Gone are the days when brands could simply broadcast their messages to the masses. The power brands that broadcast without first understanding the one-to-one relationships will encounter a minefield filled with consumer voices exploding bombs of discontent filling their social networks.
At the center of the digital experience, across all industries – fueled by leaps in technology – a consumer-led disruption marshals in the age of consumer obsession. Consumer expectations are high. Technologies such as mobile devices have conditioned consumers to receive their data how, when and where they want it.
The proliferation of channels (e.g. print, web, mobile, smart TV, etc.) has shifted the already fragmented relationship between marketing and IT. Businesses wanting sustainable competitive advantages will have to understand how to use customer knowledge to build successful engagements.
So if you’re resting on the valued business model, powerful distribution channels or your supplier relationships you are fast learning that this won’t suffice.
In the age of the customer, success depends on becoming customer obsessed. Focus your strategic decisions on customer knowledge and retention. Reestablish your brand by putting your customers at the heart of everything.
What does it mean to be customer obsessed?
A customer obsessed company focuses its resources, its energy and its financial plan on methods that foster customer knowledge that informs the engagement process rather than focusing resources on maintaining traditional competitive mindsets.
Not only is there a disruptive shift in how companies build their brand messaging, but there is also a shift in how they compete for brand share. As tools for the social web continue to evolve, brands are now forced to compete in the web’s social arena.
The consumer is going to see you! And if they sense your brand is all about a single-minded, one-dimensional broadcast lacking genuine value, it won’t take much time until backlash circulates via word-of-mouth sentiment on the social web.
Key Elements to Refocusing your Brand
Define North Star
Before you can reinforce your brand across a multitude of touch points, define your brand’s North Star. This is done in seven words or less. Understand your brand’s direction by answering yes to the following questions:
- Is it honest?
- Is it transparent?
- Is it inspirational?
- Is it strategic and concise?
Define a Brand Map
Start with mapping concepts that exemplify the experience while focusing the message to draw in the audience. Keep the customer at the center of the experience. Begin by understanding your brand as the consumer sees it. Chances are very good you’ll uncover hidden opportunities.
Define the True Brand Compass
Focus on four elements, trust, relevant, unmistakable and essential, as the building blocks for the TRUE brand compass. Successful brands, mastering the empowered consumer landscape, need to define their voice by driving one if not all of these elements.
Make sure the entire company is part of the evolution of your brand’s North Star.
Bye Bye Competition
The traditional competitive approach, inherently built from the survival-of-the-fittest mentality – where competition naturally exposes the weak links, is now taking a back seat to a more cooperative mindset, with the consumer in the drivers seat. Brands are learning that a cooperative mindset will effectively fuel the backbone of their social marketing approach.
Are you ready to see Pepsi complimenting Coke on their Facebook page? Buckle up!