all customer contacts and set the stage for future interactions.

Consequently, even the smallest of companies should be aware of and do whatever is proper, to promote its image.

Your brand strategy is how, what, where, when and to whom you plan to communicate and delivering on your brand messages. Where you advertise, is part of your brand strategy. How you speak of your company processes and what you communicate visually and verbally are part of your brand strategy, too.

Consistent, strategic branding leads to a strong brand equity, which means the added value brought to your company's products or services that allows you to charge more for your brand than what identical, unbranded products command. The most obvious example of this is Coca-Cola vs. a generic soda. Because Coca-Cola has built powerful brand equity, it can charge more for its product- and customers will pay that higher price.

Identity Through Tangibles

A corporate branding strategy creates simplicity; it is the ultimate identifier of the corporation.

The image reflected by the ‘company’s personality’ will make the company identifiable and different from the rest and it will determine its importance in the business world.

Identity Through Employees ‘Living’ The Brand

No matter what your product or service, your employees are the most powerful representation of your brand.

We have all dealt with the customer service representative that either builds loyalty or breaks it based on our experience. And while new customers were once thought of as the lifeblood of successful companies, current customers and customer loyalty has become more valuable than ever.

Employees are the marketers of your company as well as your brand ambassadors. In addition, engaged employees are going to be your best advocates for acquiring and retaining customers.

Engaged employees are concerned with producing quality work and believe that she or he has a stake in the organisation. This sense of ownership is more valuable than stock options, and results in the best brand ambassadors any company could have. These employees may not be able to articulate marketing slogans, but they speak from their hearts about the company and its products and services.

Connect with Your Customer

Defining a brand involves emphasising its key benefits and attributes for consumers. To do so, marketers must recognise that a brand consists of more than a bundle of tangible, functional attributes; its intangible, emotional benefits, along with its ‘identity', frequently serve as the basis for long-term competitive differentiation and sustained loyalty.

Coca-Cola, for example, is a powerful global brand not just because the beverage comes in a familiar red can and customers like the taste but also because it conveys an image as an optimistic, American product.

Marketers could promote many tangible and intangible brand attributes, but the goal is to uncover the relevance of each to consumers and the degree to which it helps distinguish the brand from those of competitors.

As such an analysis often shows, certain features may differentiate a brand from its competitors, but do not matter to customers. These attributes are the fool’s gold of branding.

Some attributes, however, are important even though customers expect them from any competitor. We call them ‘antes’, after the small payments poker players make to receive cards from the dealer. In the hotel industry, for example, Holiday Inn Express seeks to provide clean, fresh, comfortable facilities and Four Seasons Hotels and Resorts tries to offer all the business services its customers might need.

These antes are not the centrepiece of either brand, because they do not distinguish the players from other competitors. Nonetheless, such basic brand benefits cannot be ignored. A value establishment will not last long if it offers dirty rooms or uncomfortable beds, nor would a luxury business hotel’s brand remain credible without fax and Internet facilities.

The most successful brands emphasise features that are both important to consumers and quite differentiated from those of competitors. We refer to these features as brand drivers. Holiday Inn Express hopes to distinguish itself by providing customers with the emotional benefit of feeling like ‘a smarter business traveller’ and tries to convey a brand personality that is ‘fun’, even a bit ‘wacky’.

For the road warrior whose expense limit has been cut, an opportunity to be ‘smarter’ and ‘fun’, not just cheaper, is attractive. Further, up the price scale, Westin Hotels & Resorts is trying to differentiate itself from Hilton, Marriott, and Sheraton by claiming to offer ‘serenity and efficiency’. Among higher-end customers, the Four Seasons seek to distinguish itself by providing what it calls an ‘escape from the ordinary’ and a personality of ‘calm sophistication’.

Build Your Network – It Is Your Sales Lifeline

Your network includes business colleagues, professional acquaintances, prospective and existing customers, partners, suppliers, contractors, and association members, as well as family, friends, and people you meet at school, church and in your community. Contacts are potential customers waiting for you to connect with their needs. How do you turn networks of contacts into customers? Not by hoping, they will remember meeting you six months ago at that networking event. Networking is a long-term investment. Do it right by adding value to the relationship, and that contact you just made can really pay off. Communicate as if your business's life depends on it.

Develop Relationships with Your Customers

Customers are people, not numbers, and it is important that you put consideration and effort into building personal relationships with them. For example, when you send out Christmas cards each year, you not only gain customer loyalty, but you also inspire customers to promote your business to the people they know.

Encourage Customers to Talk About Their Experience Using Your Business

There is no tool more powerful than people talking with their family members or friends about your product or the quality of your work. If your customers are satisfied, then you should ask them to refer you or your product to their family or friends. It is important to realise that your customers may not do so automatically and sometime a little poke requesting them to refer your business may work wonders. Go ahead, be bold and ask for more work.

E-Mail Marketing Keeps Relationships Strong on A Shoestring Budget

Build your reputation as an expert by giving away some free insight. You have interesting things to say! An effortless way to communicate is with a brief e-mail newsletter that shows prospects why they should buy from you.

You can distribute an e-mail newsletter very cheaply that includes tips, advice and short items that entice consumers and leave them wanting more. E-mail marketing is a cost-effective and effortless way to stay on customers' minds, build their confidence in your expertise, and retain them. In addition, it is viral: Contacts and customers who find what you do interesting or valuable will forward your e-mail message or newsletter to other people, just like word of mouth marketing.

Go the Extra Mile

As you grow your business and your client relationships, there will be times that you will have to decide on when to adjust or expand your core offerings to cater to the needs of a client. The benefits of offering customised solutions are two-fold:

• Clients remember the times you came through for them and
• It may open added revenue streams and new product offerings you had not previously considered. A word of caution, though – if you are making a significant departure from your core offerings, ensure you are compensated.