The Relationship between Online Customer Reviews and Brand Equity

The Relationship between Online Customer Reviews and Brand Equity.

5 Steps for Creating Powerful Branded Service Encounters

Ratchet Up Your Organization’s Brand Value and Turn Service Into a Sustaining Competitive Advantage

Here are five best practices for creating branded service encounters.

1. Secure strong, top-down commitment.

Start by getting your marketing, operations, customer service, human resources and executive teams all on the same page. You must secure a firm commitment to pursue your initiative as an “ongoing, corporate-sanctioned and promoted program that is personally backed by your CEO or another top executive team leader.

It takes time to fully inculcate an initiative such as this into the culture so that it becomes a way of life. This is not a project or campaign. It is futile to even attempt such an undertaking without a strong commitment for adequate funding. The Zappos success story didn’t happen overnight. It required a bold commitment from Zappos’ visionary CEO, Tony Hsieh (pronounced Shay), who financed the initiative in part by forgoing short-term profits. With an eye toward building profitable growth for the future, it took guts, courage and an unwavering determination by Hsieh to see his vision come to fruition. Apparently, his patience paid off handsomely, but again, it took time. 

2. Clearly define your brand positioning.

A clearly defined brand position lays the foundation. There must be a unifying understanding about what your brand stands for beyond simply making money. This should be articulated in your brand purpose (mission) statement and expressed in simple language in a single phrase or sentence. Clarity and resonance are needed so you can turn this into your internal rallying call. A unifying view of your brand vision, core values, personality and value proposition is also needed. A one-or two-day work session conducted with your organization’s executives and key brand stakeholders (preferably by an objective and professional external facilitator) can help recalibrate your brand positioning (if needed) and stir the passion and emotional intensity required to launch and energize a potentially game-changing initiative such as this one.

3. Recruit the right talent. Then train, motivate and empower your frontline employees to deliver authentic branded service encounters.

Recruit the right talent that matches your brand values and personality. Then train, motivate and empower your frontline employees to internalize your brand values. Turn them into co-owners of your initiative by involving them in the process of identifying opportunities to deliver WOW service that reinforce your brand purpose, values and personality. Allow a degree of personal latitude for your employees to bring your brand to life authentically in their own manner. This is important because it ensures buy-in and prevents behavior that comes across as unfelt, robotic or insincere. Use role-play training techniques with video replay so your employees can practice and deliver these WOW service moments in a risk-free setting.   

4. Create brand alignment

Design and direct your firm’s branded service encounters in concert with your other strategic brand concept management activities, such as advertising, public relations, inbound marketing and social media engagement.

5. Measure the outcomes

Measure pre- and post-implementation performance and use mystery shopping to periodically observe employee’s interactive behaviors with customers.

One of my earlier career stops included serving as marketing director for a national, casual-theme dinnerhouse restaurant chain. I had the privilege during my tenure there to oversee development of a pilot program for a similar service enhancement initiate. The test results were eye-opening. Pre- and post-implementation exit poll surveys showed that our test group significantly outperformed our control group on 32 out of 36 brand attributes. This included dimensions such as food quality and presentation, comfortable and relaxing atmosphere, and value for the money, in addition to the service-related attributes that we focused on, such as caring and attentive service, knowledge staff and makes me feel special. Just as importantly, the test group outperformed the control group in sales growth and profitability, thus providing a solid basis for healthy ROI projections. This service enhancement initiative was successfully rolled out nationwide shortly after I left to accept a position with another firm.

The two most important determinates of success that I learned from this fun and personally rewarding experience included the needs to:

• Create local-level ownership – Our restaurant managers and key employees participated during exploration of opportunities locally to enhance delivery of our brand promise and create WOW service moments during the guest dining experience and lifecycle stages. This not only created ownership, but it additionally provided freedom to tailor service enhancements to local markets and ultimately personalize dining experiences for each guest.
• Practice and build confidence – Role-playing rehearsals and video replay were essential because they prepared our employees to confidently deliver sincere, heart-felt moments that made guests feel welcome, appreciated and special. Our employees were also divided into role-playing teams and this additionally engendered a spirit of camaraderie and fun competition.

Make Customer Loyalty Building a Strategic Imperative in 2012

A loyal customer base is one of the most valuable assets a company can own. Top global brands like Coca-Cola, IBM, GE, Apple and Disney all command exceptional brand loyalty. But, small to mid-size companies can also reap the rewards of successful loyalty building efforts.

Image via Wikipedia

So, today we’ll tackle the third pillar: maximizing the long-term value of your customer base by focusing on building brand loyalty. This is a continuation of our series on The Three Pillars of Marketing that I introduced as a framework for driving long-term profitable growth in one of my earlier articles.

However, before we begin, I must admit that it is certainly more difficult to attain brand loyalty these days due to democratized knowledge and the burgeoning number of choices now available to consumers. In fact, the trade media is full of predictions about the inevitable death of brand loyalty. Increased consumer sophistication, the convergence of quality across price points and the enablement of comparison shopping via the Web and mobile devices are often cited as the culprits. I would argue, on the contrary, that it is even more critical now than ever before to make loyalty building one of your company’s top strategic imperatives.

Why? Simply put, your image and reputation are only as good as your customer’s last experience with your brand. With so many competitive alternatives now available, customers have become less forgiving. Not only must you consistently deliver your brand promise, but you must also find creative ways to raise the bar. Good is no longer good enough. You must continually amaze your customers by pleasantly surprising them in unexpected ways to keep their abiding loyalty.

Credit: Welly-Mulia.com

This requires both the left and right sides of the brain. Your strategy should focus on maximizing the value of your target customers based on where they are at in the buying cycle. Use the latest advancements in technology to fuel your creativity through real-time reactivity and channel interactivity to dazzle your customers and enrich their buying experiences.

Your business strategy should involve your organization’s client-facing departments and enable your people, processes and technology to work together in unison. Access to customer data — including purchase history, personal information and channel preferences – is a crucial part. Technology should serve as the backbone of your strategy for organizing, synchronizing business processes (principally sales, marketing and customer service), and automating customer communication activities.

Your discovery process and loyalty-building strategy should include the following important elements:

• Identification of the gaps in your company’s overall customer experience
• The ability to embed and leverage customer insights across the enterprise
• Alignment of your intended customer experiences with your company’s brand values, points of differentiation and value proposition
• The ability to bring clarity to customer behavior and preferences through data analytics and accurate measurement of marketing vehicles, service levels, customer experiences and social engagement
• Enablement of technology platforms and applications to support the overall customer development process
• The creation of unique and memorable customer experiences that increase relevance and enrich brand engagement – Examples of innovative digital tactics that could be employed to do this end include privileged connections, exclusive content and services, customer support communities, branded content sharing, and customer participation in co-creation and beta testing of new solutions

At the end of the day, a well executed brand loyalty building strategy can have a dramatic impact on your company’s long-term financial success. Some of the key benefits include: reduced cost/response by making relevant offers to your customers; increased share of wallet; and maximized lifetime value of your best customers.

I welcome your comments and opinions. Do you agree that brand loyalty is not a dying concept and that it is still a key driver of business success? What other creative ideas have you seen used by companies to create engaging customer experiences and build brand loyalty?