PDMA03 Ducks in a row mailer AW - Creativematch

Landor Associates
Branding Consultants and
Designers Worldwide
Klamath House
18 Clerkenwell Green
London EC1R 0QE
United Kingdom
Brand engagement
Getting your ducks in a row
Tel +44 (0) 20 7880 8000
Fax +44 (0) 20 7880 8001
marketing_info@uk.landor.com
“The world’s best
branding consultancy”
Global Finance, December 2002
EUROPE
Hamburg
London
Madrid
Milan
Paris
Stockholm
www.landor.com
www.research-int.com
MIDDLE EAST
Dubai
AMERICAS
Chicago
Cincinnati
Irvine
Mexico City
New York
San Francisco
São Paulo
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ASIA
Hong Kong
Jakarta
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Taipei
Tokyo

Getting your ducks in a row
We can prove that employees who are ‘on-brand’
deliver higher levels of customer satisfaction
and thus achieve superior business performance.
performance
brand
client satisfaction
Why is this the case? How do we make it happen? What does ‘on-brand’ mean?
There are six essential activities:
If it quacks like a duck…
Today’s economy is characterised by product commoditisation and customer
disloyalty. The most successful companies are transforming into service companies,
becoming demand-led, not production-led.
Premium positioning, superior preference and enhanced loyalty can only be gained
through an advantageous reputation or image, derived through experience, not just
communications. The reality of delivery shapes brand reputation – making employee
actions and behaviours, not marketing communications, the key conduit for creating
(and delivering) uniquely relevant customer experiences and uniquely compelling
customer expectations.
Employees are responsible for meeting business goals not by ‘doing my job, my way,’
but by recognising that their job is to satisfy and delight customers – in a manner
which is unique to their organisation. An indistinct reputation is no reputation.
And we know there is a link between on-brand behaviours and business
performance. Our sister company Research International has a methodology that
proves a direct correlation between a unit’s performance, levels of customer
satisfaction and its institutionalisation of ‘on-brand’ behaviour.
But we’re human beings,
not damn ducks
Employee attitude assessment – benchmark study
Cascade/Champion network – leverage internal resources to make it stick
Communications materials – articulate the vision and values
Brand into action workshops – involve employees in determining
their own on-brand behaviours
Celebration and reward – showcase and reward best practice
Measurement and monitoring – internal and external metrics
We can map and measure the relationship between ‘our values’ and customer
satisfaction – the link is our behaviour. We can all agree that it makes sense to
adapt personal behaviours to meet customer demands. It’s better to greet an irate
customer with calm efficiency than with anger. We can further agree that the
process of engaging employees in customer-orientated behaviours needs to be
interactive – bought into, not beaten into.
But the tricky bit is agreeing how you join up three potentially conflicting agendas –
my personality, my customer’s needs and our brand values. How can you reconcile
brand differentiation with customer relevance and an employee’s individuality?
Plan it, don’t wing it
Brand Engagement is the process of bringing the organisation, its policies, processes
and people into alignment with brand values, so that they are geared around
meeting customer needs.
This is not shallow internal marketing, nor dry process re-engineering. It is a
communications-led commitment to establish ways of working which deliver
customer value and enrich brand reputation. It is a means by which differentiated
behaviour is understood, welcomed and acted out as ‘the way we work around here.’
The process is designed to manage change by building awareness, understanding
and acceptance, and then reinforcing and sustaining it over time.
A four-phase process – Prepare, Launch, Internalise and Reinforce – takes an
organisation through this change cycle.
The answer is in the shift from first person singular to first person plural. We are
all – like ducks – social animals. Our needs include the desire to be part of and take
pride in communities, to join energies with like-minded others, to gather around
shared principles and co-create distinctive cultures.
We’re not asking people to subvert their personalities to the ‘brand’ and we’re
not asking people to hymn the corporate song or slavishly recite a mantra. We
are inviting people to appreciate that being part of something bigger is inspiring,
not intimidating, and that differentiation is crucial, not cosmetic.
Ducks learn through ‘imprinting’ – automatically lining up with their cohorts.
Employees are less ‘ducktile’, but can, should and must learn to appreciate how
their collective behaviours make a telling impression upon customers.
For most people, change of almost any type, not just branding programmes,
will typically meet resistance. Employees must buy into their brand through
individualised communications which make the issues relevant to them and actively
solicit their feedback and involvement. Ultimately change must be institutionalised:
behaviours must be mapped out, monitored and measured, requiring revision to job
profiles, working procedures and protocols.