Size Up Your Brand's Health

By Kirk J. Bentham
Article published in Nov. / Dec. 2005 issue

Many people associate the term ‘branding’ with company logos and flashy advertising campaigns. But brands and branding reach far beyond such immediate representations, especially when dealing with the products from a luxury brand.

Branding is actually about the machinery behind the logo and the advertisement and how that mechanism shapes consumer perceptions of what a company is and/or what its line of products represents.

With the competition among luxury brands growing fiercer by the year, many companies are beginning to take brand issues more seriously – realising that it is through branding that they can truly differentiate themselves from their competitors. The first step is looking inward and taking stock of your company’s current brand health.

State, condition, status, position and situation are all good words to use when describing personal health. They are also appropriate to brand concerns. But before we go any further, let’s make sure we are clear about the concepts of brands and branding.

A brand is the personification or story of an organisation or its products and services. Brands are designed to build relationships and create emotional connections with customers. Mention legendary brands like Cartier, Rolex, Boucheron and Mercedes to loyal customers and they will respond like evangelists. Again, if you mention these names to members of the general public, mythic-like associations will transpire. Luxury brands are sources of penultimate promises, of lifestyles at their pinnacle. They distinguish themselves from the pedestrian products that fill our workday lives.

Branding, on the other hand, is the process of creating the identity of an organisation or its products and services. Its purpose is to develop customer relationships. A luxury brand should convey a priceless image that is enduring, and backed with a core set of values at each customer touch-point. These are the points of pre-purchase, purchase, and post-purchase.

By defining the image of your luxury brand, you can create a consensus that rings throughout your organisation. And this music will reverberate among potential customers. In other words, when you ask those who have come in contact with your brand how they would describe you, that description should be immediate, delivered without hesitation. That perception should be ingrained and inseparable from everything you do as a luxury provider.

We all know people who always look great. It’s not so much a matter of being enormously attractive, but simply being healthy. Clear glowing complexion, bright welcoming eyes, soft shiny hair, good posture and a fair disposition – all these aspects contribute to a positive demeanour. Make no mistake about it, successful luxury brands are the same.

Transfer that clear mental picture of a healthy person to the personification of your brand and see how it stacks up. Keep in mind that the brand perceptions held by you and your colleagues may not be accurate. To correctly diagnose your brand health, you need to get a second opinion, and a third, and a fourth...

So, where should you get these impartial, third-party ‘perceptions’ of your brand from? Customers are the logical place to start with and everyone knows that. We all recognise that listening to customers’ feedback is a business basic.


SURVEYING YOUR BRAND'S PULSE

BRAND IMAGE

• Are your logos, colours, font types, photography, signage, displays, packaging and staff uniforms (and anything else that bears or carries the emblem of your brand) consistent?

a) Are they old-fashioned or modern?
b) Do they capture and communicate differentiated benefits over your competitors?
c) Do they resonate with your primary customer groups?
d) Do they convey a sense of what a customer can expect from your products and services?

• How does your brand ‘sound’?

a) Do the copy, content and dialogue associated with your brand match the image that you wish to convey?
b) Are your written and spoken messages clear, concise and consistent and do they emphasise your core values?
c) Does the level of writing match the sophistication of your customers and the image of your brand?

• How do your brand’s products fit with your brand’s image?

a) Are you selling low-priced mass-market products under the flag of a fashion-
forward and style-savvy brand?

BRAND VALUE & BEHAVIOUR

• Do the people you survey have a clear understanding of what your brand’s core values and promises are?

a) In what ways does that understanding relate to such aspects as: quality, craftsmanship, honesty, service and selection?

• Are your brand’s promises being delivered on at every point of contact with your brand? This includes delivery by your people as well as your products and services.

BRAND AWARENESS

• Who is aware of your brand?

a) Where do they live?
b) What jobs do they perform?
c) What makes them unique?
d) What other products do they buy?

But when you are investigating brand health, you need to widen the range of people you get feedback from. Try to include a cross-section of those in regular contact with your brand. This includes suppliers, competitors and the media you advertise with. Their perception of your brand determines your marketplace position and your brand equity.

Let us also not forget some of the most important people in your brand’s life – your employees. For in many ways, they are the ones truly in control of creating the perceptions of your luxury brand. How they see their company’s brand directly affects all those they are in contact with. It is, therefore, more important than ever to make sure that they not only understand the image, message and values of your brand, but that they communicate it and deliver it.

Every employee in the company has the opportunity to give his impressions or story of what your brand stands for – consciously and unconsciously. It could be over a casual discussion at lunch with colleagues or family, during an introduction or while making contact with outside parties related to your business. Luxury brands, especially, thrive on what is said and left unsaid, what is revealed and left hidden, and what is perceived, and left to the imagination. Pulling that all together is no easy task.

There are three fundamental management issues that you should take note of when assessing your brand’s health:

1. Brand Leadership – this is about assessing who takes ownership of your brand issues. Many companies see branding as strictly a marketing issue and fail to place it at the top of the organisation chart. And when it comes to issues of luxury branding, it has to come from the top. Marketing people can create the concept of a brand image, but if the brand story is not controlled and passed down from the very top level, it would not have much chance of permeating the entire company. And if that luxury brand perception does not hold water down through the ranks, how will it ever leave the building?

2. Brand Strategy – do you have one and is it current? Your brand strategy should not only be an integral part of your sales and marketing plan but also part of your human resources, product development, and customer service strategies. Brand strategies help provide focus and priorities for defining objectives. They do this by putting a face, appearance, character, and personality on your company or its products. And for the luxury brand, these strategies must always capture the greatest luxury of all: Time. The time it takes to create and craft your product; and the time it takes for your customers to be able to afford your luxury item, enjoy it and make it a part of their lives.

3. Brand Management – who is managing and controlling your brand? Are there policies and procedures in place to keep your brand and its image protected and upheld? If the answer is no, then it is time to get straight into the brand health check up and create a system to address these issues.

Once you have addressed these three issues, you can put your brand under the microscope and start assessing its condition by surveying the essential target groups mentioned earlier for feedback.

At the top of this page is a brand health survey questionnaire for you and others to complete. The results can be an eye-opening experience and it is imperative for you to remain impartial when answering the questions.

After completing this brand health check up, a clear vision of how your brand is perceived should begin to come into focus, across the wide cross-section of people associated with it. From there, assessing brand health and prescribing treatment is actually a logical process. And just like your own personal health, it is not difficult to see what areas are in need of repair or maintenance, or to find specialists to help you correct any deficiencies.

The key is to never stop asking the questions that need to be asked, and to never stop undertaking the hard task of answering them. Achieving luxury never comes easy. P