For any business, your brand should be one of your biggest assets. Your brand is the promise you make to your customers about the experience they will enjoy in all of their dealings with you.
One of the most important factors in building a strong brand, is building a great team who combine to deliver the fantastic service experience that your brand promises.
Many big businesses promote their brands across a range of media, and with bold and confident claims. As customers however, our brand experience and perception is entirely shaped by the dealings we have at local brand level. Let us explain; our perception of DHL is not shaped by their beautifully crafted advertisements, but by the service we receive from our local delivery driver who drops off our parcels. Our perception of NatWest bank is not shaped by their TV Ads and claims, but by our experience dealing with customer service in branch and over the phone.
The key behind any successful brand is their ability to keep their promises and to exceed expectations. The key to a successful brand therefore, is to ensure that every member of staff is fully on board, on brand and a real ambassador for the business.
Everybody talks about the important link between marketing and sales, but for us, the key is to get the link between HR and marketing right. Whilst it is obviously important that customers believe in your businesses brand, it is even more important that your staff all buy into the brand too – your brand vision, your core values and the unique characteristics that make your business special.
Great brands recognise this and market their message to their staff first and foremost. When this is done well, every team member becomes part of the brand and the business will flourish.
Look at the Apple brand and visit an Apple store, and you will see this in action. Every staff member is an extension of the brand, and buying an Apple product is an entirely different experience to buying other consumer electronics brands from high street retailers, who may have massive advertising budgets, but staff who simply don’t believe in, and live the brand.
Promote your brand to your staff. Share your brand vision, your core values and excite the entire team with the possibilities it presents for their careers. Only with a great team, can you have a great brand.