How important is your company brand? More than you may realize.
“A brand is a shortcut,” explained Steve McKee, author of Power Branding: Leveraging the Success of the World’s Best Brands. When a consumer is faced with a purchase occasion, there’s immediate uncertainty. Who do I call? Who’s going to best meet my needs? This uncertainty carries risk; the wrong decision can cost the consumer time and money.
A strong brand helps reduce this uncertainty. In his book, McKee shared how he chose a new TV. He narrowed down the many, many choices at the big-box store to two with near-identical features and prices. One was made by Toshiba; the other by Dynex. He’d never heard of Dynex, so he bought the Toshiba, a brand he knew and respected.
A powerful brand “makes the consumer decision quicker, easier and more comfort-ing,” McKee said. “Smart brands understand consumers need short cuts. They need trust.”
BUILD TRUST. Some ways of building trust are never changing and some are constantly changing. “Being on time and keeping your word will never change, but Twitter is new,” said McKee.
Before you invest in advertising, social media and slick graphics, “get the basics right,” he said.
Your brand is the “sum and substance of everything you do,” so make sure your trucks, uniforms, employee grooming and demeanor and company forms contribute to a positive reputation. “I think the non-advertising aspect of branding is greatly underappreciated,” said McKee.
Still, it’s “not enough to just do the basics because there are competitors out there who are doing both,” he said. Sports is a great analogy: You have to do the basic blocking and tackling to compete, but if you’re only doing blocking and tackling, the team with the inventive game plan will beat you.
FOSTER AFFECTION. Power brands elevate the game to an emotional level. “Research shows that likability is the single biggest predictor of purchase,” said McKee. “We do business with people who we like; we do business with brands that we like.” Assuming you trust a person or business, you like those who make you laugh, who understand you, who make you cry (in the right way), or have interesting insights.
“Empathy, responsiveness, understanding, all go a long, long way” when a frantic homeowner calls with a pest problem, said McKee. Brands that understand this — and take steps to listen, accommodate needs and lessen customer distress — can set themselves apart from competitors. That’s an important message for pest management professionals.
STAND APART. Some companies use emotion to differentiate their brands. Coke builds its brand on the idea of happiness; Pepsi differentiates itself as the young, fresh choice of a new generation.
“There’s always room” to individualize your brand emotionally, especially if you have strong competitors with similar products, services and prices, said McKee. You can be the responsive brand, insightful brand or funny brand. Even within categories, there’s room to differentiate. “There’s a big difference between Jerry Seinfeld and Chris Rock.” Both are comedians but they appeal to different kinds of people, he said.
To differentiate by service attributes, McKee suggested exploring the five Ss — someone, somewhere, sometime, something and somehow — to identify new niches.
An exercise for a national oil change company identified a possible new someone (who you serve): moms with small children. How might this influence waiting rooms or staff appearance, McKee asked.
Ben Franklin Plumbing in Parma, Ohio, stakes its claim on sometime: It guarantees service 24 hours a day because emergencies don’t happen at convenient times.
Somehow might be green or high-tech pest management. A somewhere strategy for a pest management company might be commercial work; maybe a certain kind of commercial work such as food-processing facilities.
The narrower your target, the greater the intensity of your brand’s appeal can be, wrote McKee. And this will help you focus limited resources. But this doesn’t mean you can’t sign up other customers. “Differentiation is based on who you’ll seek, not who you’ll take,” said McKee.
MAKE IT STICK. If you invest in brand differentiation, “make sure it’s defensible and lasting,” McKee said. “Under absolutely no circumstances should you try to differentiate based on quality, caring, service or integrity.”
Why? Good differentiation needs a legitimate opposite, he said. My company’s green; that company is not. That’s legitimate. Also, people expect you to care, deliver quality, have good service and be trustworthy. “You can’t differentiate on something that’s expected,” said McKee.
It’s also making sure employees are on board. “Your most important target audience is the people who have your brand on their business cards,” said McKee. Employees have to be believers, and the brand has to be true (it can’t be lip service to ideals that aren’t practiced at your company). “Your people are your most powerful branding asset,” said McKee. If they believe, they’ll radiate the brand.
“Managed well, the brand is the only asset a company ever owns that can appreciate forever,” McKee said. “Trucks age, people leave, patents expire, roofs leak, but a brand need not ever decline in value,” he said.
The author is a frequent editorial contributor to PCT magazine.
